Revisiting “Inside the Black Box”

During a discussion at a professional development session earlier in the week the

question of the difference between being “diagnostic in your practice” and the “practice of formative assessing” came up.  When I reference “being diagnostic”, in my mind, it is not the same as giving a diagnostic assessment. The latter references a pre-assessment designed to determine where a student’s understanding about a topic is prior to introducing that topic, whereas the former is more of an “in the moment” informal assessment focused on a specific set of skills a student appears to be lacking,  is designed to try to gain an understanding of the student’s thinking, and ultimately determines the next best situation to put the student in based on that diagnosis so the student can build on current understanding.  Being diagnostic in your practice is also not necessarily the same as using formative assessments in class and that is where I was originally going with this post, but I am going to hold off on that thought until a later time because I got side tracked on the purpose of formative assessments when I revisited a Phi Delta Kappan article from 1998 titled “Inside the Black Box: Raising Standards Through Classroom Assessments” by Paul Black and Dylan Wiliam.  I suspect many of you have read or at least have heard of  “Inside the Black Box”, but when I began to re-read the article I honestly think we have gotten away from the authors’ original intent when it comes to formative assessments and thus the detour and encouragement for all of us to re-visit the article.  

As a reminder, Wiliam and Black point out, “A focus on standards and accountability that ignores the process of teaching and learning in the classroom will not provided the direction teachers need in their quest to improve (Black & Wiliam, 1998, p. 1).  In other words, educators need to focus on not what goes in or comes out of the mysterious “black box” of schooling, but what is taking place within the black box by focusing on practices within the classroom everyday.  Hence the term formative assessment or assessment “for” learning versus summative assessments or assessments “of” learning.  However, where I think we have diverged from the authors’ original intent is in the definition of learning.  In our rush for improvement and pressure from outside of the black box we, as educators, have tended to look at student learning to be equivalent to students gaining knowledge of a topic versus our young people understanding a topic.  Gaining knowledge of a topic ends up being much more shallow, yet can be measured and taught much more easily.  Determining if a student knows certain facts about a topic can be checked formatively and can be addressed quickly by telling them what they need to know and then formatively checked again.  In the end, we assessed for what we wanted the students to learn (a.k.a. the facts), but we didn’t assess for understanding.  “If the teacher assumes that knowledge is to be transmitted and learned, that understanding will develop later, and that clarity of exposition accompanied by rewards for patient reception are the essentials of good teaching, then formative assessments is hardly necessary” (Black & Wiliam, 1998,  p.9).  A curriculum transfer model for schools (see “Guilty as Charged!”) is not what Black and Wiliam had in mind when discussing the positive impact of formative assessments.  In order to improve formative assessments they suggest “concentrating on several essential elements:  the quality of teacher/pupil interactions, the stimulus and help for pupils to take active responsibility for their own learning, the particular help needed to move pupils out of the trap of ‘low achievement’, and the development of the habits necessary for all students to become lifelong learners” (Black & Wiliam, 1998, p.9).  They also warn us of the dangers of focusing on external test as “they can lead teachers to act against their own better judgement about the best ways to develop the learning of their pupils” (Black & Wiliam, 1998, p.11) and emphasize “delivery and coverage with poor understanding are pointless and can even be harmful” (Black & Wiliam, 1998, p.8).  These suggestions and warnings should cause us to pause and reflect on the practices taking place in our own classrooms.

How often do we find ourselves rushing through the content in order to get to everything that needs to be covered before “the Test”?  Can we verbalize  where each of our students understanding of a topic or skill level lies?  Do we set aside time for our students to make their own connections based on  their current level of understanding?  Is our school culture focused on nurturing our students roots? (See Instructional Leader = Questioner not Expert).  I am not pointing fingers, I am asking these questions to myself as well and that is why I feel we have gotten away from the message found within “Inside the Black Box”.  However, I think  we must still ask the questions to ourselves.  Black & Wiliam emphasized that “this process will inevitably be a slow one...if the substantial rewards promised by the evidence are to be secured, each teacher must find his or her own ways of incorporating the lessons and ideas... (from formative assessments)... into his or her own patterns of classroom work.  Even with optimum training and support, such a process will take time” (Black & Wiliam, 1998, p. 11).  As mentioned, “Inside the Black Box” was published 20 years ago this October and therefore much time has passed, but if we are optimizing on the wrong definition of learning then the amount of time won’t matter.  That is why I think it is important to focus on Black & Wiliam’s definition of formative assessments and to confront the question they pose to each of us, “Do I really know enough about the understanding of my pupils to be able to help each of them?” (Black & Wiliam, 1998, p.8).