Sharing assessment & grading strategies that help students learn
SHS Staff Development - 5/12/10 - Plans for AFL Objective
For the 2010-2011 school year, teachers in the City of Salem Schools will be required to have a growth objective related to AFL. These AFL objectives will be teacher-created. In other words, there will not a top down division-wide one-size-fits-all objective. Instead, teachers will be setting objectives based on their own content, goals, instructional plans, and personal growth needs. Teachers are encouraged to use this Assessment FOR Learning Ning to help with finding ideas to use for their personal growth objectives.
This post is excerpted from an article written by Stephen Chappuis and Richard Stiggins. It was originally published in Educational Leadership in 2002 and was then reprinted in the book, Assessment FOR Learning: An Action Guide for School Leaders. While professional reading can sometimes be dry, Chappuis and Stiggins really capture the heart of AFL. This excerpt can be used by a school as an overview of what AFL is all about - teaching and learning and getting students to take ownership of their progress. This article also includes practical examples of how teachers and students would practice AFL.
Classroom Assessment for Learning
Classroom assessment that involves students in the process and focuses on increasing learning can motivate rather than merely measure students.
Imagine a classroom assessment as a healthy part of effective teaching and successful learning. At a time when large-scale, external assessments of learning gain political favor and attention, many teachers are discovering how to engage and motivate students using day-to-day classroom assessment for purposes beyond measurement. By applying the principles of what is called assessment for learning, teachers have followed clear research findings of the effects that high-quality, formative assessment can have on student achievement.
… largely absent from the traditional classroom assessment environment is the use of assessment as a tool to promote greater student achievement (Shepard, 2000). In general, the teacher teaches and then tests. The teacher and class move on, leaving unsuccessful students, those who might not learn at the established pace and within a fixed time frame, to finish low in the rank order. This assessment model is founded on two outdated beliefs: that to increase learning we should increase student anxiety and that comparison with more successful peers will motivate low performers to do better.
By contrast, assessment for learning occurs during the teaching and learning process rather than after it and has as its primary focus the ongoing improvement of learning for all students (Assessment Reform Group, 1999; Crooks, 2001; Shepard, 2000). Teachers who assess for learning use day-to-day classroom assessment activities to involve students directly and deeply in their own learning, increasing their confidence and motivations to learn by emphasizing progress and achievement rather than failure and defeat (Stiggins, 1999; 2001). In the assessment for learning model, assessment is an instructional tool that promotes learning rather than an event designed solely for the purpose of evaluation and assigning grades. And when a student become involved in the assessment process, assessment for learning begins to look more like teaching and less like testing (Davies, 2000).
STUDENT-INVOLVED ASSESSMENT
Research shows that classroom assessments that provide accurate, descriptive feedback to students and involve them in the assessment process can improve learning (Black and William, 1998). As a result, assessment for learning means more than just assessing students often, more than providing the teacher with assessment results to revise instruction. In assessment for learning, both teacher and student use classroom assessment information to modify teaching and learning activities. Teachers use assessment information formatively when they:
• Pretest before a unit of study and adjust instruction for individuals or the entire group.
• Analyze which students need more practice.
• Continually revise instruction on the basis of results.
• Reflect on the effectiveness of their own teaching practices.
• Confer with students regarding their strengths and the areas that need improvement.
• Facilitate peer tutoring, matching students who demonstrate understanding with those who do not.
We tend to think of students as passive participants in assessment rather than engaged users of the information that assessment can produce. What we should be asking is, “How can students use assessment to take responsibility for and improve their own learning?”
Student involvement in assessment doesn’t mean that students control decisions regarding what will or won’t be learned or tested. It doesn’t mean that they assign their own grades. Instead, student involvement means that students learn to use assessment information to manage their own learning so that they understand how they learn best, know exactly where they are in relation to the defined learning targets, and plan and take the next steps in their learning.
