Chapter 4: Motivating Students and their Teachers Through Self-Regulated Learning and Reframing Assessment Language

The purpose of this chapter is to show how classroom assessments and motivation can complement each other and fulfill a common purpose. Classroom assessments are defined as being driven by the need to measure learning (assessments of learning) or enhance learning (assessments for learning; Kibble, 2017), or serve as learning—part of the process in which learning occurs (Zeng et al., 2018). Conducting assessments often is looked upon as an onerous activity that neither educators nor students want to do yet must do because they are critical for providing information that can be diagnostic, useful for guiding instruction, and reflective of one’s performance (for both teachers and students). Assessments may be met with apprehension or even groans of dread from the students. Teachers often find developing tests difficult and time consuming and struggle with accuracy and fairness issues in grading. Teacher educators that model the complimentary relationship of classroom assessments and motivation can address such groans of dread while preparing pre-service teachers to assess future students with efficiency, accuracy, and fairness.