Assessments and History: Can You Assess It?

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Theodore K. Rabb writes that in an ideal world, evaluation would be unnecessary. After all, he says, Socrates never gave grades.

But assessment is here to stay, the professor emeritus of history at Princeton University acknowledges, and the current buzzword in education is "proficiency." And yet, he argues, there is a huge divide between the nature of most history assessments and the proficiency they are supposed to demonstrate.

What do you think? What do teachers need in order to teach history effectively while meeting accountability standards?