In an earlier post (here) I talked about the 4 point rubric that we use. Now that we have the rubric, we need to make sure everyone understands how to grade with it! What we discovered early on is that there were some misunderstanding to this process and some were still grading each question /4 and then finding an average of all of the scores. This is not the way we want to be using the rubric. In fact, one thing that should be pointed out is that at no point do you ever want to see a #/4 on an assessment. Mathematically this can be confusing, as students will convert to a percent and the rubric is not about a fraction/percent "grade" but a level of understanding.
In Robert Marzano's book Formative Assessment and Standards Based Grading he spends a whole chapter (3) talking about this scale and showing how to score with it. He talks about organizing assessments into three sections - one for score 2.0 content, one for score 3.0 content and one for score 4.0 content. (Page 46) We now do this on all of our assessments. The students are well aware of where each question fits on the level of understanding rubric. Marzano then goes on to say that "to score this assessment, the teacher would look at the pattern of responses across the three sections. If a student correctly answered all items on the test, she would receive a score of 4.0. If she answered all items correctly in section A (level 2) and B (level 3) but not C (level 4), she would receive a score of 3.0. If she answered all of the items correctly to section A but not B and C, she would receive a score of 2.0. If she could answer no items correctly on her own but could answer some items correctly with help from the teacher, she would receive a score of 1.0." (Page 46) This is exactly how we grade with our rubrics. The challenge lies with those students who have some questions correct in a level but not all. This is where our half points come in to play.
This has been difficult for some students to understand. They might have the same quantity of questions correct, but score different from a peer and wonder why. It has taken a lot of teaching to have them understand that they need to read the rubric to see where their level of understanding is consistent. I have given back assessments to my students that does not have a score on it. I have corrected the assessments and recorded in my gradebook their score, but have not written it on their papers. I ask them to go through their assessment, read the rubric and score their assessment. I then take them back in to see what they think. Most students are bang on. The ones that aren't we then have a discussion. Some have even convinced me that they deserve the score they gave. These conversations show me that their level of understanding is maybe higher than I thought. I would like to do more of this with my students this year.
A couple of my colleagues and I created a couple of short videos to help others understand how to grade with a rubric. These were done a couple years ago and the look of our assessments have changed, and the rubric has changed but the idea of how to grade has remained the same. The videos are here and here.
This year our math department will meet on a regular basis to do common grading. I believe this is also important to make sure we are all interpreting the rubric consistently and to see if any need tweeking because we are too far apart in our interpretations.
Monday, August 20, 2012
Wednesday, August 15, 2012
Learning Logs
I have signed up to be a part of the math blogging initiative and have been given my first "assignment". I am looking forward to this initiative and learning from other teachers!
One of the choices for our assignment was to blog about one or two specific things that we plan on doing differently this year. One change I am planning on implementing with my math 9's is to incorporate learning logs into the classroom. I feel that I have managed to find an opener for class (My favorite formative activity) that works well, but I don't have a good closer. Typically the students are completing practice until the bell goes.
I have been reading Embedded Formative Assessment by Dylan Wiliam (a great read by the way) and found the idea of a learning log (page 157). A learning log is a way to get students to reflect on their learning. I also think it will help me improve my skills as a teacher by reading what works well and what doesn't for the students. My goal is to implement this with my math 9 class in semester 1. My math 9's have always been my guinea pigs. They are willing to try new things and we have more flexibility with time to work out kinks. Assuming it goes well I will implement it with all of my classes in semester 2.
My students have duo-tangs that are left in the classroom where they keep their continual progress reports (click here to see these), and assessments. I am also going to include sheets for their learning log in these. That way if they stay in the classroom I can sit down and read through them when I have time (my goal is once a week!). The suggestion in the book is that you provide them with the following prompts and the students are to choose no more than three to respond to that day. I am not sure if I will give the complete list or if I will choose one or two each day for the students to respond to. I am also not sure if I will ask them to choose only one a day or allow up to three. I plan on doing this with 5 minutes left in class. Any suggestions on how to proceed would be appreciated!
The prompts suggested in the book are:
Today I learned...
I was surprised by...
The most useful thing I will take from this lesson is...
I was interested in...
What I liked most about this lesson was...
One thing I'm not sure about is...
The main thing I want to find out more about is...
After this session I feel...
I might have gotten more from this lesson if...
I really liked this idea when I read about it. I hope to have it become part of our daily classroom routine.
One of the choices for our assignment was to blog about one or two specific things that we plan on doing differently this year. One change I am planning on implementing with my math 9's is to incorporate learning logs into the classroom. I feel that I have managed to find an opener for class (My favorite formative activity) that works well, but I don't have a good closer. Typically the students are completing practice until the bell goes.
