What is Assessment?

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Assessment is more than simply giving students a grade or checking whether they have achieved the intended learning outcomes. It is about gathering and interpreting evidence of learning to understand what students know, what they can do, and how they are progressing. It involves making informed judgements about achievement, but it also shapes learning itself: the tasks students complete, the feedback they receive, and opportunities for reflection influence how they learn and develop over time.

So, assessment serves different purposes. It provides evidence that students have achieved the required standards, giving confidence that a qualification represents meaningful and credible achievement. At the same time, it supports learning by helping students recognise strengths, identify areas for improvement, and develop the knowledge, skills, and confidence needed for future study, work, and lifelong learning.

A major challenge for assessment practice is that assessment always does double duty: it needs to fulfil multiple functions (...) assessment needs to provide a fair appraisal of current achievement whilst at the same time contributing to ongoing development of the individual being assessed (Carless, 2020).

We think that this quote, from David Carless, highlights a useful way of answering the question 'What is Assessment?'. Rather than seeing assessment simply as a mechanism for measuring achievement, it positions assessment as a practice with multiple, interconnected purposes. Good assessment needs to do more than measure achievement. It should provide trustworthy evidence of learning while also helping students grow, reflect, and become more independent learners. These different purposes are often described through three complementary perspectives: 'assessment of learning', 'assessment for learning', and 'assessment as learning'.

Assessment Of, For, and AS Learning

The triad of assessment Of, For, and As learning provides a useful framework for understanding the different purposes assessment can serve. It helps us recognise that assessment is not only about measuring what students have learned, but also about supporting learning as it happens and developing students’ ability to take ownership of their own learning. Taken together, these approaches are based on the understanding that assessment serves both to evaluate learning and to actively support its ongoing development.

When designing assessments, decisions about the type, timing, and purpose of assessment activities are often guided by considering what we want assessment to achieve. Assessment of learning focuses on judging and validating achievement against intended learning outcomes; assessment for learning uses feedback and opportunities for practice to support improvement; and assessment as learning encourages students to reflect, evaluate their own progress, and develop the ability to make informed judgements about the quality of their work.

In practice, effective assessment design usually involves a thoughtful combination of all three purposes, with the balance depending on the needs of learners, the discipline, and the stage of a programme. Together, these perspectives help ensure that assessment is both rigorous and meaningful, providing credible evidence of achievement while also contributing to students’ ongoing development as confident, independent learners.

Expand the headings below to learn more about Assessment of Learning, Assessment for Learning, and Assessment as Learning, and reflect on how they may apply to your practice.

Assessment of learning aims to determine the extent to which students have achieved the intended learning outcomes at the end of a lesson, unit, or course, and is most commonly enacted through summative assessment. Crucially, assessment of learning serves a valuable purpose, particularly where programmes must provide credible evidence that graduates have achieved the intended learning outcomes and possess the knowledge, skills, and competencies required for professional or academic progression.

However, integrating assessment ‘for’ and ‘as’ learning where appropriate enables assessment to extend beyond certification by supporting ongoing learner development and encouraging participants to actively engage in and regulate their own learning during and beyond the course. A balanced approach recognises that assessment of, for, and as learning each serve distinct but complementary purposes, and should be thoughtfully integrated across a programme to best support both achievement and lifelong learning.

Assessment OF Learning (Typically Summative) - Key Characteristics

Reflection

Take a moment to reflect on your current assessment practices and the messages they communicate to students about what matters in learning. Consider the following questions:

What proportion of your current assessment is assessment of learning?
How do your assessments shape what students focus on, value, and invest effort in?
How do your assessments balance the need to certify learning with the need to support learning and development?

While assessment of learning provides valuable evidence of what students have achieved, assessment can also serve a broader purpose: supporting students’ learning as it develops. Although these purposes are often discussed separately, they are not entirely distinct in practice. The same assessment activity may generate evidence of achievement while also providing opportunities for feedback, reflection, and improvement.

Assessment for learning is any assessment for which the first priority in its design and practice is to serve the purpose of promoting students’ learning. It thus differs from assessment designed primarily to serve the purposes of accountability, or of ranking, or of certifying competence (Black et al, 2004).

This definition highlights a fundamental shift in how assessment can be understood: assessment is not only a means of judging what students have learned but can also be a tool for actively supporting learning as it develops. The defining feature of assessment for learning is therefore not the method of assessment itself, but the purpose it serves.

If an assessment is designed primarily to help students learn, improve, and make progress, it can be understood as assessment for learning. Rather than being used solely to generate grades, certify achievement of learning outcomes, or rank students, these assessments provide formative information and feedback that students can use to reflect on their learning, identify areas for improvement, and set future learning goals. Assessment for learning also provides instructors with insights into students’ developing understanding, enabling them to adapt their teaching approaches to better respond to learners’ needs. Unlike assessment of learning, which typically occurs at the end of a learning period, assessment for learning is embedded throughout the learning process.

