A learning and development assessment tool is an integral part of all the people who are concerned with the field of human resource. These are the part of tool box of all the teachers. They always need not to be complex or time consuming. However there are many things which are to be concerned with the effectiveness of the implementation of the program. First of all the most important thing is to develop the characteristics of the formative assessment program. Some of them are the quickest and the most easy to use. For effective implementation following are the things that must be kept especially in mind. They have been mentioned as follows:
- It should be goal oriented: the every step of the whole process should be goal oriented which means that there must be proper goal setting in the minds of the people who are going to implement it. They must have a clear thought process in mind and the goals set must be measurable, time specific and relevant to the overall process. There must be short term as well as long term goals so that timely achievement takes place.
- Must focus on high order thinking skills: the people who are involved in the process must possess traits of implementing things in a good manner so that they can be evaluated easily. Proper analysis should be made of the tasks they are going to perform so that there can be timely achievement of the goals.
- Accountability: there must be proper accountability on the behalf of the people who are going to perform the tasks allocated to them. There must be clear and proper authority and responsibility relationships between the people who are concerned with the performance of tasks that is the superior and the subordinates. There must be cordial relations between them and there should not be duplication of the efforts.
- A great experience: this not requires changing the daily routine fully but just to identify the unproductive things and improve them which will help to achieve the goals effectively and efficiently. There is no rocket science involved in this but what one needs is continuous improvements nothing else.
- Coordinated efforts: the efforts must be in a coordinated way and there must be proper synchronization between all of them so that there is no wastage of efforts and time. This way the costs will be saved and even the goals can be easily achieved. Further this will reduce the duplication of the efforts.
- Time based: all the activities must determine a time frame in the beginning which means that in what time the goals are to be achieved must be clear in advance so that they is no useless delay in the process. The tasks must be allocated in the time allotted to perform them so that people can side by side focus on other important activities.
Some of the quick and useful tools have been mentioned as follows:
- Signs: these are easy ways of self-assessment. The people must be aware about the responses so that the tasks can be well performed.
- Yes/no cards: these can be used to answer the questions which have been asked by the superiors. The subordinates can hold a specific card in order to answer a specific question. In this way the self-awareness about a particular topic can be ensured. Even the superiors can have the different views about the various subordinates under him or her.
- Thumbs up and down approach: this is also similar to the above mentioned technique. The subordinates can use only the thumbs in order to give answers to some specific questions.
- Colour cards: these can be even used to provide answers to various questions asked to them. Different colours represent different meanings. The following may be used to symbolize:
- Red: may be used to find that there is no answer to the question.
- Yellow: this means to struggle which means that the person is dicey.
- Green: this means that the subordinate is confirm with the answer.
- 1-2-3 fingers: this is also similar to the above technique where number 1 means that one has no answer and the 2 means that the person is searching for the answer and number 3 means that he or she is confirmed with the answer.
- Writing: these activities can lead to sharing of thoughts by the trainees so that one can even come to know about the thought process of them. One can even come to know about the writing capabilities of people in the organization.
- Inventing the quiz: one can conduct a quiz to know about the thought process. They can conduct assessment procedures related to self by answering to various questions asked by the superiors.
- Opinion charts: these can be used to find the opinions of the people on various issues like right and left lines have different meanings here. In this left means the opinion of a person to a topic and the right means his or her support towards a particular topic.
- 321 charts: these are used to record 3 things they have learned and 2 things they have found interesting and 1 question that they still have in their mind. One can even include the things that surprised them or inspired them during the whole process. The actions will take lead from this stage of the process.
- Know, want and learn charts: as the name suggests these can be used to organize and analyze the information about a lesson. One can also get critical tools that the students are interested in some topics. One can get information by providing answers to question like what do they already know? And what they want to know? And what did they want to learn.
- Think-ink and pair: this is used as a technique in which people are given time to think about a particular topic and then they have to ink down their points of views and then pair and discuss among themselves.
Such learning and development assessment tools are the perfect tools in order to gather information about some of the topics.