Checklists do not capture the many and varied ways that students are 'smart'. The use of a checklist can limit the wide range of possibilities that students have to show what they know. Checklists tend to break learning into a series of small, fragmented bits, rather than recognizing the complexity of the process. An integrated look at learning, that acknowledges and builds on the relationships, gets lost when checklist reports are used. But Not On Report Cards Checklists do have a place in the assessment process.
Many teachers create and use lists when they collect information on students' learning.
Having lists for different skills and topics can help focus observations and remind us what is important. Using the information from checklists and other sources, teachers make professional judgments. These judgments become the comments that make up written report cards. Doctors and pilots use checklists, but they seldom read them to their patients and passengers. These could be useful as scaffolds for teaching and learning, but as reporting systems, especially as a means of improving performance, I suspect checklists have little value.