Students engage in the assessment for learning process when they use assessment information to set goals, make learning decisions related to their own improvement, develop an understanding of what quality work looks like, self-assess, and communicate their status and progress toward established learning goals. Students involved in their own assessment might:
• Determine the attributes of good performance. Students look at teacher-supplied anonymous samples of strong student performances and list the qualities that make them strong, learning the language of quality and the concepts behind strong performance.
• Use scoring guides to evaluate real work samples. Students can start with just one criterion in the guide and expand to others as they become more proficient in scoring. As students engage in determining the characteristics of quality work and scoring actual work samples, they become better able to evaluate their own work. Using the language of the scoring guide, they can identify their areas of strength and set goals for improvement - in essence, planning the next steps in their learning.
• Revise anonymous work samples. Students go beyond evaluating work to using criteria to improve the quality of work sample. They can develop a revision plan that outlines improvements, or write a letter to the creator of the original work offering advice on how to improve the sample. This activity also helps students know what to do before they revise their own work.
• Create practice tests or test items based on their understanding of the learning targets and the essential concepts in the class material. Students can work in pairs to identify what they think should be on the test and to generate sample test items and responses.
• Communicate with others about their growth and determine when they are nearing success. Students achieve a deeper understanding of themselves and the material that they are attempting to learn when they describe the quality of their own work. Letters to parents, written self-reflections, and conferences with teachers and parents in which students outline the process they used to create a product allow students to share what they know and describe their progress toward the learning target. By accumulating evidence of their own improvement in growth portfolios, students can refer to specific stages in their growth and celebrate their achievement with others.
Source: From "Classroom Assessment for Learning," by S, Chappuis and R.J. Stiggins, 2002, Educational Leadership, 60(1), pp. 40-44. Copyright 2002 by ASCD.
Today's faculty meeting is designed to generate some ideas for AFL growth objectives in a collaborative fashion that will help everyone at SHS make the most of this division requirement and opportunity for growth.
Here's what you need to do:
1. Read the blog post AFL - IT'S ABOUT STUDENTS TAKING OWNERSHIP OF LEARNING. (It is reposted at the bottom of this forum discussion as well.)
2. In your group discuss specific ideas from the blog post (or from any other blogs or source of ideas) that you could see using as a personal growth objective next year.
3. Based on your discussions create and post at least 1 sample AFL growth objective per group. Post those sample objectives and replies to this forum discussion using the reply feature at the bottom of the page. Remember to use MBO format as you write/post your sample growth objective.
ex. By the end of the first semester I will have created and taught a unit of study in which students will use a rubric to daily assess their understanding of the concepts being taught. This rubric will then be used by students to predict how they will do on the summative unit assessment and as a study guide for that assessment. Post-assessment the rubric will be used by students to determine what they could do to improve their performance on future graded assessments. This will be evidenced by my sharing with my evaluator sample rubrics created by students..
This post is excerpted from an article written by Stephen Chappuis and Richard Stiggins. It was originally published in Educational Leadership in 2002 and was then reprinted in the book, Assessment FOR Learning: An Action Guide for School Leaders. While professional reading can sometimes be dry, Chappuis and Stiggins really capture the heart of AFL. This excerpt can be used by a school as an overview of what AFL is all about - teaching and learning and getting students to take ownership of their progress. This article also includes practical examples of how teachers and students would practice AFL.
Classroom Assessment for Learning
Classroom assessment that involves students in the process and focuses on increasing learning can motivate rather than merely measure students.
Imagine a classroom assessment as a healthy part of effective teaching and successful learning. At a time when large-scale, external assessments of learning gain political favor and attention, many teachers are discovering how to engage and motivate students using day-to-day classroom assessment for purposes beyond measurement. By applying the principles of what is called assessment for learning, teachers have followed clear research findings of the effects that high-quality, formative assessment can have on student achievement.
… largely absent from the traditional classroom assessment environment is the use of assessment as a tool to promote greater student achievement (Shepard, 2000). In general, the teacher teaches and then tests. The teacher and class move on, leaving unsuccessful students, those who might not learn at the established pace and within a fixed time frame, to finish low in the rank order. This assessment model is founded on two outdated beliefs: that to increase learning we should increase student anxiety and that comparison with more successful peers will motivate low performers to do better.
