Can “Performative Assessment” Corrupt Transformative Learning, especially for Spiritual Formation?

Assessment is an important part of the teaching and learning process for encouraging students to research, reflect and synthesise understanding. However, in learning contexts where a goal is transformative learning, not just the acquisition of knowledge, assessment can be challenging for at least two reasons.

First, assessing the nature of personal transformation is highly individualised and contextualised, and difficult to compare with others (such assessments might be high on measures of validity, but would usually be low on measures of reliability).

Second, the act of assessment itself may affect the learning process in unhelpful ways — for example, a requirement to write a reflective essay on spiritual formation experiences may lead to a “performative” assessment product where the student writes reflections geared towards their perception of the requirements of markers, rather than potentially “messy” personal experiences.

This presentation will reflect on these challenges for assessment in theological education, particularly for spiritual formation units, including reference to Biblical concerns about the gap between the heart and actions

In other contexts, spiritual formation assessment may be “pass/fail” (or equivalent) to avoid some of the problems identified, but this may have the unintended consequence of being perceived by students as being less important compared to other marked assessments.

This presentation will reflect on these challenges for assessment in theological education, particularly for spiritual formation units, including reference to Biblical concerns about the gap between the heart and actions (e.g. Ps 51:16–17). It will also reflect on a recently completed review of the Christian education writings of Edwin Judge, and seek to connect Judge’s concerns about Christian higher education to the issues considered here via a focus on Judge’s emphasis on the “open heart”.