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There are many ways to assess student achievement. The main objective of

assessment for students is to guide instruction. For example, when analyzing test

results, it is only useful if the teacher can extract information that will guide

instruction. In education we have become dependent on grades or the final

product. We need to move away from that philosophy and move toward a way of

assessment that provides the teacher with insight about what the student

understands. A way to do this is formally and informally.

I prefer many ways of informally testing students. The main way that I

informally assess are through: Grading graphic organizers, examining quick

writes, and by questioning during discussion. The graphic organizers can be a way

of assessing if students are engaged in the subject, and are participating in the

activity. A KWL chart is a good way to informally assess students to analyze if

they had made connections to the topic. I also prefer to include several quick

writes and questioning in my instruction. Quick writes are not graded for

grammatical conventions, but rather to see how well the students answer the

question. Quick writes are also a great way of providing participation points too.

Providing higher-level questions during class instruction is also a great way to see

if the students are understanding the topic of class discussion. This type of

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formative assessment allows the teacher to make immediate adjustments to

instruction.

With summative assessments, or more formal assessments, I like to use

two strategies. One would be a traditional multiple-choice, short answer format;

and the other would be a performance assessment. For example a performance

assessment could be a paper, or project that is graded using several different

criterion. I dont like to use the multiple-choice, short answer format tests

frequently because they account for lower level Blooms thinking. Multiple choice

questions generally in the remembering category of Blooms Taxonomy.

My favorite type of formal assessment is the performance assessment. I

am a firm believer that real learning can take place in this category. In my student

teaching placement, I used two performance assessments for the different

sections that I had in the Language Arts classroom. For the advanced students I

had created a performance assessment that required the students to synthesize

information that they had learned from reading the novella Animal Farm. The

students were to create a travel brochure that related to George Orwell, who

wrote Animal Farm. Students were required to relate the locations of George

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Orwells life to Animal Farm. Every student did really well, and I was able to

analyze what the students learned quite easily through their assignment.

To conclude, in the future I would like to include more performance

assessments in my teaching. I am a firm believer that you are able to assess a

wider range of skills, and you can align the assessments to a wide range of

standards, then you will accomplish more educational achievement with the

students.