原文：

Assessment is a central process in education. If students learned what they were taught, we would never need to assess; we could instead just keep records of what we had taught. But as every teacher knows, many students do not learn what they are taught. Indeed, when we look at their work, it is sometimes hard to believe that they were in the classroom. In fact, it is impossible to predict with any certainty what students will learn as the result of a particular sequence of classroom activities. And because we cannot teach well without finding out where our students are starting from, we have to assess. Even if all our students started out at the same point (a highly unlikely situation!), each of them will have reached different understandings of the material being studied within a very short period of time. That is why assessment is the bridge between teaching and learning—it is only through assessment that we can find out whether what has happened in the classroom has produced the learning we intended. Of course, assessment is also used for other purposes in education, which makes the picture much more complicated. In all countries, assessments of the performance of individual students are used to determine which students are, and which students are not, qualified for subsequent phases of education, and also to decide which kinds of education students should receive. 

这篇文章难度并不大，但作为SWT来说非常典型，因为这篇文章运用了大量的逻辑连接词来串联作者的观点以及进一步的解释。通过掌握这些连接词，可以帮助我们更好的理解作者的意图以及文章的意思，同时帮助我们掌握文章的主旨内容，更好地进行概述。

首先，文章的开头Assessment is a central process in education，表明了整个文章的主旨，奠定了整篇文章的论调，说明评估是教育的一个核心流程，所以这句肯定是我们需要概括到我们的答案中的。

然后我们能看到，作者开始解释为什么评估对于教育来说如此重要，紧接着提出了两个原因：

其一：

如果学生能把老师教的东西都学会，那我们便不再需要评估了，但是，学生并没有完全掌握他们被授予的内容。

If students learned what they were taught, we would never need to assess; we could instead just keep records of what we had taught. 这一句话看起来重要，但其实是在解释和引出后面but后面的观点，也就是many students do not learn what they are taught，所以这一句才是我们需要概括进来的。紧接着的两句，我们能看到indeed, in fact，这两个关键连接词，说明了后面的内容其实都是在进一步解释之前的观点，所以我们可以不需要概括到我们的答案里面。

其二：

学生们的起点并不一样。

这里我们可以明显看到一个And because这组连接词，And because we cannot teach well without finding out where our students are starting from, we have to assess. 而通过内容，我们可以发现，这句话和前面的内容表达的是不同的观点，所以表示作者要进一步提出另外一个观点，也就是学生们的起点并不相同。紧接着文章又提到Even if…，这后面的内容很明显也是在进一步解释刚才提到的观点。

根据这两个观点，我们可以看到That is why这个信号，表明了是对前面内容的一个总结，为什么评估对教育如此重要，That is why assessment is the bridge between teaching and learning—it is only through assessment that we can find out whether what has happened in the classroom has produced the learning we intended. 评估是老师教学和学生学习中间的桥梁，只有通过评估我们才可以得知我们的教学结果。因为这个观点虽然是总结上面的内容得出的，但是在前文中并没有提到过，所以也是十分重要的，但因为破折号后面的句子比较长，我们需要根据意思进行一定的缩写。

最后，我们能看到of course后面，作者又提出了一个新的观点，assessment is also used for other purposes in education，也就是评估在教育中还有其它的用途。后面的内容具体说了两个方面，也就是determine which students are, and which students are not, qualified for subsequent phases of education, and also to decide which kinds of education students should receive. 但是在总结的时候我们只需要把这两个观点进行缩写写进我们的答案中即可。

总结：

根据解析我们可以发现，这篇文章的重点有5个：一个总起句，两个原因，一个总结论点，以及一个扩展论点。通过掌握连接词的作用可以帮助我们更好地理清作者的思路，快速地找到和鉴别这些重点。这不仅在SWT中，在阅读和听力中也是帮助我们能更准确地定位答案的信号。

参考答案：

Assessment which is the bridge between teaching and learning is a central process in education, because many students do not learn what they are taught, and teachers cannot teach well without finding out where students are starting from, which means teachers can only assess the result of learning through assessment, and assessment are also used to determine which students are qualified for subsequent phases of education and which kinds of education students should receive.（74words）