Criteria and Indicators for Assessing Authentic Task in Elementary School: a Qualitative Study

The optimal use of authentic task is the intelligent strategy for reforming educational systems to understand the real world needs of the in order to nurture and develop the competencies of students as productive, responsible, self-regulating, creative, resilient, and confident citizens. The present study was conducted to identify criteria and indicators of authentic task in primary schools. For this purpose, a descriptive phenomenological method was used. The data were collected through in-depth semi- structured interview with 14 informants who were selected by purposive sampling and was analyzed using the Colaizzi's method. The deep analysis of data revealed 43 indicators and 11 criteria including: “clarity of learning objectives”, “relationships with daily lives and the ability to solve problems”, “clarity of assessment criteria”, “feedback”, “cognition and metacognition”, “giving students the right to choose” and “critical thinking”. Since the type of homework and its properties affect the performance of students, if the authentic criteria and indicators are used in the development of task, this transformative opportunity can be applied to empower students and develop their competencies to play the roles of effective citizens.