This is a guide to help teachers at all grade levels to improve the quality of their student assessments. It is designed for preservice and inservice teacher education to assist in conducting performance assessments to evaluate student learning. Performance assessment requires a student to analyze a problem, synthesize information, and attempt to apply acquired information to a new problem situation. It enables the teacher to measure a student's ability to transfer, not just recall, skills and knowledge. The basic aspects of a performance assessment are the decision situation, exercise, response, and rating. Performance assessments must be handled systematically to produce dependable and useful information about student achievement. The guide provides instructions for designing a performance test and guidelines for maximizing the quality of assessments. (DWH)