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TeachingEnglish: Assessing learning

Help all your learners benefit from and get actively involved in assessment in the language classroom. This course is open now – enrol until 23 September.

Young girl giving a presentation in class
TeachingEnglish
Engagement
9–12 hours
Start: 01/07/25
End: 30/09/25
Certificate
Workbook
Online community

How will the course help you?

By the end of Assessing learning, you'll be able to:

  • design assessment methods that take into account ways to include all learners fairly
  • apply relevant and appropriate assessment for learning (AfL) strategies
  • adapt different types of test tasks to make preparation for tests more enjoyable and motivational for your learners.

How can you enrol on the course?

Register for a free TeachingEnglish account or log in to your account.

Enrol on this free course

What does the course include?

  • Self-study modules that you can access at any time before the course closes
  • A certificate of achievement on successful completion of the self-study modules
  • A free workbook with extra learning content and resources connected to the course contents
  • A dedicated Facebook community of course participants with up-to-date insight, resources and innovative teaching ideas for you to try out (Facebook account required)
  • Learning content related to our courses on Facebook and YouTube
  • Live events and recordings with course tutors and language teaching experts on Facebook and YouTube

What are the self-study modules?

Module 1 – Inclusive assessment approaches

In this module, you'll learn about inclusive assessment and get ideas about ways to recognise if a learner may need adjustments in assessment. You'll assemble a set of checklists to determine if a learner may need additional help or adjustments in assessment, reflect on the difference between assessment of learning and assessment for learning, as well as consider assessment methods that take into account ways to include all learners fairly.

Module 2 – Engaging with assessment for learning

The aim of this module is to explore the main areas of assessment for learning strategies – effective questioning, teacher feedback, peer feedback and self-assessment. You'll plan how to apply assessment for learning strategies in your classrooms in ways that are relevant and appropriate to your learners and context.

Module 3 – Understanding teaching for tests

The aim of this module is to explore how to balance test preparation and learning. You'll begin by looking at the effects of testing on teaching and learning. Next you'll identify different types of test tasks and consider how to adapt these so that test preparation is more enjoyable and motivational for your learners.

Course reviews

What have other teachers said about how Assessing learning helped them?

"When I used to do spelling reviews at the end of the week, they were very old-fashioned and rigid - but I tried one of the fun methods of assessing the vocabulary and spelling shown in the course and the result was much more beneficial". 

Course participant, Türkiye

"I applied the knowledge that students can take part in deciding the assessment criteria and I found immense participation from my students as they received a clear direction for their study goals decided by themselves, had the enthusiasm to achieve those goals, and found tests not stressful but fun". 

Course participant, Bangladesh

"One practical way I’ve applied what I learned from this course is by using think-pair-share activities in my classes. This simple strategy has made a big difference in getting students more involved. It encourages them to share ideas and think critically, and I’ve noticed that our classroom discussions have become much more lively and meaningful". 

Course participant, Oman

What teaching techniques will you explore?

Watch Rabia, one of our course tutors, demonstrating an idea from the Assessing learning course – the KWL tool. What do learners already know, want to know and end up learning?

Enrol on the course to discover many more teaching tips and strategies to help you assess learning effectively.

Do you have more questions?

Please see our FAQs or access further support through our Help button.

Downloads
File attachments
Assessing learning workbook 20251.82 MB
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Comments

Hello

Thanks for your comment. If you would like to register for this free course, you just need to click on the button on this page that says 'Enrol on this free course'.  This (like all of our courses) is an online, self-access course. When you want to work on the course, you just need to log in to your TeachingEnglish account, then click/tap on the 'My portfolio - my courses' tab (top left of the screen). You will see your courses and then can work on the modules at your own pace.

For answers to our frequently asked questions about our training courses, please see this page: https://www.teachingenglish.org.uk/training/training-courses-faqs

If you are still having problems please contact us at Teachingenglish@britishcouncil.org

Thanks and I hope you enjoy the course!

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by Sh.Az1378 on Sun, 10/01/2023 - 15:31

Hello
I have participated in this course and wanted to watch the full version of the seminar by Barry Sullivan: Language Testing: Looking Back and Looking Forward; however the link in the references and further reading does not work. Can you help me find it?
Thank you for your help

Hi Sh.Az1378,

I'm not sure exactly which seminar you are referring to - could it be this Facebook Live session? https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?ref=watch_permalink&v=206220407561371 Here Barry O'Sullivan, Carolyn Westbrook and Mina Patel discuss assessment in the classroom.

Hope that helps,

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by jerryconneyotey on Mon, 06/12/2023 - 07:57

Hi there,

Please help me. I'm trying to access the courses but keep getting a "your connection is not private" message. Please tell me what to do? Thank you for your help. This has never happened before.

