Know how you’ll be assessed

We hope you all enjoyed last week’s folder giveaway to help you develop your file and get assessment ready. This week we go further into helping you know more about your assessment and in particular, understanding and using command words.

We have established that by now, you should know what your exams or assessments will look like. You can build a bank of them in your file for quick and regular access. Becoming familiar with your assessment, the structure and the style of questions will help them seem less daunting.

So you know what your assessments look like, but do you know what questions might look like? You can develop valuable skills to help you apply whatever content you have learned to an exam question by focusing on skills and style of answering. Assessments are always full of command words. These are the words which often start a question, such as Describe, Explain, Analyse and Evaluate. Command words are the words and phrases used in exams and other assessment tasks that tell students how they should answer the question.

A good habit to get into is to identify the command word before answering the question by highlighting, circling or underlining it. This will help you focus your mind on what the question is asking and give you thinking time to explore how you can go about answering it. A routine like this can also be a useful way to help you approach exam questions without panicking.

Analyse	Examine in detail to show meaning, and identify elements and the relationship between them
Assess	Make an informed judgement
Calculate	Work out from facts, figures or information
Comment	Give an informed opinion
Compare	Identify/comment on similarities and/or differences
Consider	Review and respond to given information
Contrast	Identify/comment on differences
Define	Give a precise meaning
Describe	State the points of a topic or give characteristics and main features
Develop	Take forward to a more advanced stage or build on given information
Discuss	Write about the issues or topics in a structured way
Evaluate	Judge or calculate the quality, importance, amount or value of something
Explain	Give reasons, say why and support with relevant evidence
Identify	Name, select
Justify	Support a case with evidence or an argument
Outline	Set out the main points
Predict	Suggest what may happen based on available information
State	Express in clear terms
Suggest	Apply knowledge and understanding where there are a range of valid responses to make a proposal
Summarise	Choose and present the main points, without detail

Freebie Friday returns this week! Get down to the Plaza early to bag your Freebie to help yourself Get Assessment Ready.

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