Standard 5: Assessment in a multi-racial, multicultural democracy
Educators should understand that assessment is an integral part of teaching, and that children’s developmental and academic interests, accomplishments, and challenges should drive their daily instructional decisions. They should know that various types of assessments, including self-assessment, have different uses, advantages, limitations, and biases. They should understand that appropriate assessment must consider the cultural, familial, and community contexts from which children come. Educators should know how to use a variety of formal and informal assessment tools and strategies to monitor and promote each student’s learning and development; use both formative and summative assessments to determine students’ understanding in each subject area; and be aware of technological tools that can facilitate assessment.
Assessments are an important part of a student’s education. They allow both teachers and students to see what objectives have been met and which still need some work. Teachers should use a variety of formal and informal assessments to truly assess students and understand their learning. Through assessment teachers can learn where students are still struggling and then find ways to make sure they learn the material. Teachers can also learn what types of assessment work for each student. Giving students the opportunity to write a song about a math term might be a great assessment for some students but for others it might be a challenge and they would do better drawing a picture to describe the term or write a definition.
In the book, Making Formative Assessment Work: Effective Practices in the Primary Classroom Hall (2004) advocates for formative assessment in all grades in classrooms. Early on in the book, she states that “each learner interprets, makes sense of and builds his or her own unique representation of what was taught because it gets connected to each learner’s unique set of prior understandings” (Hall, 2004, p. 5). Teachers should always try to make sense of lessons for students and if possible, relate them to prior knowledge or to their lives outside of school. This will make understanding the lesson easier for students and thus allow them to learn even more. Along the way , teachers should look over students’ work and check in with them to see how they are making sense of the topic.
Assessment was originally thought of as just formal tests. However, educators are now learning that teachers can also learn a lot by looking at students’ work throughout their learning and not just on an end- of- unit test. In the article, From Formative Assessment to Assessment For Learning, Stiggins (2005) discusses how teachers are beginning to do more assessments for learning. “Teachers can use many different assessment methods to provide students, teachers, and parents with a continuing stream of evidence of student progress in mastering the knowledge and skills that underpin or lead up to state standards” (Stiggins, 2005, p. 327). By using different methods, teachers can see how students learn best. If students are struggling, it is easier for teachers to help students along the way rather than at the end of a unit when it’s time to move onto something else.
During my practicum, I had students do a lot of informal assessments. In math, the students were learning about how to double numbers, for example 12 doubled is 12+12 which equals 24. I started off introducing this lesson with a book about a magic pot where anything that goes in the pot is doubled. The students then had to create their own magic pot problems where they doubled a number and solved for the equation. After all the students completed their problems, I gathered the students on the rug and had a few students read their problems while the rest of the class tried to figure out the answer. This was the first type of assessment I did. The students were helping each other solve different magic pot problems and it allowed me to see who could solve using really high numbers, who was struggling a bit, and who knew what doubling was. After students shared, I then collected all of their magic pot problems. After school I read through them and looked at each of the student’s work to see how they solved their problem. In appendix 5A, there are a few samples of some students’ magic pot problems and how they solved them.
Another informal assessment I did was with my reading group. My group had just finished reading a Nancy Drew book and in reading workshop, the students were all learning about different character traits. With the completion of the book, I split my group up into groups of two. Each group got a poster and selected a character from the story. They then had to draw the character, write different character traits around the character, and present the poster to the class. The students were so excited by this activity and sharing with the class that they would hide their posters so nobody could see them until they were done. This whole activity provided an excellent assessment for me to see if the students understood what a character trait really was. The students also had to answer questions from their peers about the characters they chose and why they picked certain traits. Almost all the students were able to choose a scene from the book where a character fulfilled a certain trait. In Appendix 5B are images of the students’ posters that they made.
Every week in reading, there would be a different set of words we were working on, for example, consonant-vowel-consanant (CVC) words or how to make plurals (s/es) rules. The students would get a word list and had to pick 8 words at the beginning of the week. Throughout the week, students would work with these 8 words making sentences, building them, finding other words that were similar, and on Friday, the students would each have a quiz to see if they could spell the words. After students were done, teachers would look at the quiz and see which words students struggled with and which words students excelled at. Teachers would then write the correct spelling next to incorrect words. By reviewing the quizzes and letting students see their results, students are able to see where they might have made errors and teachers can work with students who might struggle with a specific phonics rule. In Appendix 5C, are samples of students’ corrected quizzes.
Assessment is important for the education of children. It allows teachers to see the progress students are making. When people think of assessment, they often think of just tesst and quizzes but assessments don’t have to be just that, they can be projects or collections of students’ work. Children can be assessed in a variety of ways and it is our job as educators to discover new methods of assessment so each student can be assessed fairly.
References
Hall, K., & Burke, W. M. (2004). Making formative assessment work effective practice in the primary classroom. Maidenhead: Open University Press.
Stiggins, Rick (2005). From Formative assessment to assessment for learning: a path to success in standards-based schools. p. 324-328. Phi Delta Kappan
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