Assessment is Continual
In my last two practicums I was able to see many different ways to assess students in their learning both formative and summative. We are definitely stepping into this career at the cusp of change and new direction. You can feel a slight shift in the movement towards gradeless marking yet we are not quite there.
In my PRAC 490 K/1 we used the iPad to show parents how their child was doing in class. Pictures, videos and small notes every week went home to keep up to date and on top of the students learning and growing. This tool was a very easy way to stay on top of the continual formative assessing that happens in the classroom.
During my time in PRAC 491, I had the privilege to work with 2 classroom teachers. One worked Monday-Wednesday and the other teacher was Thursday and Friday both teaching opposite subjects. At the very beginning of PRAC 491, I came into the classroom with having a substitute teacher in for apporoximately 1 month and a half before me. My Monday-Wednesday teacher had been sick for quite awhile before my practicum started and she was still off when I started. So my Thurs/Fri. teacher stepped up and worked the whole week with me until my other teacher was well enough to come back to work. In that time though, we didn’t know where the students were at with their learning and with my teacher not usually teaching those days, we had to come up with our own way to assess where the students were in order for me to move forward. We made our own assessment worksheets for the students to answer questions and from there we knew were to start with my math and science units. It was a HUGE learning curve for me because I had to readjust all of the unit planning that I had started but extremely beneficial in the long run because I then knew what I had to do to meet the students where they were at. I learned that being a teacher is much like an ADST lesson. You create, then adjust, create again, then you might take something out, then create again until it is the final product.
In my PRAC 491 I was able to co-create a single point rubric for our Social Studies Ancient Civilizations unit. I gave the students the basics of what I wanted in the rubric then let the studens pair up with a friend and come up with their own list of criteria they wanted in their rubric and what they wanted to be assessed on in the final presentation. This rubric was used for me to assess the students presentations as well has having a peer review their presentation. After their presentation was finished, they used this tool to self-assess their own learning as a reflection tool. This was a huge success and was easy for the students to use as well!
In math I found it quiet difficult to assess where the students were when it came to answering the questions during our learning discussions. There were only a few students who put their hands up to answer questions and even less coming up to the board and answering questions on the board (which some enjoyed very much!) But my dilemma was focuses on the ones that weren’t answering the questions and the ones that didn’t want to volunteer and come up to the board to answer questions. My solution to this was to have everyone with their own whiteboards. They were able to show me their math equations and answers from their desks without having to say anything in class and were less vulernable in case of the wrong answer. I was able to see who understood and who didn’t. Which students needed help and how many were ready to move forward.
had to create their own catapult. They kept track of how they adjusted their materials
and what they changed as they went along.
their understanding of Beginning, Middle, and End of the story as well as characters,
the students recreated the play for me at the puppet theatre station.
in order to assess where the students were at by taking a little bit from one sheet and
a little bit from another…only using what I needed.
