Lesson 4 – Culturally Responsive Assessments
Two fish are swimming in the ocean. “How’s the water?” asks one fish. The other replies “What the hell is water?” (Wallace, 2005)
This brief exchange, made famous by writer David Foster Wallace, captures something profound: the most pervasive forces in our lives are often the hardest to see—because we’re swimming in them every day.
Culture is our water.
Just like the ocean surrounds and shapes everything the fish experiences, culture surrounds and shapes everything we do—how we think, interact, learn, lead, and work. Whether we’re aware of it or not, culture influences our values, communication styles, decision-making and assessments.
Reflection:
- What makes your assessment “rigorous”?
- Do your classes typically begin 10 minutes after the scheduled time, even if the timetable lists the start at the top of the hour?
- If a student consistently interrupts you with questions while you deliver your lesson, would you consider them rude or eager to learn?
- Do your exams include “questions that rely on knowledge obtained outside the class [that] will disadvantage students without that knowledge (such as idioms and sports references)” (Hogan & Sathy, 2022, p. 181)?
- Do your students perceive you as the absolute authority on the subject in the classroom, whereas you consider your students more equal and are open to them challenging you? Or vice versa?
- If a student is not participating in class discussions, how likely are you to consider them less engaged than the students who regularly speak in class, even though their contributions don’t directly respond to the prompts you’ve given?
The above questions recall another definition of culture, as “an accumulated pattern of values, beliefs, and behaviours, shared by an identifiable group of people with a common history and verbal and nonverbal symbol systems” (Neuliep, 2012).
These questions are designed to prompt reflection about the ways in which your own personal and cultural identities, values, and beliefs, as well as those of your departments, institutions and workplaces, influence learning and teaching experiences. If you and your students are not aware of the tacit influences of these cultural norms and identities in the classroom, important dynamics may go unrecognized, impacting inclusion and equity in learning.
“…that system of unwritten rules and unset expectations that you might hear about at the dinner table when your father is a professor, and your mother is a doctor. Office hours, internships, shadowing—these are shorthand things that everyone seems to know about from their very first day on campus, because their parents were able to socialize them in the way of universities, effectively giving them an 18-year head start. That makes certain students feel less-than and othered for not knowing.” (Jack, in Bouranova, 2023)
Culturally responsive pedagogy teaches us to recognize the hidden curriculum, the cultural assumptions (our own and those of our students), and how knowledge is shaped by experiences and identities. Culturally responsive assessments affirm student identities and design respectful and empowering learning experiences.
Activity: Select an assessment you currently use. What are some tacit knowledges, the hidden curriculum, that you expect your students to have to succeed in this assignment? How might you embed and address culture, in the broadest sense, in your assignments?
Here are some suggestions for culturally responsive assessments from the edited volume Culturally Responsive Assessment in Classrooms and Large-Scale Contexts by Evans & Taylor (2025):
Representation and Exposure
“Assessments where students either (a) see themselves, their communities, and cultures represented in some form or fashion or (b) are exposed to other cultures’ lived experiences, conceptions, and belief systems in the items/tasks, stimulus materials, and/or images. Representation and exposure sometimes focus on surface-level features of culture (e.g., food, fashion, festivities).” (Evans & Taylor, 2025, p. 6)
Perspective Taking
“Assessments that require students to explain how an issue, problem, or scenario may be perceived or viewed from different cultural perspectives. Perspective-taking requires students to possess a level of cultural competence wherein students understand, research, or surmise about different cultural beliefs and how they differ from their own.” (Evans & Taylor, 2025, p. 6)
Taking Informed Action
“Assessments that include contexts or scenarios that identify social justice or community issues. Students must apply their disciplinary content knowledge and skills to address those issues by planning for or taking informed action (e.g., addressing food insecurity, scarcity, or food deserts; creating solutions to local homelessness; rising costs of medical care, prescription medications, or affordable housing).” (Evans & Taylor, 2025, p. 6)
Reflection: Using the principles and frameworks outlined above, think: how do they look in practice in your class?
After brainstorming, explore some suggestions that you may adapt for your classroom:
- Personal Support Worker: Students interview older adults from different cultural backgrounds to explore how beliefs, age, gender and other intersecting identities influence healthcare choices.
- Architectural Technician: Students design a building project that considers cultural and environmental influences instead of relying on standard Western principles.
- Business Administration: Students take turns analyzing companies from parts of the world they are the least and the most familiar with, examining how local factors shape their strategy.
- Civil Engineering Technology: Students compare global approaches to sustainable building, adapting designs based on regional climate and materials.
By designing assessments that honor students’ diverse cultural, linguistic, and experiential backgrounds, we shift from a deficit mindset—focusing on what students lack—to a strengths-based approach that recognizes and builds upon the unique assets each learner brings to the classroom. When we maintain high expectations for all students while creating multiple, equitable pathways for demonstrating mastery, we do not lower standards; rather, we ensure that assessments measure what truly matters—understanding, application, and critical thinking—without being clouded by barriers unrelated to learning outcomes.
Ultimately, culturally responsive assessment empowers students to see their identities as sources of strength, supports their growth into confident and capable learners, and prepares them to thrive in both academic and professional environments that value diversity, equity, and inclusion.
Next, we will explore Indigenous-informed assessment, which builds on these principles while drawing on Indigenous ways of knowing, learning, and demonstrating understanding to create assessments that are both culturally grounded and academically rigorous.