Real time embedded assessments

Learning-Centered Leadership Development Program for

Practicing and Aspiring Principals

August 8-10

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Real Time Embedded Assessments

Goals:

1. To understand the different types of assessments.

2. To understand the impact formative assessments have on student achievement.

3. To understand the how teacher evaluations, both formative and summative impact student achievement.

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Real Time Embedded Assessments

What are assessments?

What is the purpose of these assessments?

Do these assessments provide the data we need?

Do grades motivate students?

Should teachers take responsibility for student learning?

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Real Time Embedded Assessments

Kellough (1999) lists the purposes of asssessements• To assist student learning• To identify students’ strengths and weaknesses• To assess the effectiveness of a particular instructional

strategy• To assess and improve the effectiveness of curriculum

programs• To assess and improve teaching effectiveness• To provide data that assist in decision making• To communicate with and involve parents

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Real Time Embedded Assessments

Kellough also suggests that students need the answers to the following questions:

• Where am I going?• Where am I now?• How do I get where I am going?• How will I know when I get there?• Am I on the right track for getting there?

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Real Time Embedded Assessments

The American Association for Higher Education (AAHE) has established nine principles for implementing instructional assessments:

• The assessment of student learning begins with educational values.

• Assessment is most effective when it reflects an understanding of learning as multidimensional, integrated, and revealed in performance over time.

• Assessment works best when the programs it seeks to improve have clear, explicitly stated purposes.

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AAHE Principles (cont.)

• Assessment requires attention to outcomes but also and equally to the experiences that lead to those outcomes.

• Assessment works best when it is ongoing, not episodic.• Assessment fosters wider improvement when

representatives from across the educational community are involved.

• Assessment makes a difference when it begins with issues of use and illuminates questions that people really care about.

• Assessment is most likely to lead to improvement when it is part of a larger set of conditions that promote change.

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AAHE Principles (cont.)

• Through assessment educators meet responsibilities to students.

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Types of Assessments

Marzano (2010) suggests that there are three types of assessments

1. Obtrusive

2. Unobtrusive

3. Student generated

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Types of Assessments (cont.)

• Normed Referenced

• Criterion Referenced

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Types of Assessments (cont.)

• Authentic

• Portfolios

• Observation

• Formative

• Summative

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Summative Assessments

• State tests (MEAP, MME, etc)• District benchmark• Chapter tests• Unit tests• Final exams

• All are graded in some form

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Formative Assessments - definitions

Bell and Cowie (2001) “the process used by teachers and students to recognize and respond to learning in order to enhance that learning, during the learning.”

Popham (2008) as a planned process in which assessment-elicited evidence of students’ status is used by teachers to adjust their ongoing instructional procedures or by students to adjust their current learning tactics.

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Formative Assessments - definitions

Garrison and Ehringhaus (2011) view formative assessments as providing the information necessary to adjust teaching and learning while they are happening.

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Formative Assessments

Research has shown the formative assessments implemented properly provide dramatic gains in learning.

The work of Black and William (1998) found that the gains in learning by using formative assessments were “amongst the largest ever reported for educational interventions.”

Formative assessment works and there is no particular formula to follow and it appears to work very well for slow learners (Popham, 2008)

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Is This Formative Assessment?

Measuring Poetry

Robin Williams Video from the

Dead Poet Society

http://youtu.be/tmayC2AdkNw

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Formative Assessment

Marzano (2010) explains the elements of formative assessment

• Formative assessment is a process, not any particular test

• It is used not just by teachers, but by both teachers and students

• Formative assessment takes place during instruction

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Marzano’s Elements (cont.)

• It provides assessment-based feedback to teachers and students

• The function of this feedback is to help teachers and students make adjustments that will improve students’ achievement of intended curricular aims

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Formative Assessment w/o Technology

• Robin Williams’ In Class Assignment

from Dead Poet Society cut 4 3:28 minutes

http://youtu.be/2EdWgsTUhmI

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Feedback

Effective feedback is critical in the formative assessment process.

Students need to know what skills and knowledge they are to gain, how close are they to achieving those skills, and what do they need to do next in order to be a successful learner.

Provides motivation for students.

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Feedback

Hattie and Timperley (2007) model for feedback

• Feedback about the task – whether answers are right or wrong or directions to get more information. 

• Feedback about the processing of the task – strategies used or strategies that could be used.

• Feedback about self-regulation – feedback about student self evaluation or self confidence.

• Feedback about the student as a person.

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Feedback

Marzano (2003) best ways to use feedback

• Feedback should be “corrective” in nature – provide students with an explanation of what they did right and wrong.

• Feedback should be timely – immediately following an assessment

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Marzano Feedback (cont.)

• Feedback should be specific to a criterion – it should reference a specific level or skill or knowledge.

 • Students can effectively provide some of their own

feedback – students keeping track of their performance as learning occurs.

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Feedback

Marzano indicates that feedback must be based on criterion or goals.

• Instructional goals narrow what students focus on.

• Instructional goals should not be too specific.

• Students should be encouraged to personalize the teacher’s goals.

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Goals

Brookhart (2008) states that teachers must be sure to do the following with each assignment:

• Require student work to demonstrate the content knowledge or skills specified in the learning target.

 • Require students to demonstrate the cognitive process

specified in the learning target.

