Protocol for Most Formative Assessment

Protocol for Most Formative Assessments

Protocol for Using Most Formative Assessments

April 26th, 2012

Team: Grade Level: Math Subject:

Introduction:

Our team seeks to use Most Formative Assessments to support all students in achieving the Common Core State Standards. Most formative assessments are part of the Assessment Continuum. Teachers and students use Most Formative Assessments in the moment when instruction occurs and when a rapid collection of information, diagnosis, and intervention can be most helpful in supporting student learning.

Purpose:

The main purpose of the Most Formative Assessment Module is to provide teachers with the knowledge and skills that they will need to implement most formative assessment practices that will support the collection of immediate information concerning student performance on lesson-based learning targets aligned to the Common Core State Standards. The module provides teachers with resources and tools that they can use to collect instantaneous information about all students performance on key learning targets; diagnosis; intervention to support groups or individual students; and tools for monitoring the improvement of student learning. This module will also provide teachers with technology tools that they can use to carry out most formative assessment routines within their classrooms. This module will provide both the moral purpose and research support for the effectiveness of most formative assessments in supporting student learning. Finally, the module will end with support for principals and district leaders in supporting the use of most formative assessment systems within classrooms and schools.

Module Outline:

1.  Introduction to the Assessment Continuum

2.  Definition of Most Formative Assessments

3.  Examples of Most Formative Assessments

4.  The Moral Purpose Supporting Most Formative Assessments

5.  Research Supporting the Use of Most Formative Assessments

6.  Most Formative Assessment Model

7.  Technology Support for the Use of Most Formative Assessments

8.  Leadership Support for the Use of Most Formative Assessments

What problems are we trying to fix?

·  How do we measure whether all of the students in our classrooms achieve the intended learning targets while instruction occurs?

·  How do we use the assessment information to diagnose whole class, small group, and/or individual student learning needs and then intervene to support those learning needs?

·  How do we monitor how well our intervention supported student learning?

What is the Assessment Continuum?

·  Most Formative Assessments

o  Definition: Most formative assessments are closest to instruction. They take place within the actual instructional cycle and provide students and teachers with immediate feedback about the degree to which all students are achieving the instructional targets. Results from these assessments can be used to address student learning needs quickly.

o  Examples:

§  Minute to Minute Assessment

§  Questioning by teachers and students

§  Whiteboard responses to key questions

§  More Formative Assessments

·  Definition: More formative assessments are used after a short instructional cycle of 1-4 weeks. They provide students and teachers with feedback about student learning needs aligned to instructional targets. Results from these assessments can be used to address student learning needs in an ongoing way.

·  Examples:

o  Science Progress Assessments

o  Teacher team developed common assessment

o  Performance Assessments

o  NWEA Assessments

§  More Summative Assessments

·  Definition: More summative assessments are used at the end of a longer instructional cycle of 6-8 weeks and are meant to measure student achievement of learning targets after the student has had many opportunities to achieve and demonstrate mastery of the targets.

·  Examples:

·  End of Unit Assessments

·  Mid-Year Benchmark

·  Math Placement Assessment

§  Most Summative Assessments

·  Definition: Most summative assessments are usually used at the end of a semester or at the end of the year. Results can be used to make key decisions for students. Results are also used to inform the success of the adults in helping students achieve key learning standards.

·  Examples:

·  California Standards Test (CST)

·  Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT)

·  National Assessment of Educational Progress NAEP)

Activity 1: Based on your review of the Assessment Continuum, definitions, and examples, work individually and then in pairs to answer and discuss the following questions.

·  What are the purposes of the assessments within the Assessment Continuum? How are they similar? How are they different?

·  How are the audiences for the assessments within the Assessment Continuum similar and different?

·  Can we expect one Assessment type to serve multiple purposes and audiences? Please discuss.

How do the Experts Define High Quality Assessments?

