Improving Learning Through Dynamic Assessment Fraser Lauchlan University of Strathclyde, UK Dynamic assessment is increasingly being used by educational psychologists around the world and is largely seen as a valuable approach to assessing chil- dren and providing useful classroom suggestions to help teachers working with children who have learning difficulties. However, a common complaint about the approach is the difficulty in moving from theory to practice, and in particular how to feedback the results of a dynamic assessment to teaching staff, parents, and children in order to provide an effective programme of intervention. This article provides some background to a practical resource created by two prac- tising educational psychologists who have developed a framework on how to put dynamic assessment into practice that has the potential to make meaningful gains in children’s learning. ■ Keywords: dynamic assessment, improving learning, intervention, educational psychology practice, school psychology practice Educational Psychology Assessment It has often been argued that a question frequently neglected by educational psycholo- gists is: Why am I carrying out this assessment? The goals for carrying out an assessment should be clarified first before embarking on the process (Haywood & Lidz, 2007). It has been argued that there is often a huge misunderstanding made by psychologists whereby the most up-to-date technique is taken from the shelf without pausing to consider why one is carrying out the assessment (Cizek, 1997). Prior to embarking on the assessment process, there may be far too little attention paid to essential questions regarding the purposes of assessment. Burden (1996) argued that this can result in teachers, parents and administrators obtaining ‘useless information which they either find impossible to interpret, or which doesn’t answer the questions that were required but they didn’t bother to ask’ (p. 97). Burden referred to the kinds of questions that should be asked as the ‘why’ of assessment: essentially, why is the assessment being carried out? This specific question leads to many others; for example: Who wants information about this child? What kind of information is desired? In whose interest is the assessment being carried out? What are the gains and the adverse consequences of carrying out this assessment? (Burden, 1996; Cizek, 1997). Gipps (1994) outlined a number of purposes in the context of assessment in education: Address for correspondence: Fraser Lauchlan, School of Psychological Sciences and Health, University of Strathclyde, Graham Hills Building, 40 George Street, Glasgow, G1 1QE, UK. Email: fraser.lauchlan@strath.ac.uk The Australian Educational and Developmental Psychologist Volume 29 | Issue 2 | 2012 | pp. 95–106 | c  Australian Psychological Society Ltd 2012 | doi 10.1017/edp.2012.13 95