I have been reading Embedded Formative Assessment by Dylan Wiliam (a great read by the way) and found the idea of a learning log (page 157). A learning log is a way to get students to reflect on their learning. I also think it will help me improve my skills as a teacher by reading what works well and what doesn't for the students. My goal is to implement this with my math 9 class in semester 1. My math 9's have always been my guinea pigs. They are willing to try new things and we have more flexibility with time to work out kinks. Assuming it goes well I will implement it with all of my classes in semester 2.
My students have duo-tangs that are left in the classroom where they keep their continual progress reports (click here to see these), and assessments. I am also going to include sheets for their learning log in these. That way if they stay in the classroom I can sit down and read through them when I have time (my goal is once a week!). The suggestion in the book is that you provide them with the following prompts and the students are to choose no more than three to respond to that day. I am not sure if I will give the complete list or if I will choose one or two each day for the students to respond to. I am also not sure if I will ask them to choose only one a day or allow up to three. I plan on doing this with 5 minutes left in class. Any suggestions on how to proceed would be appreciated!
The prompts suggested in the book are:
Today I learned...
I was surprised by...
The most useful thing I will take from this lesson is...
I was interested in...
What I liked most about this lesson was...
One thing I'm not sure about is...
The main thing I want to find out more about is...
After this session I feel...
I might have gotten more from this lesson if...
I really liked this idea when I read about it. I hope to have it become part of our daily classroom routine.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Redos
When making a shift to learning for all, one of the discussions/debates is centered around whether or not to allow "redos". This is a tough one for a lot of people. Four or five years ago I didn't believe in redos. I felt that if the student worked through the unit, did the assignments, asked for help, completed the review, which I always set up as a pre-test, then they should be ready for the unit exam. If they weren't then they hadn't tried hard enough and too bad. Now I feel bad for my students of that time period! Once you make the shift to "learning for all" and "moving learning forward" for the students, then redos/reassessments make sense! Why wouldn't we want our students to be able to demonstrate understanding of an outcome, even if it is two months after the formal lessons in class? Ultimately the goal of the course is for students to have demonstrated learning in all outcomes. Why we have set dates for this to happen is beyond me! The curriculum states that the student will demonstrate an understanding of.... by the end of the course, not by October 15, when I have decided to give a "unit exam"!
Rick Wormeli has a great video where he shares his views as to why we should allow reassessments. You can click here to watch part one of this video. Click here to watch part two.
Here are some of the hurdles that I hear to giving reassessments and my solution to them:
"If I allow reassessments then kids won't try hard the first time"
Well in some cases this is true. However, I have discovered that if you present this in a certain way then those will be minimized. I tell my students that it is important to do the best you can on the first try because in the end, if you jump around with your levels of understanding then I will look for the most consistent level. They know that if they consistently improve, then I will give them their final score, so the first ones won't count, but if they jump around ie. 2, 3, 2, I tell them I have to look at consistency and now that first assessment holds some weight. Because of this, most students will do the best they can on the first attempt. But yes, there are those that won't... we simply have to worry about what we can control!
"If I allow reassessments for everyone then the high achievers will keep rewriting until they get the 4 because they want the scholarships and they might write 10 times to do this."
In three years of experience I have yet to come across this. I am not saying it won't happen and we might have those one or two students who do this. I say let's cross that bridge when we get there. I think that with the way things are now set up this won't be a problem. But I might be wrong!
"How is it fair that a student who scores a 3 on their third attempt is the same as the a student who scores a 3 on the first try."
It is about the student's learning. The ultimate goal is that students will learn. We don't go and ask our doctors how many times they had to write the medical exams before they passed. They are all doctors now and it doesn't matter. Some babies learn to walk at 6 months and some not until 18 months. Should we penalize the late walker and say they can never play sports? A level 3 is a level 3, no matter when they achieved it. Ultimately they now know the material.
"It will be time for me to create and score all of these extra assessments. What does the student have to do?"
Well there is a cost associated with reassessing. I don't allow my students to walk into my classroom and say "I want to rewrite outcome 5." They have to show me that they have done some work in preparing for this outcome. Whether it be making the corrections on their last assessment, or showing me that they have now completed all of their practice questions, or doing an extra set of practice questions, or simply having a conversation with me, they have to have put in some extra time before they get to reassess. It's not a revolving door where they write, get back a low score and walk in to write again. There has to be work done in between. This work must be shown at least one day prior to wanting to reassess. As far as creating these, yes, it is a little extra work, but ultimately I feel my job is about helping students learn and this is one part of my job. With math, it is pretty easy to change numbers in a question. Level 2 and 3 questions which tend to be process problems, are easy to change. The level 4 do require a little more thought on my part, but when I am developing the learning plan I try to create a bank of level 4 questions so that I can easily pull from this. Depending on the outcome and the extent of the misunderstanding in the first assessment, sometimes I simply do an oral reassessment. If I have a conversation with the student and they are able to explain their understanding then that is good enough for me. It is really not a lot of work and in the end it benefits the student. It also makes my job easier in following classes when I get these students as they now have a higher level of understanding than if I didn't allow for the reassessments and learning to occur.