* A Note on Terminology: Advocates for Assessment for learning will often use the term 'feedforward' instead of 'feedback' to denote a focus on providing guidance that informs and improves future learning, rather than simply evaluating past performance.

Assessment FOR Learning (Typically Formative) - Key Characteristics

Reflection

Take a moment to reflect on how your current assessment practices support students’ learning as it develops. Consider how assessment information is used by both students and educators to guide improvement and shape future learning. Consider the following questions:

How much of your current assessment provides opportunities for students to receive, interpret, and act on feedback during the learning process?
How do your assessments help students recognise where they are in their learning, where they need to improve, and what steps they can take next?
How do your assessments provide you with insights into students’ understanding and enable you to adapt your teaching to better support their learning? *

* Important to note: Assessment for learning is not only about supporting students; it also provides instructors with insights they can use to adapt and improve their teaching.

Having explored how assessment can measure learning (assessment of learning) and support learning (assessment for learning), we now turn to a third perspective: assessment as learning. This approach places students at the centre of the assessment process, encouraging them to reflect on their understanding, monitor their progress, and make informed decisions about their next steps. Assessment becomes not only something done to learners or for learners, but a process in which learners actively participate in evaluating and shaping their own learning, or something they actively ‘do’ themselves.

Assessment as Learning is the ultimate goal, where students are their own best assessors. At some point, students will need to be self-motivating and able to bring their talents and knowledge to bear on the decisions and problems that make up their lives. They can’t just wait for the teacher (…) to tell them whether or not the answer is “right.” (Earle, L, 2003).

One might say that assessment ‘as’ learning is a form of assessment ‘for’ learning, but just with a different emphasis. Both are concerned with improving learning rather than simply measuring it, but they differ in who is primarily using the assessment information and what capacity the assessment is intended to develop. Rather than focusing primarily on how assessment information can be used by educators to support improvement, assessment as learning emphasises developing learners’ capacity to evaluate their own progress, monitor their understanding, and regulate their own learning.

Although both approaches support learning, they do so in different ways. The table below highlights the key differences between assessment for learning and assessment as learning.

In practice, the term ‘assessment as learning’ can be used to signify any assessment in which priority is given to learners:

Self-assessing
Setting their own goals and monitoring their own progress towards them
Judging the quality of their own work using criteria they understand (evaluative judgement)
Validating and questioning their own thinking
Practicing, refining, and evaluating their own approaches so as to become confident, competent self-assessors
Engaging in 'metacognitive' practices, i.e. 'thinking about their own thinking' and learning, so that they can be aware of, reflect on, and manage how they learn,

Adapted from Earl and Katz (2006, 43).

Key Concepts Associated with Assessment AS Learning

Assessment as learning is underpinned by concepts that support learners in developing agency, judgement, and confidence. These emphasise a shift from teacher-controlled evaluation towards students actively understanding quality, monitoring their progress, and making informed decisions about improvement. The table below outlines key terms associated with assessment as learning and how they contribute to developing self-directed, lifelong learners.

Self-Assessment	Learners judge the quality of their own work and evaluate their own learning.	Self-directed Learning	Learners are comfortable taking the initiative to plan, carry out, and evaluate their own learning, making their own decisions about how to approach assessment tasks and assessing their own progress.
Self-regulation	Learners take control of their own learning by setting goals, planning and monitoring their own progress, and not (over)relying on their instructor.	'Learning how to learn'	Learning how to understand and manage your own strategies (including metacognitive skills) for learning effectively.
Metacognition	Learners reflect critically on how they learn and solve problems, and on what they can do to improve.	Evaluative Judgement	The ability to evaluate the quality of your own work, and that of others, against agreed standards.
Learner Self-Efficacy	Learners develop a belief in their ability to succeed in learning, developing, making decisions about assessment, and achieving learning outcomes independently.	Assessment Literacy	Understanding how assessment works, how to approach it effectively, and how to interpret and act on feedback.

Assessment AS Learning (Typically Formative) - Key Characteristics

Reflection

Take a moment to reflect on how your current assessment practices support students in becoming active participants in their own learning. Consider how your assessments develop students’ ability to reflect, monitor their progress, and make informed decisions about how to improve. Consider the following questions:

How much of your current assessment encourages students to reflect on and evaluate their own learning?
How do your assessments help students develop the ability to recognise quality, judge their progress, and identify their own next steps?
How do your assessments support students to take greater ownership and responsibility for their learning?

To conclude, identify one existing assessment activity that you could adapt, even in a small way, to encourage students to become more active participants in monitoring and shaping their own learning.

Looking to explore these concepts in greater depth?

The National Forum for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education provides an excellent overview of assessment of, for, and as learning. The Forum, operating under the auspices of the Higher Education Authority, leads and supports the enhancement of teaching, learning, and assessment across Irish higher education.

Assessment OF/FOR/AS Learning was the Forum's national enhancement theme from 2016 to 2018. This work led to the development of a shared national understanding of assessment, a set of principles to underpin assessment practice in Irish higher education, and a range of practical resources to support educators in implementing these approaches.