Progress Reports

When I started on this journey three years ago, I wanted to simply add a visual bar graph to the student's progress report.  Dr. Marzano had shown studies that said this would improve student's learning.  At the time I didn't know why it would improve student's learning, but I thought it would be an easy addition. It lead me to where I am today!

What I soon discovered was that our division's gradebook was not compatible with outcomes (standards) based grading.  I needed a gradebook where I could group my outcomes, allow for individual student ordering of assessments, allow for professional growth in determining grades, allow for bar graphs, etc.  Our gradebook did not do this!  I looked at a sample progress report from Formative Assessment and Standards Based Grading, Dr. Robert Marzano, page 115 - 117 and wondered if I could create something similar.  My brother is a whiz with excel and he helped me get started.  Over the past couple of years our PLC has expanded our resources and asked people in our division who have a strong understanding of excel to create a gradebook that fits our needs.  It has really grown over the past year.  We have an idea, present it to these people and they tell us yes or no or they'll figure it out!  Here is what we have come up with:

This first picture is part of our first sheet in excel (it continues to the right for however many outcomes the particular class has).  It looks like a paper gradebook might look like.  The student's names are down the left hand column, but across the top it is organized by outcomes.  In this particular picture there are only 4 columns for assessments showing.  However I have hidden the columns that did not have anything in them.  So this sheet can be expanded to fit however many assessments you might give for a particular outcome.  Notice, there is also a current level for each outcome.  There is no magic formula for this current level.  The teacher inputs the value they feel best represents the students current level of understanding (I will blog more about this in a later post).  You might note that I have not changed the titles for the headings of each column - they are simply assessment 1, 2, 3, etc. other than the final.   This is because assessment 1 might be different for different students.  It is simply the first assessment for that outcome that the individual did.  As I am using the same scoring rubric for all assessments for that outcome, it doesn't matter if they completed a different assessment.  I no longer specify quizzes, exams, tasks, projects, etc.  They are all just assessments.  

This second picture is what gets created from that first sheet above (this pic has been saved as pdf, so the excel format isn't showing).  The first sheet (above) is where the teacher enters in their data.  Everything is then linked to another individual sheet that looks like the following.  This is an individual progress report.  It has the student's name (Student A) at the top.  It shows all of their assessment scores and their current level for each outcome and then it has a visual color coded bar graph (I will comment on the bar graph below).  We have also incorporated a comment box and a behaviours box.  You will notice that there is NO average or overall grade anywhere!  These are what the student gets at midterm when report cards are handed out, as well as many times throughout the semester as each teacher sees fit.  My students will receive hard copies at least once a month, but we often have mini interviews after each outcome or two when they will also see these.

I love this progress report!  I like that it shows exactly where the student is at on each outcome.  I like that it shows the progress.  I will communicate to students and parents that they should not just look at the current level, but look at the progress for each outcome.  Is their level of understanding improving?  Maybe they only have level 2 (yellow), but there has been growth from 0.5, to 1 to 1.5 to 2, so this student is improving.  I like this because it gives a clear picture of where the student is at on each outcome.  They can then refer to the specific rubric to see what they still need to learn to improve their learning.

In my class I will allow for individual assessments a few times through the year.  So when I have a short interview with each student to find out what they'd like to review and reassess, we look at this progress report.  It is amazing how many will simply say "I need to get rid of the red".  They do not like to see red on their report!  Yet, if it was just a number and no color, it wouldn't stand out as much!  I have also begun to ask parents at interviews how they feel about these progress reports.  I've asked them if there is too much information.  The comments are "these are great, with a quick glance I can look at the colors and see if there is a major problem occurring."   I now understand why the research shows a visual bar graph will improve learning.

The other thing that I like about this is that excel allows you to write comments for a particular cell and then you can hide them.  There is a little red arrow in the corner of the cell to show that you have a comment there.  I use this function a lot.  I can indicate if a student received help, whether the students were working in groups, used their notes, whether the assessment was formative or summative, etc.  I will also write reminders as to why a student received a particular level.  For example, if I gave them a 3.5 I will comment as to whether it was because some understanding was missing or if it was a calculation error.  Some students will get a 1.5 because they missed a term in level 2, but had lots of level 3 and 4 questions correct or some get a 1.5 because they were almost at a level 2 but no higher.   These types of comments are huge when determining the current level.  They are also helpful when having interviews with students and parents.  We can discuss what is holding them back from reaching the next level.

This past year we were watching some Rick Wormeli videos and one that fits with this can be watched here.  It was really neat to watch this video and realize that we are making many of these changes!

I am happy with where our progress report is at.  We are still tied to the gradebook that our division has purchased for submitting final marks.    Our division is also implementing a new gradebook at the elementary level (and soon the secondary level) that is suited for outcome based reporting, but as of yet, I haven't seen it produce the type of progress report that we are using or even one that will be similar AND provide the key information.  Through this experience I believe the key points that a progress report need to have are: 1) separation of outcomes 2)  progress shown and 3)  visual bar graph.   The format doesn't have to be exactly what we do, but those are key elements that have helped students move their learning forward and assist parents with understanding outcomes based reporting.