Curriculum-Based Assessment: An Introduction

Curriculum-based assessment (CBA) is a new term for a teaching practice that is as old as education itself: using the material to be learned as the basis for assessing the degree to which it has been learned. In this article, the concept of curriculum-based assessment is introduced, and the stage is set for the articles which follow to present the details of its theory and practice. Curriculum-based assessment is compared to traditional forms of assessment, and the practical application of CBA to special education is briefly discussed.