As part of joints efforts to tackle the current learning crisis affecting Sub-Saharan Africa, the Teaching and Learning Educators' Network for Transformation (TALENT) organized in collaboration with IICBA, a regional capacity development workshop on: Classroom-Based Formative Assessments in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (July 2 - 4 2019). 

The three-day workshop was the third in a series of four capacity-strengtheninginterventions planned to take place in the framework of the project “Strengthening Learning Assessment Systems in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) through TALENT” financed by the Global Partnership for Education (GPE).

This event aimed at increasing theoretical and practical knowledge of participants by (i) developing a clear and shared understanding of formative assessment and other related concepts; (ii) learning from best practices and identifying main challenges in the use of classroom-based formative assessment; and (iii) identifying key elements to develop supportive tools for an efficient use of classroom-based formative assessments.

The workshop gathered national senior managers responsible for the areas of curriculum, teacher development and assessment from the following 14 countries: Cameroon, Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Tanzania and Togo. Representatives from UNESCO Beirut and TALENT Secretariat based in UNESCO Dakar, as well as from the two UNESCO Institutes IICBA and IIEP-Pôle de Dakar, UNICEF, the Brookings Institution and the Australian Council for Education Research (ACER) participated in the workshop. They shared studies and initiatives that can be adopted as models for developing modern learning assessment systems, including the redesign of the teacher training to build their capacity to facilitate and assess learning.

Throughout the workshop, participants had the opportunity to hear about the major challenges and promising practices from the other countries in ensuring classroom-based monitoring of learning for a formative purpose. Guided by international experts on the topic, the national representatives were able to question the current role played by classroom-based formative assessment in the teacher training programs and in the overall education system and identify potential paths to improve the use of this tool. Based on their own experiences, participants managed to reflect on the challenges to ensure effective alignment of different initiatives related to the assessment of students’ performance, as well as on the opportunities to foster the use of formative assessment to effectively orient teaching and learning in the classroom and better equip teachers to ensure that every student learns.