We are looking for something that will give us a sense of their reading level and the types of strategies they use to decode. When the students have read the articles, we also ask comprehension questions and/or ask students to tell us about the article, allowing them to refer back to it.

For the writing portion, students are asked to write/print the alphabet, complete sentences with a word(s) left blank, answer a few questions in writing (e.g., What food do you like to eat?), and then write a few sentences (or more, if possible) about a place they have lived, or any other topic they would like to write about.

We stop the assessment at any point when it is clear that the student will not be able to handle the next level or task.

This assessment reflects literacy practices within the classroom. Several colleges have developed an assessment that "can be used to determine a student's instructional reading level, writing strengths and weaknesses, and knowledge of mathematical concepts and operations." For example, the Basic Education Department at Vancouver Community College has published an intake assessment tool that is being used by several colleges in British Columbia. In the territories, Aurora College has developed the Aurora College Placement Test, and Nunavut Arctic College has designed placement tests for Math, Inuktitut, and English.

Workplaces tend to develop contextualized performance assessments that assess the essential skills used in the workplace or occupation. A field officer who coordinates workplace education programs provided the following description of the initial assessment for workers in a specific occupation:

The process is informal in that it is carried out in an interview with the learner and a range of activities are offered and the learner can self-assess and then choose the activity that he/she feels comfortable with. For example: for uncertified workers in the field of early childhood we used a growth chart and asked the participants to determine the weight/height of a two-year-old if he were in the 50th percentile for his age. We refer to the Essential Skills profiles for ideas. The tasks have a complexity level assigned and it is easy to duplicate that activity with materials from the workplace to create the needs assessment.