By contrast, assessment for learning occurs during the teaching and learning process rather than after it and has as its primary focus the ongoing improvement of learning for all students (Assessment Reform Group, 1999; Crooks, 2001; Shepard, 2000). Teachers who assess for learning use day-to-day classroom assessment activities to involve students directly and deeply in their own learning, increasing their confidence and motivations to learn by emphasizing progress and achievement rather than failure and defeat (Stiggins, 1999; 2001). In the assessment for learning model, assessment is an instructional tool that promotes learning rather than an event designed solely for the purpose of evaluation and assigning grades. And when a student become involved in the assessment process, assessment for learning begins to look more like teaching and less like testing (Davies, 2000).
STUDENT-INVOLVED ASSESSMENT
Research shows that classroom assessments that provide accurate, descriptive feedback to students and involve them in the assessment process can improve learning (Black and William, 1998). As a result, assessment for learning means more than just assessing students often, more than providing the teacher with assessment results to revise instruction. In assessment for learning, both teacher and student use classroom assessment information to modify teaching and learning activities. Teachers use assessment information formatively when they:
• Pretest before a unit of study and adjust instruction for individuals or the entire group.
• Analyze which students need more practice.
• Continually revise instruction on the basis of results.
• Reflect on the effectiveness of their own teaching practices.
• Confer with students regarding their strengths and the areas that need improvement.
• Facilitate peer tutoring, matching students who demonstrate understanding with those who do not.
We tend to think of students as passive participants in assessment rather than engaged users of the information that assessment can produce. What we should be asking is, “How can students use assessment to take responsibility for and improve their own learning?”
Student involvement in assessment doesn’t mean that students control decisions regarding what will or won’t be learned or tested. It doesn’t mean that they assign their own grades. Instead, student involvement means that students learn to use assessment information to manage their own learning so that they understand how they learn best, know exactly where they are in relation to the defined learning targets, and plan and take the next steps in their learning.
Students engage in the assessment for learning process when they use assessment information to set goals, make learning decisions related to their own improvement, develop an understanding of what quality work looks like, self-assess, and communicate their status and progress toward established learning goals. Students involved in their own assessment might:
• Determine the attributes of good performance. Students look at teacher-supplied anonymous samples of strong student performances and list the qualities that make them strong, learning the language of quality and the concepts behind strong performance.
• Use scoring guides to evaluate real work samples. Students can start with just one criterion in the guide and expand to others as they become more proficient in scoring. As students engage in determining the characteristics of quality work and scoring actual work samples, they become better able to evaluate their own work. Using the language of the scoring guide, they can identify their areas of strength and set goals for improvement - in essence, planning the next steps in their learning.
• Revise anonymous work samples. Students go beyond evaluating work to using criteria to improve the quality of work sample. They can develop a revision plan that outlines improvements, or write a letter to the creator of the original work offering advice on how to improve the sample. This activity also helps students know what to do before they revise their own work.
• Create practice tests or test items based on their understanding of the learning targets and the essential concepts in the class material. Students can work in pairs to identify what they think should be on the test and to generate sample test items and responses.
• Communicate with others about their growth and determine when they are nearing success. Students achieve a deeper understanding of themselves and the material that they are attempting to learn when they describe the quality of their own work. Letters to parents, written self-reflections, and conferences with teachers and parents in which students outline the process they used to create a product allow students to share what they know and describe their progress toward the learning target. By accumulating evidence of their own improvement in growth portfolios, students can refer to specific stages in their growth and celebrate their achievement with others.
Source: From "Classroom Assessment for Learning," by S, Chappuis and R.J. Stiggins, 2002, Educational Leadership, 60(1), pp. 40-44. Copyright 2002 by ASCD.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Danyel Dawn Brugh on
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By the end of the first semester, I will have implemented a method of pre-testing students to determine their prior knowledge and what my primary focus should be in the new unit. This will be evidenced by my lesson plans and student success.
