formative assessment: suriname

Assessment in the 21st Century Classroom: Learning through Conversations

Konrad Glogowski, Ph.D. Executive Director

Teachers Without Borderskonrad@twb.org

Students who are valued do valuable things.

The Plan

Part 1: Formative Assessment

Part 2: Feedback

Learning Together

• Focus on learning from and with each other

• Activities (in groups, with a partner, individual)

• Reflection and planning

Part I

Formative Assessment

Fingers Up!

What research tells us:(Black & Wiliam, 1998)

• Comments have a strong impact on learning, stronger than comments and grades or only grades.

• Quality of feedback is crucial to learning.

• Setting process goals is more effective than setting product goals.

• “Assessment conversations” are effective.

• Formative feedback is associated with more positive attitudes to learning.

• Mastery orientation in assessment is more effective than performance orientation.

Let’s ask the students … about the learning targets, criteria for success, and elements of quality.

How do you share the learning targets, criteria for success, and elements of quality with your students?

Let’s ask the teacher …

What’s the questioning pattern in your classroom?

More…

Let’s ask the teacher …

What’s the questioning climate in your classroom?

ContinuumActivity 1

• Latin root: assidere (“to sit beside another”)

• Provides information that can inform teaching and improve learning while learning is in progress and before summative evaluation (gathers evidence)

• Provides students with feedback that is timely, effective, and meaningful; impacts motivation through student support, clear communication, and engagement

• Focuses on process, not product

• Assessment instruments are used diagnostically and analytically to measure progress, not to determine a final grade.

Formative Assessment

In Summary

• Focused on students (provides support for them and a clear reflection of their progress)

• Informs instruction (helps teachers determine how well they are teaching)

• Is Outcomes-based (is about reaching pre-determined learning outcomes)

Think-Pair-Share

Activity 2

Focused on Students

• Students’ learning needs and styles are addressed and instruction adapted accordingly.

• Individual student achievement is tracked

• Appropriately challenging and motivational learning activities

• Offers students opportunities for improvement

Informs Instruction

• Purposeful selection of teaching strategies

• Assessment is part of instruction

• Guides instructional decisions

Outcomes-Based• Focused on moving towards and achieving learning

outcomes

• Goals and standards are clear to students / shared with them

• Provides clear criteria

• Closes the gap between current level and desired level

• Provides feedback that is clear, actionable, and relevant

• Provides diagnostic information

Formative Assessment

Using assessment information to:

a) track learning

b) provide feedback

c) adjust your instruction to further progress towards learning goals

Definition:

Formative assessment gives teachers information on student progress - information that supports decisions about learning, support, and practice students need to reach the goal.

Formative Assessment is a process:it starts before you start teaching and continues while you teach.

Fingers Up!

Formative Assessment Before Instruction

• Determine students’ existing knowledge and skills

• Learn the depth of their knowledge

• Identify students’ existing attitudes, dispositions, and beliefs

• Identify sources of their information

• Guide student and teacher planning

• Identify the gap between where they are now and the learning outcome

• Prepare students for learning

Respond to pre-instruction evidence:

• What do I know?

• What does it mean?

• How do I make use of this information?

Formative Assessment Before Instruction

Pre-Instruction Case Studies

Activity 3

• Take the temperature/pulse of class progress

• Identify individual progress

• Identify success, points of confusion, decide on additional/different steps

• Monitor changes in thinking, attitudes, etc.

• Provide feedback

• Include self-assessment opportunities

Formative Assessment During Instruction

• Respond to during instruction evidence:

• What does it mean?

• What level of understanding in regards to the learning outcomes is being demonstrated?

• Where should the students be now in their progress to ensure ongoing success?

• How many are where they should be? How many are not?

• How should I respond instructionally to this information?

Formative Assessment During Instruction

During Instruction Case Studies

Activity 4

Part II

Feedback

Feedback?

Activity 5Corners

Feedback:

“... needs to provide information specifically relating to the task or process of learning that fills a gap between

what is understood and what is aimed to be understood”

“Specifically, feedback is more effective when it provides information on correct rather than incorrect

responses and when it builds on changes from previous trails.”

(Hattie & Timperley, 2007).

Definition

In short ...

Feedback must help the students answer the following three questions:

1. Where am I going?2. How am I doing?

3. What actions do I need to take next?

Feedback must be:

1. Clear and specific2. Timely and relevant

3. Actionable and aimed at closing gaps

Effective feedback should:

•Focus on student learning•Focus on the task rather than the learner•Focus on process rather than the product•Focus on progress•Focus on particular qualities of the work•Advise how to improve•Encourage the student to think•Require action that is challenging but achievable•Be specific•Avoid comparison with others•Be understandable to the student

(Swaffield, 2008)

Feedback Strategies

Feedback Strategies

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Feedback Strategies

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Feedback Strategies

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Feedback Strategies

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Feedback Content

Feedback Content

Examples of Feedback Content

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

Good or Bad Feedback?

The following comes from a grade 8 science teacher in Vancouver, Canada, who is commenting on a student project on biofuels:

There’s so much more detail in this draft, Vanessa! Last time we looked at your project you just had an outline and some great ideas. Now I see you added your research. Remember when we talked about including specific examples and practical uses of biofuels? You made it happen here. That section now reads like something written by an expert!

I see that you organized the information more visually and added a chart. Have you thought of making it bigger? I think it would make a very nice large format pull-out/ insert. Ask some of your friends for their opinion. You could still keep the paragraphs you have but the graphic organizer you created could get lost in the middle of all that text. I could book computer lab time for you to work on that.

Any ideas on the video component? What do you think would be better – you, summarizing the information as the author of this report, or the Discovery Channel videos you found? Both?

Have you thought about re-writing the introduction – remember? We talked about how your focus has changed a little since you started.

Next conference: Monday, May 12th.

Strategies for Sharing Learning Targets and Criteria for Success

Strategies for Sharing Learning Targets and Criteria for Success

Activity 73-2-1 Reflection

ContinuumActivity 8

Part III

Preparing for Implementation:Developing an Assessment Instrument

RubricsScoring tools that teachers and students find helpful because:

1. They are tools for both teaching and assessment - they make teachers' expectations clear and show students what they need to do in order to meet those expectations. Rubrics help teachers define what they mean by quality work.

2. They help teachers reduce the amount of time they spend evaluating student work.

3. Rubrics allow teachers to be more consistent and objective in their assessments.

4. Rubrics provide teachers with helpful feedback regarding their instruction and help them identify areas in need of improvement.

Rubrics

Activity 9

Graffiti Wall

Activity 10

Give me Feedback

Activity 11

Impact of Formative Assessment on Teachers

Thank You!

konrad@twb.org