This review essay describes in detail two recent publications: "Formative Assessment: Improving Learning in Secondary Classrooms" (Centre for Educational Research and Innovation [CERI], 2005, Paris, OECD) and "Towards Coherence Between Classroom Assessment and Accountability" ("The 103rd Yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education, Part 2," Mark Wilson [Ed.], 2004, Chicago, IL, Chicago University Press). This reviewer identifies the key themes and focus of each book, and provides a critique of the main aspects of the work. He concludes that these two books illustrate in very different ways the impact on teachers' practice of the acceptance and use of new assessment methods as part of their pedagogy. Although written for very different audiences, both books advocate the possibilities that formative assessment can bring to assessment regimes and add to the body of literature on this topic. (Contains 2 notes.)