Failing Sideways: Queer Possibilities for Writing Assessment

Failing Sideways is a groundbreaking approach to assessment that combines writing studies, educational measurement, and queer rhetorics to promote joy and justice in the work of assessment. It proposes queer validity inquiry (QVI) as a model that values failure, affect, identity, and materiality, and offers programmatic and classroom examples to demonstrate what writing can be and could do in a more diverse and just world.

Format: Hardback
Length: 284 pages
Publication date: 15 May 2023
Publisher: University Press of Colorado

Failing Sideways is a groundbreaking and innovative approach to assessment that seamlessly intersects writing studies, educational measurement, and queer rhetorics. While wholeheartedly embracing and showcasing the research, theory, and practice of assessment, the authors Stephanie West-Puckett, Nicole I. Caswell, and William P. Banks vividly illustrate how students, teachers, and other stakeholders can derive immense joy and equitable outcomes from the realm of assessment.

A failure-oriented assessment model disrupts conventional practices such as rubrics and portfolios and questions long-standing assumptions about validity and reliability, prompting us to contemplate what might unfold if assessment were directed toward possibility and potential. By striving to expand the scope of writing, the authors propose queer validity inquiry (QVI) as a transformative model for assessment that values failure, emotion, identity, and materiality. These interconnected lenses empower teachers to recognize and appreciate aspects of writing and learning that have often been overlooked in the fast-paced and efficiency-driven school environment.

Through programmatic and classroom examples, Failing Sideways prioritizes what is valued in the classroom but traditionally neglected in assessments. By reimagining what truly matters in the teaching and learning of writing and employing assessment data in novel ways, this book showcases the immense potential of writing to shape a more diverse and just world.

ISBN-13: 9781646424474