Research & Assessment

For students, we collect it as evidence and use it to help them to improve their learning

For teachers, we do it to improve our teaching and see what we can fix to allow all students to work to their best ability

Using homework as assessment does not prove anything because for all we know, students may not have even done it

Do not use ALL their grades in a subject for assessment, use MOST RECENT

Frequent evaluation and grades may have a negative impact, because they may lose motivation

Different sources are used: 1) Observation, 2) Conversations, and 3) Student products (Watt, pg 17)

PACK THEIR PARACHUTE: all students are DIFFERENT, and as long as they get to their end goal, it does NOT matter how long it takes to get there.

Not what we grew up learning, it was always one try

Taking marks off for late work will do more harm than good, it is ok to apply consequences but not take off grades, it is likely to discourage them and we want them to IMPROVE.

Regardless of a student's ethnicity, SES, gender, learning style, you CAN assess their abilities

As long as we do not change the whole criteria we can aid/asess them in other ways. For example. if ESL, try to put the criteria in their first language

single point Rubrics are faster and easier for teachers and much easier for students to understand- rather than multiple columns, there are two- what the student did really well on, and what they can do to improve

Not just the same old levels 1,2,3,4 rubrics from when we were in school

Assessment→feedback→learning

Formative assessment is beneficial as it can improve both teaching and learning as it is an ongoing exchange between both teacher and student

So many different kinds, such as checklists, Peer and self assessment, anecdotal notes, rubrics- and these can be used in both primary and junior grades. They can also be used for formative, summative, self, and diagnostic assessment.

Subtopic

Needs to be TIMELY, especially for young students who may forget shortly after their assignment what it was even about

Regenerates talent

Expands possibilities

Helps them because its specific (opposed to "information dump")

Effective feedback=structure (identify what was done well first, what needs improvement, how to improve), focus (relate to learn goals and success criteria), amount (don’t want to overwhelm, so prioritize)

Use feedback to develop student's self awareness: Descriptive feedback (detailed, specific) models what kind of thinking you want students to do as self –assessors

Focus on most important feedback, do not put piles of comments, students will be overwhelmed

Is a BASIS for consistent and meaningful feedback

Categories involve: 1) Knowledge (meaning and significance), 2) Application (select appropriate tool and fit it), 3) Communication (can you explain how you did it?), and 4) Thinking (go through a variety of solutions and pick the one you think fits most)

Can help create criteria for assessment purposes and tells you want you can do to get your students to a level 4