Formative Assessment for English Language Arts: A Guide for Middle and High School Teachers 
Amy Benjamin
For English teachers in middle and high school.
139 pages
$29.95 

Benjamin presents a thorough overview of formative assessment for English. "The Foundations" part of her book contains sections on formative assessment, English Language Arts and assessment, and rubrics. Her "Applications" part contains formative assessments for reading comprehension, writing, note taking, and vocabulary. The last part of the book addresses assessment with performance tasks such as journals, projects, and longer papers.

The author gives many different detailed examples of formative assessments. She demonstrates how standard English activities can used in a formative manner. For example, in the Applications  section on reading comprehension, she lists ten assessments, what the teacher can find out from each, and how the teacher can respond to the student.  She covers the reading assessments of five easy questions, reading aloud, recognizing accurate paraphrase, summarizing, word discrimination, ascertain prior knowledge, quality of question, word component charts, and mini-mysteries. Likewise, in the Application section on  note taking she covers the formats of outline, chart, extended map, sentences and the Cornell Method.

Throughout, Benjamin has many peer- and self-assessments. Peers review writing drafts by selecting from a supplied list of some strong areas and some areas needing improvement in the writing. She engages students in many metacognitive exercises. In a self-assessment about their reading, students indicate which kinds of questions (literal, interpretative, analytical, or speculative) they ask. In another activity, they identify which strategies they use as they read.

Benjamin shows, through her many examples, how students can take more responsible for their own learning and their own assessment. For example, she uses a “homework miles” system in which students earn points for commendable (exemplar) work that they can cash into against homework assignments. Likewise, in the vocabulary section, she urges that students make an educated guess about a word in context and then check their guess against a dictionary or glossary definition.

She has many charts and illustrations that teachers can directly use with their students. For example, her sensory description chart guides the student through a series of questions that focus on all of the senses. Also, her vocabulary journal chart contains the target word, the student's guess, the dictionary definition, the definition in the student's own words,  a visual of the word, and complete sentence using the word.  Furthermore, she uses stories about various teachers to illustrate how the assessment works in the classroom, such as  Mrs. Greenfield and her formative assessments for vocabulary.

In addition, Benjamin provides the teacher with many valuable charts. She has a reading assessment that teachers can use to identify students who read at various rates of speed, comprehension, and vocabulary. In addition, she supplies a rubric that combines a horizontal rubric (boxes going across) with a vertical rubric (a list going down). Furthermore, she has charts that help teachers to better understand a concept such as what excellence looks like in the various categories of a writing rubric such as addressing the task, development, organization, language, and conventions.

Benjamin's book contains many visuals that illustrate the formative assessment principles.  Each of her charts focuses on a specific learning gap. She has a different proofreading guide for grammar, spelling, punctuation, and capitalization so the student reviewer can focus on a single concept at a time. Her charts are not cluttered with jargon or lengthy sentences.  In each chart, students instantly know what they are to do to help themselves or others

This author presents practical information that is based on solid educational research. She  uses a conversational style of writing to guide the reader through the many aspects of formative assessment.

Teachers of English in the middle and high school will benefit greatly from the practical nature of this book on formative assessment.

Dr. Harry Grover Tuttle focuses on assessing and improving student learning through low- and high-tech tools.

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