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Assessment and Measurements

 

 

 

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Essential Questions:

How can we get our students to own and be part of assessing their learning?

Assessment is Learning

When students know about the goals of instruction, they can give the teacher evidence about their own understanding in relation to those goals. The more students can take on the role of self-assessment, the more they can move toward being able to decide their own next steps. 


As an example, What do we want the students to take away with them after completing the assignment:
  The goals for this assignment is:

  • Find design challenges in the story that we can choose to create a useful design project.

  • Use math and science concepts in creating your design.

  • Work collaborative with your follow team mates.

  • Using divergent thinking during the design process.

Using the goals and the 4 levels of expertise listed below you and the students can create the rubrics to use during the project.

Exceeds expectations Highly creative, inventive, mature understanding of design process.  Much original thought.  Completion of the assignment with attention to detail and thoughtful planning. Has included well thought out learning objectives for the students.
3  Meets the full scope of work:   Detailed and consistent evidence of how to use tools of the design process. Has a grasp of the concepts. Understands the role that thinking skills play in this interdisciplinary project.
2  Progressing to achieve full level:  Beginning of/ or some evidence of understanding the design process. Is beginning to use thinking skills in the lesson plan. Has not developed the use of learning objectives in the lesson plan.
1  Needs support to understand concepts
: Shows little or no understanding of the design process or thinking skills.

 

Formative assessment … How do we have students involved and why.  What measurements are we going to use during the project to help the students get feedback on what they are doing:  We can provide feedback at How well they gather, process, apply and analyze there data.  The data points can be applied to the following:

  1. Understanding concepts

  2. Use of processing skills

  3. Attitude about the project

 

How did you connect the rubric to the requirements ?

explicitly making a connection between requirements and rubrics?  It seems like this is a good way to have students create their own rubric...Mark

 

the formative assessment cycle, a model that can be applied to assess any science teaching goals, including

science concepts, science process skills and scientific attitudes

 

 

This exercise gives the teacher the opportunity to have some exciting dialogue with the students about what they are going to do and how will they measure success. Questions can be raised about their previous knowledge of the engineering design process, what do they do if they make a mistake, What goals should we be looking to achieve, how do I work as a team member, How am I going to learn and so forth.

This time is a great place to follow up on students responses to encourage clarity and enforce their thinking skills by asking questions such as:

  • Can you restate that?
  • Could you clarify that further?
  • What are some alternatives?
  • How can you defend your position?

 

Student Self-Assessment

Student participation is a key component of successful assessment strategies at every step.
If students are to participate effectively in the process, they need to be clear about the target
and the criteria for good work, to assess their own efforts in light of the criteria, and to share responsibility in taking action in light of the feedback.”
National Research Council. Classroom Assessment and the National Science Education Standards. (Washington, DC.: National Academy  Press, 2000) p. 1

Path to Self-assessment

Year

Tasks

K-2 grade

Understanding vocabulary; tasks, goals, reviews, test,  evidence

3

Role play using the words; feedback, gathering, observing. Ask them  “What have you learned from your mistakes?”.

4

Teacher build simple Assessments and rubrics with the students  

5

Student is setting simple goals and self assessments.

Project Zero ... Harvard Education Graduate School
Assessment is not just a method for measuring students' thinking and understanding of a particular subject. Assessment can be a powerful approach for teaching thinking as well. Teaching thinking through assessment helps set standards for the types of thinking performances that lead to deeper understanding.

Thinking-centered assessment provides information on students' understanding performances by highlighting both the strengths and the weaknesses of students' thinking. Such information is crucial for helping teachers develop follow-up lessons and instruction.

Teaching thinking through assessment helps provide teachers and students with a common set of tools they can use to communicate and articulate their ideas about what's good and not so good about their thinking. Teaching thinking through assessment helps teachers consider and specifically target the types of thinking they value in the lessons and projects they develop.