"I'm going to have so many assessments to mark at the end of the semester when all of a sudden they realize they don't have the scores they want."
Yes, this was a problem. However another colleague and myself have found a solution that has worked. We have set up a reassessment policy that is communicated to the students and signed by the students and their parents. We have set up contract dates at the start of the year. They are 3 - 4 weeks apart. At each date, any student who is below a level 2 on any outcome is placed on contract. They then have until the next contract date to attempt this outcome again. The other colleague and I each take a noon hour a week to supervise these reassessments, so the student has two days a week to complete this. This keeps the students more organized and spreads out the assessments over the course of the semester. We also have a final reassessment date about 2 weeks prior to the final exam. After this, there is no reassessing. The final exam is the reassessment. The students are all aware of these dates and it keeps things moving smoothly.
"In the real world you don't get a second chance."
Well that is actually false. There are many instances where people have redos! Going for a drivers license is one that most people will experience. Not everyone passes on their first attempt, yet that isn't held against them when they go the next time. We don't have stickers on our vehicles that say "I passed on my fifth time". Airplane pilots did not land an airplane on their first attempt. They practiced hundreds or thousands of times in a simulator before attempting with a real aircraft. Accountants have more than one chance to write their exams. Lawyers have more than one chance to pass the bar exam. This list could go on and on. School is about learning. Failure is a part of learning. Moving forward and becoming better is a part of learning.
Reassessments have worked well for me when a student walks in on an assessment day and says that they are not ready for the assessment. I now tell them that it is okay, they can try the assessment, do the best they can and then we'll know what they still need to work on. Usually the student is more prepared than they think. Test anxiety is removed when they know there is another chance if needed. Many times the student doesn't have to reassess, they simply weren't confident enough and are still programmed that all assessments "count" towards their final grade. With that not being the case anymore, the student is more relaxed and often finds that they are more prepared than they thought!
Reassessments are not a bad thing. I now not only allow reassessments, but encourage them. I want my students to WANT to learn and WANT to show mastery. I encourage them to be the best they can be. I apologize to my students in the past when I didn't allow reassessments!
Rick Wormeli has a great video where he shares his views as to why we should allow reassessments. You can click here to watch part one of this video. Click here to watch part two.
Here are some of the hurdles that I hear to giving reassessments and my solution to them:
"If I allow reassessments then kids won't try hard the first time"
Well in some cases this is true. However, I have discovered that if you present this in a certain way then those will be minimized. I tell my students that it is important to do the best you can on the first try because in the end, if you jump around with your levels of understanding then I will look for the most consistent level. They know that if they consistently improve, then I will give them their final score, so the first ones won't count, but if they jump around ie. 2, 3, 2, I tell them I have to look at consistency and now that first assessment holds some weight. Because of this, most students will do the best they can on the first attempt. But yes, there are those that won't... we simply have to worry about what we can control!
"If I allow reassessments for everyone then the high achievers will keep rewriting until they get the 4 because they want the scholarships and they might write 10 times to do this."
In three years of experience I have yet to come across this. I am not saying it won't happen and we might have those one or two students who do this. I say let's cross that bridge when we get there. I think that with the way things are now set up this won't be a problem. But I might be wrong!
"How is it fair that a student who scores a 3 on their third attempt is the same as the a student who scores a 3 on the first try."
It is about the student's learning. The ultimate goal is that students will learn. We don't go and ask our doctors how many times they had to write the medical exams before they passed. They are all doctors now and it doesn't matter. Some babies learn to walk at 6 months and some not until 18 months. Should we penalize the late walker and say they can never play sports? A level 3 is a level 3, no matter when they achieved it. Ultimately they now know the material.
"It will be time for me to create and score all of these extra assessments. What does the student have to do?"
Well there is a cost associated with reassessing. I don't allow my students to walk into my classroom and say "I want to rewrite outcome 5." They have to show me that they have done some work in preparing for this outcome. Whether it be making the corrections on their last assessment, or showing me that they have now completed all of their practice questions, or doing an extra set of practice questions, or simply having a conversation with me, they have to have put in some extra time before they get to reassess. It's not a revolving door where they write, get back a low score and walk in to write again. There has to be work done in between. This work must be shown at least one day prior to wanting to reassess. As far as creating these, yes, it is a little extra work, but ultimately I feel my job is about helping students learn and this is one part of my job. With math, it is pretty easy to change numbers in a question. Level 2 and 3 questions which tend to be process problems, are easy to change. The level 4 do require a little more thought on my part, but when I am developing the learning plan I try to create a bank of level 4 questions so that I can easily pull from this. Depending on the outcome and the extent of the misunderstanding in the first assessment, sometimes I simply do an oral reassessment. If I have a conversation with the student and they are able to explain their understanding then that is good enough for me. It is really not a lot of work and in the end it benefits the student. It also makes my job easier in following classes when I get these students as they now have a higher level of understanding than if I didn't allow for the reassessments and learning to occur.
