Every student in the Swedish compulsory school system is entitled to information regarding their progress in all school subjects given. In 2008, a mandatory assessment tool, called the individual development plan (IDP) with written assessment, was introduced by the Government. The statutory purpose was to provide teachers with a formative assessment tool to be used mandatory in the follow-up of student’s progress all thru mandatory compulsory school (year 1–9). This study explores the use of the IDP documents in technology education. Authentic documents from different municipalities, different schools and different school years have been studied. In this article findings regarding formal assessment documents and teacher’s formal assessment practice in primary (year 1–6) technology education are presented.

In order to position yourself with a Global Positioning System (GPS) device, you need (1) to have a GPS device with (2) accurate software, (3) the knowledge to use and interpret it, and last but not least (4) information from at least three different satellites in order to determine a position. Depending on the model and the coverage in the area, you can get different accuracy levels. Being a technology teacher myself, I can see many similarities between the traveller’s need for milestones along the road and the teachers’ need for several clear benchmarks to support the assessment work that supports the student’s progress. The importance of navigating at sea is familiar to me, after years of sailing on our family boat. Teaching could, in my experience, be seen in many respects as a similar activity, which put demands on all the participants. Neither teaching nor sailing is an easy, laid-back activity.

To ‘navigate’ students towards the goals of the curriculum, while making sure to keep every student ‘on-board’, is a challenge worthy of a world sailor. Despite thorough planning, you still need to make frequent check-ups, since you know neither exactly what will happen during the journey in advance nor which way to take to reach the wanted destination. This, I find, is part of the excitement/allure with travel, both as a sailor and teacher. In this study teachers’ day-to-day work with assessment to support the student’s progress is highlighted from the perspective of technology education. How does a technology teacher gather information in order to position her/his students before deciding on what step to take next?

Assessment and evaluation of student performance and progress in school is an ongoing process and far from consisting of only grades and test scores. Teachers make assessments/assess their students all the time with the intention of moving their students forward on their learning journey (Kimbell, 2007). They ask questions and they look for signs of response (‘a glimpse in the eye’) in the faces of their students. This subtle evaluation and appraisal work, which takes place every day in every classroom, is the focus of this article.

This study explores possible differences in the views on assessment between two groups of teachers teaching technology in compulsory school: 1) teachers with subject-specific teacher training in technology education; and 2) teachers without such training. This topic is of particular interest because of the recent changes in the regulations that govern compulsory schools in Sweden, such that only certified teachers now will be permitted to teach and assign grades, despite the clear lack of certified teachers in technology education. The study is situated in two fields of interest—technology education and assessment. Both topics are highly relevant, especially in combination, because previous research on teachers’ assessment practices in technology is rare. In this study, the goal is to contribute to deepening the understanding of how subject-specific teacher training affects teachers’ ability to assess students’ knowledge while maintaining alignment with stated regulations. The results show significant difference between these two groups’ use of curriculum documents as the basis of their teaching and their self-efficacy in assessing student’s knowledge in technology. The results suggest interesting possibilities for curriculum alignment and indicate that the opportunities for student learning increase according to whether teachers are specifically trained in the subject. 

Transparency regarding criteria for success in assessment processes is challenging for most teachers. The context of this study is primary school technology education. With the purpose to establish what criteria for success teachers put forward during the act of assessment, think-aloud protocols were collected from five primary teachers during an assessment act. Results are based on content analysis of think-aloud protocols and quantitative measures of reliability in order to ascertain teachers’ motives for decision-making when assessing Year 5 pupils’ multimodal e-portfolios.

Findings show consensus among these teachers, focusing on the execution of the task in relation to the whole, rather than to particular pieces of student work. The results confirm the importance of task design, where active learning in combination with active tutoring is an integral part, including provision of time and space for pupils to finish their work.