Teaching thinking through assessment gives teachers a number of thinking-centered lenses through which to examine students' thinking and understanding performances. Employing a variety of thinking-centered assessments also helps students’ better gauge how well they are thinking and learning.

 

Defining Formative and Summative Assessments
The terms "formative" and "summative" do not have to be difficult, yet the definitions have become confusing in the past few years. This is especially true for formative assessment. In a balanced assessment system, both summative and formative assessments are an integral part of information gathering. Depend too much on one or the other and the reality of student achievement in your classroom becomes unclear.

Summative Assessments are given periodically to determine at a particular point in time what students know and do not know. Many associate summative assessments only with standardized tests such as state assessments, but they are also used at and are an important part of district and classroom programs. Summative assessment at the district/classroom level is an accountability measure that is generally used as part of the grading process. The list is long, but here are some examples of summative assessments:

  • State assessments
  • District benchmark or interim assessments
  • End-of-unit or chapter tests
  • End-of-term or semester exams
  • Scores that are used for accountability for schools (AYP) and students (report card grades).

The key is to think of summative assessment as a means to gauge, at a particular point in time, student learning relative to content standards. Although the information that is gleaned from this type of assessment is important, it can only help in evaluating certain aspects of the learning process. Because they are spread out and occur after instruction every few weeks, months, or once a year, summative assessments are tools to help evaluate the effectiveness of programs, school improvement goals, alignment of curriculum, or student placement in specific programs. Summative assessments happen too far down the learning path to provide information at the classroom level and to make instructional adjustments and interventions during the learning process. It takes formative assessment to accomplish this.

Formative Assessment is part of the instructional process. When incorporated into classroom practice, it provides the information needed to adjust teaching and learning while they are happening. In this sense, formative assessment informs both teachers and students about student understanding at a point when timely adjustments can be made. These adjustments help to ensure students achieve, targeted standards-based learning goals within a set time frame. Although formative assessment strategies appear in a variety of formats, there are some distinct ways to distinguish them from summative assessments.

One distinction is to think of formative assessment as "practice." We do not hold students accountable in "grade book fashion" for skills and concepts they have just been introduced to or are learning. We must allow for practice. Formative assessment helps teachers determine next steps during the learning process as the instruction approaches the summative assessment of student learning. A good analogy for this is the road test that is required to receive a driver's license. What if, before getting your driver's license, you received a grade every time you sat behind the wheel to practice driving? What if your final grade for the driving test was the average of all of the grades you received while practicing? Because of the initial low grades you received during the process of learning to drive, your final grade would not accurately reflect your ability to drive a car. In the beginning of learning to drive, how confident or motivated to learn would you feel? Would any of the grades you received provide you with guidance on what you needed to do next to improve your driving skills? Your final driving test, or summative assessment, would be the accountability measure that establishes whether or not you have the driving skills necessary for a driver's license—not a reflection of all the driving practice that leads to it. The same holds true for classroom instruction, learning, and assessment.

Another distinction that underpins formative assessment is student involvement. If students are not involved in the assessment process, formative assessment is not practiced or implemented to its full effectiveness. Students need to be involved both as assessors of their own learning and as resources to other students. There are numerous strategies teachers can implement to engage students. In fact, research shows that the involvement in and ownership of their work increases students' motivation to learn. This does not mean the absence of teacher involvement. To the contrary, teachers are critical in identifying learning goals, setting clear criteria for success, and designing assessment tasks that provide evidence of student learning.

One of the key components of engaging students in the assessment of their own learning is providing them with descriptive feedback as they learn. In fact, research shows descriptive feedback to be the most significant instructional strategy to move students forward in their learning. Descriptive feedback provides students with an understanding of what they are doing well, links to classroom learning, and gives specific input on how to reach the next step in the learning progression. In other words, descriptive feedback is not a grade, a sticker, or "good job!" A significant body of research indicates that such limited feedback does not lead to improved student learning.