"I'm going to have so many assessments to mark at the end of the semester when all of a sudden they realize they don't have the scores they want."
Yes, this was a problem. However another colleague and myself have found a solution that has worked. We have set up a reassessment policy that is communicated to the students and signed by the students and their parents. We have set up contract dates at the start of the year. They are 3 - 4 weeks apart. At each date, any student who is below a level 2 on any outcome is placed on contract. They then have until the next contract date to attempt this outcome again. The other colleague and I each take a noon hour a week to supervise these reassessments, so the student has two days a week to complete this. This keeps the students more organized and spreads out the assessments over the course of the semester. We also have a final reassessment date about 2 weeks prior to the final exam. After this, there is no reassessing. The final exam is the reassessment. The students are all aware of these dates and it keeps things moving smoothly.
"In the real world you don't get a second chance."
Well that is actually false. There are many instances where people have redos! Going for a drivers license is one that most people will experience. Not everyone passes on their first attempt, yet that isn't held against them when they go the next time. We don't have stickers on our vehicles that say "I passed on my fifth time". Airplane pilots did not land an airplane on their first attempt. They practiced hundreds or thousands of times in a simulator before attempting with a real aircraft. Accountants have more than one chance to write their exams. Lawyers have more than one chance to pass the bar exam. This list could go on and on. School is about learning. Failure is a part of learning. Moving forward and becoming better is a part of learning.
Reassessments have worked well for me when a student walks in on an assessment day and says that they are not ready for the assessment. I now tell them that it is okay, they can try the assessment, do the best they can and then we'll know what they still need to work on. Usually the student is more prepared than they think. Test anxiety is removed when they know there is another chance if needed. Many times the student doesn't have to reassess, they simply weren't confident enough and are still programmed that all assessments "count" towards their final grade. With that not being the case anymore, the student is more relaxed and often finds that they are more prepared than they thought!
Reassessments are not a bad thing. I now not only allow reassessments, but encourage them. I want my students to WANT to learn and WANT to show mastery. I encourage them to be the best they can be. I apologize to my students in the past when I didn't allow reassessments!
Friday, August 3, 2012
My Favorite Formative Activity
There are many different definitions and ideas of what formative assessment is. Do you grade it? Is it just feedback? Is it an assessment? A tool? A process? Dylan Wiliam says "Formative assessment involves getting the best possible evidence about what students have learned and then using this information to decide what to do next." Embedded Formative Assessment, Dylan Wiliam, page 50. I like this statement. I want to find out what my students know and from there I need to make decisions on what to do next to move learning forward.
There is a lot of debate as to whether formative scores should be recorded. I've adopted the idea that some of my formative "activities" are simply to collect evidence in an informal way, I will not score these. The activity I am going to describe in this post falls in this category. Other formative "activities" I will record and use these to assist with determining overall levels of understanding, "the summative score". I think that Dr. Marzano best describes this when he says "a specific assessment is neither formative nor summative - it all depends on how the information is used. Theoretically then, the same assessment could be used in a formative sense or in a summative sense." Formative Assessment and Standards Based Grading, Robert J. Marzano, page 27. He goes on to further say that "all assessments are in a sense 'formative'." page 28.
In my class, I believe all of my formal assessments can be formative in nature. The student has until the end of the semester to demonstrate deep understanding, so if a "unit test" at the start of the semester is improved upon by the "final exam" then that unit test was formative in nature.
My favorite "informal" formative "activity" is one that has been routine in my class for about 5 years. I got the idea from a colleague who did "3 minute reviews" at the start of her class. It is similar to an entrance slip, but instead of testing what will be happening that day, I ask a question about a past skill/process. It may or may not have anything to do with the daily lesson. When the bell rings, there will be a question on the board and the students have 3 - 5 minutes to try and answer it. For four and a half years, I had students put these in a duo-tang that were kept in my classroom. I would look at them usually once a week. They were not graded, just given feedback. Each day, after the students had time to complete the question we would then take it up as a class. Sometimes I would have a student put the answer up on the board, sometimes I would question a number of students on each step of the problem. I loved this activity as I felt it was a great review. I have had other teachers ask what they should do when at the end of a "unit" a number of students are still struggling with the concept. In many cases I don't feel that spending one or two more days will be of great benefit. However if you now do one question a day, for two or three weeks, the students will have the time to sort out their problems, and those who understand it won't be bored. In my math 9 class, three of the first four outcomes that we learn are rational numbers, polynomials and solving linear equations. I now have the entire year to continually review these skills, which are essential to success in math down the road.