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Brookhart (cont.)

• Provide students with complete and clear directions.

• Specify the criteria for good work (which will be the criteria for both feedback and final evaluation).

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Feedback Strateties

Timing

• Provide immediate feedback for knowledge of facts• Delay feedback slightly for more comprehensive reviews

of student thinking and processing• Never delay feedback beyond when it would make a

difference to students• Provide feedback as often as is practical, for all major

assignments

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Amount

• Prioritize – pick the most important points

• Choose points that relate to major learning goals

• Consider the student’s developmental level

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Mode

• Select the best mode for the message. Would a comment in passing the students desk suffice? Is a conference needed?

• Interactive feedback is best• Give written feedback on written work • Use demonstration if how to do something is an issue

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Audience

• Individual feedback makes the student feel the teacher values their learning

• Group/class feedback works if most of the class missed the concept – re-teaching opportunity

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Focus

• When possible, describe both the work and the process

• Comment on the student’s self-regulation if the comment will foster self-efficacy

• Avoid personal comments

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Comparison

• Use criterion-referenced feedback for giving information about the work itself

• Use norm-referenced for giving information about student processes or effort

• Use self-referenced for unsuccessful learners who need to see the progress they are making, not how far they are from the goal

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Function

• Describe – don’t judge

Valence

• Use positive comments that describe what was done well

• Accompany negative descriptions of the work with positive suggestions for improvement

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Clarity

• Use vocabulary and concepts the student will understand

• Tailor the amount and content of feedback to the student’s developmental level

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Specificity

• Make the degree of specificity to the student and the task

• Make feedback specific enough that they know what to do, but not so specific that it is done for them

• Identify errors or types of errors, but do not correct everyone – leave some for the student to correct

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Feedback Strategies (cont.)

Tone

• Choose words that communicate respect for the student and the work

• Choose words that position the student as the agent

• Choose words that cause students to think or wonder

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Types of Learners

Successful Students

• Successful students are typically interested in school and learning and want to do well on assignments.

• They also greatly benefit from constructive feedback on their skills and knowledge.

• These students do self-assessements spontaneously whether or not the teacher provides opportunities for this activity.

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Types of Learners

Successful Students (cont.)

• Teachers may often neglect to provide feedback to these successful students to spend more time with slower learners.

• Successful students will achieve even more with proper feedback.

• No student should be neglected by the teacher even though they are perceived as successful.

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Types of Learners

Struggling Students

• Struggling students are those who have fallen behind in school or haven’t had positive learning experiences.

• These students struggle when they view the large gap in their knowledge based on criterion.

• Therefore, criterion-referenced feedback is not the best choice for these students.

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Types of Learners

Struggling Students (cont.)

• Self-referenced is much more applicable – comparing their current work to previous work.

• It is important to make suggestions for improvement in small steps for struggling students.

• Gradual and small improvements are better for the students than being overwhelmed and not improving at all.

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Types of Learners

Reluctant Students

• These are students who perceive themselves as failures are accustomed to viewing any kind of feedback as confirmation that they are stupid.

• All they hear is what they did wrong.

• The natural tendency for teachers is to do just that, tell the students what they did wrong.

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Types of Learners

Reluctant Students (cont.)

• Reluctant students will benefit from self-referenced assessments.

• This may take more time, but when students see success and progress, they become more willing to put forth effort into the learning process.

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How Technology Can Help

• Provide feed back to students in ways that enable the students to learn better.

• Eliminated the drudgery of assessment.

• Assessing students more accurately, efficiently, and quickly.

• Make evaluating student skills unobtrusive and easy.

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Can Technology Help with Formative Assessment?

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How Technology Can Help

• Individualized assessment

• Immediate nature of the assessment

• Create virtual real-time picture of which students need helps, where they need it, and how the teachers can help them best

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How Technology Can Help

• Enhancing formative assessment with technology enables teachers to embed assessment into instruction and provide immediate feedback.

• It has become cheaper (some times free) and easier to use.

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Technology Quiz

• What is the largest factor

in determining use of

technology in a school? 1. Technology budget

2. Amount of professional development

3. Teachers interest

4. Principal interest

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Quiz Answer

The largest factor in determining use of technology in a school is the Principal’s interest that it be used.

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Some Ways of Using Technology for Formative Assessment?

• Differential Instruction• Rubrics• White Boards and Clickers• Problem Based Learning• Infographics

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Rubistar

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Some Ways of Using Technology for Formative Assessment?

• ePortfolios• Digital Storytelling• Students as Teachers• Commercial Tools and Games• Free Web 2.0 Internet Tools

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Free Web 2.0 Tools

• Project Zone• Quizlet• ASSISTments• Star Fall• ePals• Twitter in Education

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Project Zone Exercise

• Mini Golf game

Go to http://tinyurl.com/projectzone

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ASSISTment Demo

Go to http://www.assistments.org/

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Star Fall Demo

• A free public service to teach children to read with phonics.

• http://www.starfall.com/

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Acrobat Demo

Create you own ePortfolio

with Acrobat Pro X

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What’s Next?

• Learning Analytics - enable teachers and schools to tailor educational opportunities to each student's level of need and ability.“

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What Next?

• Personal Learning Environments - allow students to direct their own learning by themselves or in groups.

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Assessing Teacher Performance