I. Types of Assignments

  • Abstract
  • Advertisement
  • Annotated bibliography
  • Biography or Autobiography
  • Blueprint
  • Briefing paper or "white paper"
  • Brochure
  • Budget with rationale
  • Business letter
  • Case study
  • Chart, graph, visual aid
  • Client report for an agency
  • Concept map, web, or diagram
  • Contemplative essay
  • Court brief
  • Debate (can be online)
  • Definition
  • Description of a process
  • Dialogue
  • Diary of a real or fictional character
  • Executive summary
  • Feasibility study
  • Flowchart
  • Group discussion (can be online)
  • "I-search" (1st-person narrative of a research project)
  • Instruction manual
  • Interview
  • "Introduction" to an essay or report (rather than the full text)
  • Inventory
  • Laboratory or field notes
  • Letter to a newspaper editor
  • Literature review
  • Materials & method plan
  • Mathematical analysis
  • Memo
  • "Micro-theme" (a coherent essay typed on a 5 x 8 note card)
  • Multimedia or slide presentation (e.g., Powerpoint)
  • Narrative
  • News or feature story
  • Notes on reading
  • Nursing care plan
  • Oral report
  • Outline
  • Personal letter
  • Photo or illustration cutlines
  • Plan for conducting a project
  • Poem or play
  • Discussion question
  • Reading log
  • Reflective journal
  • Regulations, laws, rules
  • Research proposal addressed to a granting agency
  • Review of book, play, exhibit
  • Freewrite (written freely with no constraints for 5-15 minutes)
  • Script for documentary, commercial, public service announcement, etc.
  • "Start" draft (thesis statement w/ outline or list of ideas)
  • Statement of assumptions
  • Summary or précis
  • Summit conference (e.g., teams in a history class represent nations negotiating a treaty)
  • Taxonomy or set of categories
  • Technical or scientific report
  • Term paper, research paper
  • Thesis sentence
  • Three-dimensional model
  • Word problem
  • Work of art, music, architecture, sculpture

II. Types of Tests

  • Essay exam
  • Fill-in-the-blank
  • Glossary quiz
  • Oral exam
  • Matching
  • Open-book quiz
  • Mathematical problem
  • Multiple choice
  • Reading comprehension quiz
  • Short answer


A thought: "Objective" tests focus on short-term memory. But if students write their own tests,
you help them develop long-term memory.

(adapted from Effective Grading, Walvoord & Anderson, Jossey-Bass, 193-95)