Hi 

Thank you for contacting us. We are aware that there are currently security issues affecting your access to the training courses.
We are working hard to resolve the issues and we hope to have a solution in the next 24-28 hours when you should be able to access your courses again normally.
Thanks,

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by hasna anwaar on Sun, 06/11/2023 - 23:41

Hello , thanks for your efforts,
,I would like to enter and start courses but kt doesn't work :( when I log in, it didn't work, what i can do ? :(

Hi hasna

Apologies for this - there is a technical issue with the site which we are working to resolve as soon as possible. Thanks for letting us know, and sorry for the inconvenience. We hope to have this sorted out very soon so that you can access your course again normally.

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by Sh.Az1378 on Fri, 05/26/2023 - 06:55

Hello
First, I wanted to express my gratitude for this great course. It helped me learn how to evaluate my students in various ways and combine the positive aspects of formative and summative assessments.
I have finished the course and got my certificate. The problem is I edited my profile after the certificate was issued (I changed the name from SH to my full name), but the certificate is based on the previous name (SH). Can it be changed to include my full name?
Thank you for your help

Submitted by Cath McLellan on Mon, 05/29/2023 - 08:41

Hi

Thanks for your positive comments about the course - we are glad you enjoyed it and found it useful!

To request a new certificate, you can log in to your account, go to the courses website (through MY PORTFOLIO- My courses) and then use the orange "help" button on the bottom right hand side of the screen to contact the courses team and ask them to re-issue your certificate.

Hope that helps,

Cath
TeachingEnglish team

Hi Samangi

Your certificate should appear in the "My awards - My certificates" tab on the website when you have successfully completed the whole course. If you think there is an error with this, can you report it to the courses team by using the orange "help" button on the bottom right of the page?

Thanks,

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by mangelicalopez on Wed, 05/24/2023 - 03:50

I don't find the section "My learning". I don't get the word "start".

Hi MohamedKhalil8311

Once you have enrolled, you should be able to access your course by clicking on the "My Portfolio - My courses" tab at the top of the page (you need to be logged in to your TeachingEnglish account). If you do not see that tab when you are logged in, you haven't enrolled in any of our courses.

Let us know if you are having problems.

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by Aynur467536 on Tue, 02/25/2025 - 19:12

I think it is very useful traning for us,we learn more useful thıngs

Hi Letsogile

Where it says "How do I sign up for the course" you will see there are 2 steps you need to follow. Click on each step to follow the instructions to enrol.

Let us know if you are still having problems.

Thanks,

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by Cath McLellan on Mon, 05/08/2023 - 08:44

Hello

This is a self-access course, which. means you can enrol yourself from this page. Just follow the 2 steps under "How do I sign up for the course?" on the page above.

Let us know if you are having problems.
Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by Hussain on Tue, 05/02/2023 - 21:39

This is Hussain Liton from Saudi Arabia welcoming you here for sharing course learning and relevant free thinking. The assessing Learning course is very useful for teaching assessment and learning feedback. I hope we will enjoy the course with maximizing assessment skills and pragmatic practices.

Submitted by Cath McLellan on Wed, 05/03/2023 - 09:12

Hi Hussain

Hope you enjoy the course! Remember that there is also a Facebook group for this course. Here's the link to join (it's also on the courses homepage) https://www.facebook.com/groups/coursesforteachers It's a great place to interact with other course members, ask questions and also to join additional live events.

All the best,

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Hi esraemir,

I have just checked and I can see the course in the list of available courses on our training platform, here: https://open.teachingenglish.org.uk/Home/ExploreProgrammes. Could you please log in to your account and try again. If you did not log out of your TeachingEnglish account previously, we recommend logging out and logging back in again.

Thanks,

Paul (TeachingEnglish team)

Hi h.buckoke

To enrol in the course you need to first log into your TeachingEnglish account and then access the course website here: https://open.teachingenglish.org.uk/Home/ExploreProgrammes

Once there you can see all of our available courses, and you just need to click to enrol.

Hope this helps - let us know if you continue to have problems.

Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Hi Yasser

Can you access the course website? The link is: https://open.teachingenglish.org.uk/Home/ExploreProgrammes

Once there you can see all of our available courses, and you just need to click to enrol. If when you click the link you are taken back to your profile page, then you need to follow the troubleshooting steps - basically, log out of your account, clear your cache and then log back in again. This time when you click on the link you will be taken to the courses website. 

Hope this helps - let us know if you continue to have problems.
Cath

TeachingEnglish team

Submitted by Cath McLellan on Wed, 04/26/2023 - 07:54

Hi fMusharaf

Can you access the course website? The link is: https://open.teachingenglish.org.uk/Home/ExploreProgrammes

Once there you can see all of our available courses, and you just need to click to enrol. If when you click the link you are taken back to your profile page, then you need to follow the troubleshooting steps - basically, log out of your account, clear your cache and then log back in again. This time when you click on the link you will be taken to the courses website. 

Hope this helps - let us know if you continue to have problems.
Cath

TeachingEnglish team

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