The traditional evaluation methods largely ignored students’ learning subjectivity, initiative and creativity,which causes a situation in that a number of students lose their self-confidence and reduce the efficiency of foreign language learning。 Formative assessment is proposed with respect to the drawbacks of conventional methods。 Its purpose is to discover each student's potential to strengthen and improve student learning。

     In fact, the performance of English learning has a variety of forms, not only with scores。 In teaching practice, the test, which we are very familiar with is only one kind of teaching evaluation。 Learning evaluation depends on much information。 A simple classroom oral question or written exam does not fully reflect the student learning outcomes。 The author briefly analyzes formative evaluation in middle school English teaching, based on a questionnaire survey conducted in middle schools。

     In the first chapter, the concepts of teaching evaluation and formative evaluation were introduced。 The three different methods of teaching evaluation were compared in table format。 They are diagnostic evaluation, formative evaluation and summative evaluation。

     In Chapter two, the author briefly analyzed the current situation of formative evaluation in middle school English teaching。

     In Chapter three, the reasons for implementing formative evaluation and its characteristics were explained。

     In Chapter four, the author briefly analyzed the application of formative evaluation, it includes: the principle, means and methods of formative evaluation。 The author also described the application of formative evaluation in students’ listening, speaking, reading and writing in brief。论文网

2。 Literature Review

For the development situation of formative evaluation, some scholars did lots of outstanding contributions, such as: G。F。 Scriven, B。S。 Bloom, Bachman, P。 Black, D。 Wiliam, E。G。 Guba and Lincon Y。S。 Scriven is the pioneer of the formative evaluation。 At that time, the formative evaluation focused on the curriculum development。 It means the evaluation evaluates if the course can be suitable for teachers and students。 B。S。Bloom put the concept into teaching。 He pointed out that the scientific evaluation could improve teaching method and value the teaching method。 

2。1 What is teaching evaluation?

     The late 19th century, American educator John Dewey criticized traditional classroom teaching evaluation。 He adopted a new three-center (students, experience and activities) instead of the three centers of traditional education (teachers, books and classroom)。 He requested that people should learn from doing, learn by experience and he demanded empirical active jobs to replace traditional books。 On this basis, he demonstrated the five steps of pedagogy: situation, problem, hypothesis, inference, verification。 These views provided theoretical basis to classroom teaching evaluation。

     Since the beginning of 20th century, our country carried out a comprehensive reform in basic education and introduced developmental classroom teaching evaluation。 “the New Curriculum and Assessment Reform”, published in 2001, stressed the evaluation facilitate student development, and improvement of teachers and teaching practice features。 The articles and books about developmental teaching evaluation which are discussed at present in our country included “Theory and Model of Development Teacher Evaluation” and “Developing Teacher Evaluation System”, “Theory and Practice of Developing Evaluation System”, “the New Curriculum Evaluation Methods and Design”。 Overall, the purpose of teaching evaluation is to help student development, and promote teachers and to improve teaching function and desalination selection。 Developmental classroom teaching evaluation is characterized by emphasis on the teaching process, emphasis on the qualitative evaluation, evaluation objectives and pluralism body, emphasis on participation and interaction, and attention to inpidual differences and other features。