In about April this past year, I watched the following video that was posted on twitter from The Teaching Channel. It changed how I went about these entrance slips and has given me better feedback, instant feedback, and it has given the students better feedback, so learning moves forward at even a quicker pace! Click here to see the video. The teacher was doing something very similar to me, except she went one step further. She then turned the activity into an error analysis. Brilliant! It meant a slight change to what I was doing. Instead of using the duo-tangs that I was, or the index cards she used, I took scrap paper and cut it into four pieces and I hand that out to the kids at the start of class. They then hand them back to me as they complete the problem, I quickly sort them into yes or no piles, choose one from the "no" to rewrite on the board. We then spend time going through this solution. We find things that the student did correctly, we try to analyze where their misconception was, and we correct the solution. It is instant feedback for the students and for myself and I find that learning occurs quickly. One of my first attempts with this was when I was reviewing solving linear equations containing fractions. It had been a while since we had done these in class. I put a question on the board and discovered that only about 4 students had done it correctly. The majority of the "no's" had converted the fractions to approximate decimals. We went through the error analysis and discussed why this was not an exact answer. The next day, I put a similar question on the board and I had about half of my class get the question correct. This time only 2 students converted to decimals! We were improving. With this process I know how long I need to spend on the same type of question before we are ready to move to another skill. I also know at the end of it which students now need some extra one on one help with the skill. I love it! This whole process takes 5 - 10 minutes, but it is well worth that time. I don't believe I could accomplish the learning that takes place in this time in one period of extra practice on the skill. I highly encourage trying this with your students!
There is a lot of debate as to whether formative scores should be recorded. I've adopted the idea that some of my formative "activities" are simply to collect evidence in an informal way, I will not score these. The activity I am going to describe in this post falls in this category. Other formative "activities" I will record and use these to assist with determining overall levels of understanding, "the summative score". I think that Dr. Marzano best describes this when he says "a specific assessment is neither formative nor summative - it all depends on how the information is used. Theoretically then, the same assessment could be used in a formative sense or in a summative sense." Formative Assessment and Standards Based Grading, Robert J. Marzano, page 27. He goes on to further say that "all assessments are in a sense 'formative'." page 28.
In my class, I believe all of my formal assessments can be formative in nature. The student has until the end of the semester to demonstrate deep understanding, so if a "unit test" at the start of the semester is improved upon by the "final exam" then that unit test was formative in nature.
My favorite "informal" formative "activity" is one that has been routine in my class for about 5 years. I got the idea from a colleague who did "3 minute reviews" at the start of her class. It is similar to an entrance slip, but instead of testing what will be happening that day, I ask a question about a past skill/process. It may or may not have anything to do with the daily lesson. When the bell rings, there will be a question on the board and the students have 3 - 5 minutes to try and answer it. For four and a half years, I had students put these in a duo-tang that were kept in my classroom. I would look at them usually once a week. They were not graded, just given feedback. Each day, after the students had time to complete the question we would then take it up as a class. Sometimes I would have a student put the answer up on the board, sometimes I would question a number of students on each step of the problem. I loved this activity as I felt it was a great review. I have had other teachers ask what they should do when at the end of a "unit" a number of students are still struggling with the concept. In many cases I don't feel that spending one or two more days will be of great benefit. However if you now do one question a day, for two or three weeks, the students will have the time to sort out their problems, and those who understand it won't be bored. In my math 9 class, three of the first four outcomes that we learn are rational numbers, polynomials and solving linear equations. I now have the entire year to continually review these skills, which are essential to success in math down the road.
In about April this past year, I watched the following video that was posted on twitter from The Teaching Channel. It changed how I went about these entrance slips and has given me better feedback, instant feedback, and it has given the students better feedback, so learning moves forward at even a quicker pace! Click here to see the video. The teacher was doing something very similar to me, except she went one step further. She then turned the activity into an error analysis. Brilliant! It meant a slight change to what I was doing. Instead of using the duo-tangs that I was, or the index cards she used, I took scrap paper and cut it into four pieces and I hand that out to the kids at the start of class. They then hand them back to me as they complete the problem, I quickly sort them into yes or no piles, choose one from the "no" to rewrite on the board. We then spend time going through this solution. We find things that the student did correctly, we try to analyze where their misconception was, and we correct the solution. It is instant feedback for the students and for myself and I find that learning occurs quickly. One of my first attempts with this was when I was reviewing solving linear equations containing fractions. It had been a while since we had done these in class. I put a question on the board and discovered that only about 4 students had done it correctly. The majority of the "no's" had converted the fractions to approximate decimals. We went through the error analysis and discussed why this was not an exact answer. The next day, I put a similar question on the board and I had about half of my class get the question correct. This time only 2 students converted to decimals! We were improving. With this process I know how long I need to spend on the same type of question before we are ready to move to another skill. I also know at the end of it which students now need some extra one on one help with the skill. I love it! This whole process takes 5 - 10 minutes, but it is well worth that time. I don't believe I could accomplish the learning that takes place in this time in one period of extra practice on the skill. I highly encourage trying this with your students!
