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Abstract: Assessment is an essential part to student learning because it helps students understand the learning objectives and gives feedback on progress and achievement. Assessment needs to be well thought through, organized, and used together with instruction. In order to show how assessment helps direct learning and provides a measure of progress and achievement in learning, I describe in this article an example of my approach to a unit of study on soprano recorders for third grade music. I include the standards from Japan's national curriculum, the instruction around a mid-unit lesson, a plan of assessment for the unit, and a rubric to use for performance assessment.
Is elementary school music assessment really necessary? This question was raised among some teachers discussing the necessity of assessing student learning and achievement in non-core subjects for progress reports. I believe that it is a necessary part of learning in these subjects because assessment helps guide the teaching and learning of any subject, and gives feedback to the students about how they are progressing with the learning and tasks given them. Assessment helps teachers monitor students' learning, and feedback informs the students on their achievement in the learning, which can motivate them to greater learning and success. According to Stiggins, teachers "weave classroom assessment and its results into instruction in ways that benefit our students; that is, not merely to grade them, but to enhance both their desire to learn and their achievement" (2005, p. 5). Assessment plays an important role in instructional practices and learning because it helps focus on the objective or purpose of the learning and provides a measure of progress and learning based on the goals and standards.
Before designing a music program with lessons and assessments, it is essential to have a clear understanding of the standards for the program of study. The Japanese national curriculum standards help direct the student learning to specific grade-level concepts and practice. Knowing and understanding the standards means that I can monitor the learning of the students in relation to specific objectives to assess if there is achievement in those learning targets or not. In order to create a music program that meets the standards of learning for the national curriculum, but also provides English...