This post will cover wed & thurs, assessment and rich tasks. The article on assessment was about triangulation and COP, cops stands for conversation, observation, product. I have never heard those terms before, and one of my group members said the York Region asked her about those in her interview and expected her to know it. I also heard several of my classmates say their principals want to see learning goals as well as success criteria posted in the classroom. However, we also discussed how in an inquiry lesson, the learning goal should be shared at the end, and if a goal is to be shared at the beginning, it is a process goal. Therefore, if an administrator really wants to see a learning goal presented at the beginning of the lesson, that's how you do it. And in an ideal classroom, learning goals are presented every day, but in reality that doesn't always happen.
Our instructor made reference to a teacher, Mr. So, who blogs and taught grade 6 math. He didn't even do marks until midterms and finals, and instead asked for portfolios. According to his experience, his students assessed themselves 5% lower than he would of, so anyone who thinks allowing students to assess themselves means they would give themselves higher marks, that's not necessarily true. Plus, ultimately it's up to the teacher to see if the students are assessing themselves fairly according to the success criteria.
It seems like there is a trend away from marks, one of our classmates said that England has done away with them for elementary, and apparently the Ottawa board, as well as BC, don't do marks for midterms, only do them for finals, and at midterms, the mark is "incomplete". However, in grade 12, second semester, universities look at those marks, so they put in a mark for the midterm. If that practice were to carry over into elementary, you wouldn't have to give students a mark all year, until the very end, and just give feedback, but of course, that would have to be approved at a board level.
Another big aha! moment I got from yesterday's assessment discussion was you don't really have to do a summative assessment (assessment "of" learning) very often. One of my group mates, in fact made the observation that she was assessing "too much", in the sense that assessment = marks. So she was doing too much assessment of learning. Formative assessment should always be occurring.
Our instructor showed us a cartoon at the very beginning of the assessment lesson, with a principal asking a teacher to drop into a box, all evidence of teaching practice. I think it might be a challenge for a lot of teachers to do that, unless they are being TPA'ed (evaluated). Our instructor said that ideally the administrator would talk to all the students in his class, and I think that's the best way to assess one's teaching practice. Of course, you can observe the class, but that tends to be a "dog and pony show", an acronym I picked up from teacher's college, in which you prepare a super awesome lesson during teaching placement when being evaluated by your faculty advisor. And of course, there should be some documentation to show your administration but that's not the entire picture, talking to the students should be the ultimate measure of a teacher's effectiveness (not meticulous documentation) because ultimately our role as educators is to improve student success
I am really glad Andrew that you brought up the idea of over assessing, as likewise this was an ah ha moment or I sometimes like to call it a yip, yip yip
ReplyDelete(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TStPNqex3uA) moment. lol Sorry I had to make the reference. I really hope it brings back memories for you as well. : )
I do agree that we are at times over assessing, without considering how long it may take a student to absorb the knowledge and apply the learning. Things take time and practice. I thought of it as if you put students on skates for the first time and assessed their ability to fly across their ice with great speed after a short 40 minute lesson. It takes time for someone to used their pre-existing skills of walking and apply it to skating as they test out certain movements. Do I just step, or can can I glide for a bit. It may take several more practices until they realize that if they bend their knees they have more balance or if they shift their weight and push to the side they gain force and a bigger forward push.
At the same time though we want to make sure we are assessment form multiple perspectives, as perhaps the one day we assess their skating ability happens to be the day following a very long hill hike where their muscles aren't as fresh and therefore their performance is not longer reliable.
Assessment is not an easy concept in teacher, probably the hardest however considering how often we assess is one way we can push to attain more accurate results of our student's learning.