There are many classroom instructional strategies that are part of the repertoire of good teaching. When teachers use sound instructional practice for the purpose of gathering information on student learning, they are applying this information in a formative way. In this sense, formative assessment is pedagogy and clearly cannot be separated from instruction. It is what good teachers do. The distinction lies in what teachers actually do with the information they gather. How is it being used to inform instruction? How is it being shared with and engaging students? It's not teachers just collecting information/data on student learning; it's what they do with the information they collect.

Some of the instructional strategies that can be used formatively include the following:

·         Criteria and goal setting with students engages them in instruction and the learning process by creating clear expectations. In order to be successful, students need to understand and know the learning target/goal and the criteria for reaching it. Establishing and defining quality work together, asking students to participate in establishing norm behaviors for classroom culture, and determining what should be included in criteria for success are all examples of this strategy. Using student work, classroom tests, or exemplars of what is expected helps students understand where they are, where they need to be, and an effective process for getting there.

·         Observations go beyond walking around the room to see if students are on task or need clarification. Observations assist teachers in gathering evidence of student learning to inform instructional planning. This evidence can be recorded and used as feedback for students about their learning or as anecdotal data shared with them during conferences.

·         Questioning strategies should be embedded in lesson/unit planning. Asking better questions allows an opportunity for deeper thinking and provides teachers with significant insight into the degree and depth of understanding. Questions of this nature engage students in classroom dialogue that both uncovers and expands learning. An "exit slip" at the end of a class period to determine students' understanding of the day's lesson or quick checks during instruction such as "thumbs up/down" or "red/green" (stop/go) cards are also examples of questioning strategies that elicit immediate information about student learning. Helping students ask better questions is another aspect of this formative assessment strategy.

·         Self and peer assessment helps to create a learning community within a classroom. Students who can reflect while engaged in meta-cognitive thinking are involved in their learning. When students have been involved in criteria and goal setting, self-evaluation is a logical step in the learning process. With peer evaluation, students see each other as resources for understanding and checking for quality work against previously established criteria.

·         Student record keeping helps students better understand their own learning as evidenced by their classroom work. This process of students keeping ongoing records of their work not only engages students, it also helps them, beyond a "grade," to see where they started and the progress they are making toward the learning goal.

All of these strategies are integral to the formative assessment process, and they have been suggested by models of effective middle school instruction.

Balancing Assessment
As teachers gather information/data about student learning, several categories may be included. In order to better understand student learning, teachers need to consider information about the products (paper or otherwise) students create and tests they take, observational notes, and reflections on the communication that occurs between teacher and student or among students. When a comprehensive assessment program at the classroom level balances formative and summative student learning/achievement information, a clear picture emerges of where a student is relative to learning targets and standards. Students should be able to articulate this shared information about their own learning. When this happens, student-led conferences, a formative assessment strategy, are valid. The more we know about individual students as they engage in the learning process, the better we can adjust instruction to ensure that all students continue to achieve by moving forward in their learning.


References

Black, P., Harrison, C., Lee, C., Marshall, B., & Wiliam, D. (2003) Assessment for Learning: Putting it into practice. Berkshire, England: Open University Press.

Butler, D.L. & Winnie, P.H. (1995) Feedback and self-regulated learning: a theoretical synthesis. Review of Educational Research, 65(3), 245-281.

Sadler, D.R. (1998) Formative assessment: revisiting the territory. Assessment in Education, 5(1), 77-84.


Catherine Garrison is a professional development specialist at Measured Progress, Dover, New Hampshire. cgarrison@measuredprogress.org

Michael Ehringhaus, Ph.D., is director of professional development services at Measured Progress, Dover, New Hampshire. mehringhaus@measuredprogress.org

For more information about Measured Progress, visit www.measuredprogress.org

 

 

 

 

  Prepared by  Bill Wolfson.  Copyright © 2009-2010
Last Updated 
05/08/2010