Monday, July 23, 2012
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.
Sunday, July 15, 2012
Tracking Growth of Understanding
One of the student self reflection pieces I do in my classroom is have students track their growth of understanding. I feel that it is part of my job to teach them a way to do this. At the high school level we often assume a certain level of maturity, but we shouldn't. Many students do not know how to self reflect and ask questions to guide their learning forward. I ask my students if they know of a student who finished high school with really high grades, but then struggled at University. Almost all students will put up their hand. I tell them that it is important to be able to reflect on their learning and be able to identify any red flags that will hinder their success. In University no one is going to teach them this skill, so it is important to learn it now!
Once again, I got this idea from Dr. Marzano, in his book Formative Assessment and Standards Based Grading. He has a couple of examples of student progress charts. One is found on page 82, another on page 87. I first started by using the one on page 87. I had a chart for every outcome for every student. They kept these in a personal folder that were left in the classroom. What I found with this particular chart, was that it was simply taking up too much space (I could only fit two outcomes on a page) and therefore was a lot of photocopying. Another example of a continual progress report is found on page 103. There is a free reproducible found here. This is what I ended up using. Our PLC group adapted it to fit our needs. Here is a sample of one of my student's progress reports:
We left approximately 5 or 6 lines for each outcome. We also added a column for reflection. When a student received a graded assessment back, they were to chart their results. Since I was assessing an outcome using the same rubric, a student could easily track if they were improving their understanding or not. It is crucial, however, that the student charts their scores in the order that THEY completed the assessments.
We talked about how they would want to be maintaining or improving each time. We talked about if they dropped on an assessment, they should be asking themselves "why". "What did I know the first time that I now don't understand?" "What do I still need to learn?"
On occasion, an assessment would not test all four levels of understanding. Maybe the maximum score on a particular assessment was 2.5. I had students who received the maximum score star this in their charts. That way, if they had a 4, 2.5* and then a 4, they would know that they didn't actually "drop", it was simply the maximum they could score.
I had students tell me that this chart helped guide them when preparing for a comprehensive assessment. They knew which outcomes they needed more work on and which they had a pretty consistent understanding of. This also helped them when an opportunity would arise in class to have a redo (I would have a few days a semester where it was "student's choice" assessment day). With a quick glance of these charts they could see which outcomes still needed to be worked on.
These continual progress reports are also great for students who typically struggle and take longer to become proficient with an outcome. They will (hopefully!) be able to see growth happening. Even if they are moving from a 0.5, to a 1, to a 2, it shows growth and we will celebrate this growth. I had a student my first year of doing this who hated math, thought she sucked at it, and wouldn't try. Once I got her to realize that she was actually learning, her whole attitude changed. Yes, she was only at a level 2 after the outcome was completed (completed as in formal lessons done, my outcomes are never completed until the end of the semester!), but she had started at level 0.5. We celebrated her growth. She walked away with a smile on her face and a positive attitude followed her to class from then on.
I will continue to use these growth charts, in all of my classes from grades 9 - 12. Even if one student benefits from them it is worth it!
Wednesday, July 11, 2012
Outcome (Standards) Based Reporting
"In a standards based system, a student does not move to the next level until he or she can demonstrate competence at the current level. In a standards-referenced system a student's status is reported (or referenced) relative to the performance standard for each area of knowledge and skill on the report card; however, even if the student does not meet the performance standard for each topic, he or she moves to the next level." Formative Assessment and Standards Based Grading, by Robert J Marzano, page 18.
Two years ago, our math department was outcome-referenced (I will use outcome instead of standards as our provincial curriculum is by outcome). We were reporting on the student's progress for each outcome. However, we still looked at simply a "passing" average of these outcomes when determining if a student was to receive the credit. We encouraged students to meet at least the level 2 of understanding on all outcomes, but it wasn't necessary to move on.
After reading the difference between standards based and standards references, we started to question whether we could make the move to outcomes based. We wanted to, but were a little afraid of that step. We had already made so many changes to our philosophies and to our policies, we weren't sure we could handle another large "shift". We still had colleagues in our PLC that were still trying to understand and make the shift to outcome referenced reporting. We tossed around ideas of students having to be level 2 on a certain percentage of outcomes, or certain "essential" outcomes. After some debate, we finally decided as a group, with support from admin, that we would move to outcomes based. We made this change this past year. We communicated it to all students and their parents. We informed them that in order to receive the credit at the end of the semester, the student would need to have at least a level 2 on EVERY outcome.