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Permalink Reply by Justin Halterman on
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Fred Campbell, Mark Ingerson, Thad Synder, Justin Halterman
Through the course of the 2010-2011 school year, students will generate their own review questions for end of unit examinations. In standard level courses, this can be used as "Do Now" acitivities or "Exit Slip" activities. From a review standpoint, the questions can be taken by the teacher and posed to the class which will allow us to check for inconsistencies in answers and assess student comprehension. In advanced classes, this can be an opportunity for a graded assignment and allow students and teachers to critically review materials on examinations, tests, etc. This will be evidenced by collected sample questions for specific units.
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Permalink Reply by Scott Habeeb on
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Posted by Pam Carter:
During the 2010-2011 School year, we will increase student learning by using practice assessment via paper or technology to assess student weaknesses in order to identify students who may need additional practice. This may come in the form of short non-graded quizzes, surveys, or journal writings.
Example...give the students the word 'Civilization' and ask them to write 3 sentences on what the word means.
Students can then list an example from the current unit of study.
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By the end of the first semester, I will have implemented the idea of giving a unit pre-test to analyze student knowledge on previously taught topics. This will be evidenced by sharing the pre-test with my evaluator and viewing powerschool grades.
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B. Moody, L. Armistead, A. Burns, P. Blue, V. Furrier
By the end of first semester, I will choose at least 2 different types of problems that require multiple steps to solve and I will provide a clear model and corresponding markscheme in order to improve my student's ability to preform successfully on these types of problems. Evidence will be the markscheme or teacher graded student work or student graded student work.
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By the end of the first semester, my IB students will have critiqued samples of one another's writing for the purpose of recognizing and learning from one another's excellent performance. Evidence will be writing samples with highlighted indicators of excellence.
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Students have difficulty answering questions in science completely. They don't use discriptive words or proper terminology. They don't want to make the effort to find information in a book or on the lab.
Our goal is to help students be more successful in their scientific writing through evaluation of samples of good and bad as well as creating a step by step writing process to achieve solid science communication with effective writing skills and techniques.
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Permalink Reply by Emily on
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Our group discussed using to better prepare for the SOL Writing Test, possibly using anchor papers to provide examples of writing scores along the whole spectrum of scoring,
By the end of the first semester I will have created and taught a unit of study in which students will evaluate anonymous student writing samples using the SOL Writing Rubric in order to demonstrate their understanding of effective writing as defined by the Commonwealth of Virginia. They will then use this same rubric to assess their own writing and determine how their writing meets SOL standards. This will be evidenced by my sharing with my evaluator samples of student-assessed essays.
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Posted by Augusta Freedman
Students achieving a skill level required will assist/tutor/remediate students who still need to reach that skill level. This will be assesed by the teacher and students observing that all students have achieved that level.
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Permalink Reply by Jen Martell on
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Special Education AFL objective (to be used in supplemental, self-contained and resource classes):
By May, 2011, my students and I will have developed a notebook for each of them in which they will establish daily or weekly objectives and record their daily accomplishments in class. The notebook will be reviewed periodically by student and teacher to determine whether objectives have been met and the student may move on, or whether more time needs to be spent on the particular topic. Evidence will include examples of student notebooks.
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By the end of the first grading period, the guidance department will meet in small groups or individually will all students in grades 9 and 12. Each student access his/her own information in parent portal. Evaluation will be done by the student showing their ability to list the assignments in each course.
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Permalink Reply by Jim Paxton on
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Bev Allman, Debbie Stratton, Rachel Sailer, Jim Paxton
By June 2011, I will present to my evaluator evidence of Family and Consumer Sciences/Performing Arts co-curricular activities through FCCLA/Marching Band/Theater productions that focuses on organization, planning, and production of an adjudicated or student adjudicated exhibit/performance in culinary/child development/marching band/theater. Post-assessment of this evaluation will be used by students to determine levels of performance positions. Sample rubrics will be shared with my evaluator.
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