This month’s Teacher’s Corner focuses on making and designing meaningful assessments to use in the English language classroom. We will begin the month by examining what makes a meaningful assessment and then offer a series of assessment ideas that you can use and adapt to fit the needs of you and your students.

In this week’s Teacher’s Corner, we show you an easy way to check in on your students’ learning and progress. Using “exit tickets” is a way to ask students to recall what they’ve learned. In order to exit class, they must turn in a ticket with their responses. You can then take a few minutes to see what went well and what needs review in the next class. It’s a simple, easy way to check their progress. In fact, this technique is so easy that you should try it in your next class.

Diagnostic testing helps teachers address the needs of all students, those successful and struggling. When teachers know about the individual needs of their learners, they can tailor extra work and attention, through differentiated instruction to meet those individual needs.

Learners are powerful allies in the assessment process. If adequately trained and guided, learners can add beneficial and relevant information about their language learning to support the observations and findings of teachers. In this week’s Teacher’s Corner, we will look at the role students play in assessment through assessment creation and self-reflection.

In this week’s Teacher’s Corner, we examine the value of peer assessments in the English language classroom and offer several ways for teachers to use peer assessments in the classroom regardless of content or skill.