I'd have students ask me "do you mean I'm going to fail if I just have one outcome below a 2?" My reply would be "no you will not 'fail', but you will have to continue working on that outcome before the credit will be assigned." We were not asking the student to repeat the entire class. I would explain that this made more sense than the "old" way as now they would be better prepared for the next level as they would have met a basic understanding of ALL outcomes. I asked them to reflect on where they were currently at with their feelings towards math. If they struggled with math, I asked them to reflect on whether they felt they had "passed" all parts of math in the past. We then talked about if you don't "pass" everything, then the next year it is harder to learn the new outcomes, which in turn means you may "fail" more outcomes again, which will lead to more frustration at the next level. When explained this way they nodded and agreed that outcomes based made sense (even if they didn't like it!). Outcome based also means a student can't ignore an outcome that they are finding difficult and still pass the class. They HAVE to do the work!
We are very fortunate at our school (it is a large school - approx. 2000 students), to have an extensions campus. Students are able to take courses on their own, by completing work through modules, or online, etc. So it was pretty easy for us to say that if a student had not met the requirements by the end of the semester, they would simply enroll with the extensions campus to complete the required outcomes.
We also realized that many students would struggle with continuing to work on an outcome they were struggling with on their own, so we set up some structures to assist them. Our school hired a grade 12 student who was strong in math, to provide free tutoring 3 hours a week after school (1 hour a day, 3 times a week). For our grade 9 students, the math 9 teachers rotate through 2 days a week of noon hour extra help. For grades 10 - 12, teachers provided their own noon hour extra help.
Another teacher and I joined forces to allow our students two noon hours a week for help and to reassess. We each supervised one of these days a week. We also set up guidelines to help students organize their time. We didn't want them to all of a sudden, at the end of the semester, realize that they needed to reassess a ton of outcomes. We came up with a policy and had student support dates. On these dates, any student who had an outcome below a level 2 would be put on a "contract" and given 3 - 4 weeks to ask for help and reassess.
The first semester we implemented this we knew we may end up with some unhappy or surprised parents/students. We communicated it over and over, and sent out letters to parents reminding them of the policy. One of the things we stressed in our PLC group was that we had to stick to our guns and the final progress report could not have any current levels below a 2 if we were assigning credit to the student. The minute you break what you have stated, it no longer holds weight. At the end of the semester we had a number of students who had not met the criteria. We made the appropriate phone calls to parents informing them that their son/daughter was not receiving the credit at this time and recommended one of two options to them. If we felt that the student actually did need to repeat the entire class with a teacher, then we told the parent this. We had very few students fall in this category. With all of the support provided along the way, there were not many students left in this position. The other option presented was that their son/daughter would register with the extension campus to complete the outcomes, and once successful the credit would be applied. We were pleasantly surprised as to how many parents and students were thankful for this opportunity. "You mean I don't have to repeat the entire class? Thanks!" There were very few unpleasant conversations.
The second semester with this system went a lot more smoothly. We found a couple of things second time through. One, the students now believed that we were going to follow through and they knew they had to work to achieve a certain level of understanding and then maintain or improve this level. Two, we found that teaching the next level was far easier than it had been in the past! Instead of having to re-teach a skill that was necessary for a new outcome, I only had to review it! Since all students sitting in my class had met the basic level of understanding in the previous class, I wasn't speaking Greek to some of them! We were able to go deeper with outcomes as the time was there to advance instead of back up.
It was interesting as we met after semester 1 to reflect on how things went, that the issue of "grades" came up. We still have to convert to a percentage at the end of the semester (grades 10 - 12 only) for the Ministry of Education. We only converted if the student was receiving the credit, which meant they met the requirement for all outcomes. If they hadn't then there was a "blank" on their report card where the grade would have been. The comment a teacher made was that their marks seemed quite high and their class average was a lot higher than before. I had to grin. Yippee!!!! That means you had students who LEARNED and are proficient with what they are supposed to be! Dylan Wiliam says "we should set a goal of proficiency for all, excellence for many, with all student groups fairly represented in the excellent" Embedded Formative Assessment, page 22. We need to stop norm referencing and thinking we can't have a lot of students at the top of the class! Also, because we were now only assigning "grades" to students who had achieved EVERY outcome, there were no "failure" marks being factored into the student's grade.
We have learned from this year that it is very important to communicate regularly with parents on how their son/daughter's progress is going so there are no surprises. It is also important to realize we are still dealing with kids, and they need help organizing their time. We work on having students track their growth and take ownership for their learning, but we guide them with structure and provide reminders (contracts) to help them achieve.
Two years ago, our math department was outcome-referenced (I will use outcome instead of standards as our provincial curriculum is by outcome). We were reporting on the student's progress for each outcome. However, we still looked at simply a "passing" average of these outcomes when determining if a student was to receive the credit. We encouraged students to meet at least the level 2 of understanding on all outcomes, but it wasn't necessary to move on.
After reading the difference between standards based and standards references, we started to question whether we could make the move to outcomes based. We wanted to, but were a little afraid of that step. We had already made so many changes to our philosophies and to our policies, we weren't sure we could handle another large "shift". We still had colleagues in our PLC that were still trying to understand and make the shift to outcome referenced reporting. We tossed around ideas of students having to be level 2 on a certain percentage of outcomes, or certain "essential" outcomes. After some debate, we finally decided as a group, with support from admin, that we would move to outcomes based. We made this change this past year. We communicated it to all students and their parents. We informed them that in order to receive the credit at the end of the semester, the student would need to have at least a level 2 on EVERY outcome.
I'd have students ask me "do you mean I'm going to fail if I just have one outcome below a 2?" My reply would be "no you will not 'fail', but you will have to continue working on that outcome before the credit will be assigned." We were not asking the student to repeat the entire class. I would explain that this made more sense than the "old" way as now they would be better prepared for the next level as they would have met a basic understanding of ALL outcomes. I asked them to reflect on where they were currently at with their feelings towards math. If they struggled with math, I asked them to reflect on whether they felt they had "passed" all parts of math in the past. We then talked about if you don't "pass" everything, then the next year it is harder to learn the new outcomes, which in turn means you may "fail" more outcomes again, which will lead to more frustration at the next level. When explained this way they nodded and agreed that outcomes based made sense (even if they didn't like it!). Outcome based also means a student can't ignore an outcome that they are finding difficult and still pass the class. They HAVE to do the work!
We are very fortunate at our school (it is a large school - approx. 2000 students), to have an extensions campus. Students are able to take courses on their own, by completing work through modules, or online, etc. So it was pretty easy for us to say that if a student had not met the requirements by the end of the semester, they would simply enroll with the extensions campus to complete the required outcomes.
We also realized that many students would struggle with continuing to work on an outcome they were struggling with on their own, so we set up some structures to assist them. Our school hired a grade 12 student who was strong in math, to provide free tutoring 3 hours a week after school (1 hour a day, 3 times a week). For our grade 9 students, the math 9 teachers rotate through 2 days a week of noon hour extra help. For grades 10 - 12, teachers provided their own noon hour extra help.
Another teacher and I joined forces to allow our students two noon hours a week for help and to reassess. We each supervised one of these days a week. We also set up guidelines to help students organize their time. We didn't want them to all of a sudden, at the end of the semester, realize that they needed to reassess a ton of outcomes. We came up with a policy and had student support dates. On these dates, any student who had an outcome below a level 2 would be put on a "contract" and given 3 - 4 weeks to ask for help and reassess.
The first semester we implemented this we knew we may end up with some unhappy or surprised parents/students. We communicated it over and over, and sent out letters to parents reminding them of the policy. One of the things we stressed in our PLC group was that we had to stick to our guns and the final progress report could not have any current levels below a 2 if we were assigning credit to the student. The minute you break what you have stated, it no longer holds weight. At the end of the semester we had a number of students who had not met the criteria. We made the appropriate phone calls to parents informing them that their son/daughter was not receiving the credit at this time and recommended one of two options to them. If we felt that the student actually did need to repeat the entire class with a teacher, then we told the parent this. We had very few students fall in this category. With all of the support provided along the way, there were not many students left in this position. The other option presented was that their son/daughter would register with the extension campus to complete the outcomes, and once successful the credit would be applied. We were pleasantly surprised as to how many parents and students were thankful for this opportunity. "You mean I don't have to repeat the entire class? Thanks!" There were very few unpleasant conversations.
The second semester with this system went a lot more smoothly. We found a couple of things second time through. One, the students now believed that we were going to follow through and they knew they had to work to achieve a certain level of understanding and then maintain or improve this level. Two, we found that teaching the next level was far easier than it had been in the past! Instead of having to re-teach a skill that was necessary for a new outcome, I only had to review it! Since all students sitting in my class had met the basic level of understanding in the previous class, I wasn't speaking Greek to some of them! We were able to go deeper with outcomes as the time was there to advance instead of back up.
It was interesting as we met after semester 1 to reflect on how things went, that the issue of "grades" came up. We still have to convert to a percentage at the end of the semester (grades 10 - 12 only) for the Ministry of Education. We only converted if the student was receiving the credit, which meant they met the requirement for all outcomes. If they hadn't then there was a "blank" on their report card where the grade would have been. The comment a teacher made was that their marks seemed quite high and their class average was a lot higher than before. I had to grin. Yippee!!!! That means you had students who LEARNED and are proficient with what they are supposed to be! Dylan Wiliam says "we should set a goal of proficiency for all, excellence for many, with all student groups fairly represented in the excellent" Embedded Formative Assessment, page 22. We need to stop norm referencing and thinking we can't have a lot of students at the top of the class! Also, because we were now only assigning "grades" to students who had achieved EVERY outcome, there were no "failure" marks being factored into the student's grade.
We have learned from this year that it is very important to communicate regularly with parents on how their son/daughter's progress is going so there are no surprises. It is also important to realize we are still dealing with kids, and they need help organizing their time. We work on having students track their growth and take ownership for their learning, but we guide them with structure and provide reminders (contracts) to help them achieve.
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