Formative assessment occurs while knowledge is being learned. Summative assessment occurs at the end of a learning episode – for example, at the end of a course. (McMillan, 2000)

Formative assessments are interactive and used primarily to form or alter an ongoing process or activity. In contrast, assessments that come at the end of a process or activity, when it is difficult to alter or rectify what has already occurred, are called summative assessments. (Airasian, 1994)

Formative assessments are all those activities undertaken by teachers and/or by students which provide information to be used as feedback to modify the teaching and learning activities in which they engage. (Black and Wiliam, 1998)

Comparing Formative and Summative Assessments

Activity 2: Based on your review of the Assessment for (Formative) and the Assessment of (Summative) graphic, please work with an elbow partner to discuss the following questions.

How are the foci of Formative and Summative Assessments similar? How are they different?

Which type of assessment contributes most directly to building student capacity to learn? What are some examples from your practice in using these kinds of assessments?

Do summative assessments play a role in informing the quality of the system used to support student learning? Please describe how your system uses these types of assessment.

A Model of Formative and Summative Assessments

Activity 3: Based on your review of the model for formative and summative assessments, discuss the questions below with a table partner.

Describe whether you support or do not support the idea of using at least 3 un-graded formative assessments for every summative assessment that is administered to students.

How do you think that un-graded formative assessments can contribute to improved gains in student learning?

Can the summative assessments in the model provide any formative assessment value for students? Please describe.

What are Formative Assessments?

Activity 4: Please use the Venn Diagram Below to identify similarities and differences between Formative (assessment for learning) and Summative Assessments (Assessments of Learning). Please consider purpose, audience, and use in your comparison.

What are some examples of Most Formative Assessments?

Activity 5: The Book by Page Keeley called Science Formative Assessment contains 75 high quality examples of most formative assessments. You will be given a packet of 3 examples of Most Formative Assessments. Please read each example and then think about how you might use the most formative assessment within the context of your own teaching. Please discuss the answers to the questions on the subsequent slide with a table partner.

Please describe a classroom instructional event where you might be able to use on of the Formative Assessment Classroom Techniques described in this book.

Key Questions:

•  How would you embed the assessment into your instruction?

•  What might be some responses that you might get from students?

•  How would you use the information that you collected to diagnose student learning needs?

•  What interventions would you use to address student learning needs?

•  How would you monitor whether students learned?

What is the Moral Purpose for the Use of Formative Assessments

"Of all the civil rights for which the world has struggled and fought for 5,000 years, the right to learn is undoubtedly the most fundamental...The freedom to learn...had been bought by bitter sacrifice. And whatever we may think of the curtailment of other civil rights, we should fight to the last ditch to keep open the right to learn, the right to have examined in our schools not only what we believe, but what we do not believe; not only what our leaders say, but what the leaders of other groups and nations, and the leaders of other centuries have said. We must insist upon this to give our children the fairness of a start which will equip them with such an array of facts and such an attitude toward truth that they can have a real chance to judge what the world is and what its greater minds have thought it might be."

W.E.B. DuBois

The True Meaning of Assessment

Activity 6: Please describe below how this painting exhibits the elements of a quality formative assessment experience.

Instructional Practices that affect Student Achievement: What the Research Says

Source: Marzano

Activity 7: There is abundant research that supports the use of Formative Assessment in supporting student learning. John Hattie conducted over 800 meta-Analyses on 138 on various influences on student learning. Providing formative evaluation to students was the third highest influence on student learning.

You will be provided with a reading from an important research student about the use of formative assessment. Please read these resources and discuss the questions on the following page with a table partner.

Research Sources:

Source 1: Visible Learning by John Hattie. Pages 173- 178

Source 2: Classroom Assessment and Grading by Robert J. Marzano. Pages 1-11.

Source 3: Inside the Black Box by Paul Black and Dylan Wiliam. Pages 1-6.

After reading your Research Source Material, please form groups of 3 and discuss the following questions with your team members.

What are two or three key research findings that you found in the source?

Why are these findings important?

How can you use the findings in your practice of using formative assessments?

How can we model the use of Most Formative Assessments?

We can model the use of Most Formative Assessments by beginning with a Lesson Plan aligned to helping students demonstrate their understanding of learning targets that align with the Common Core Standards. We will begin this modeling process with a lesson entitled: Exponential Growth: How Long will it take for a bacterial colony to grow as big as the earth? Please review the copy of this lesson plan that is attached to this protocol.

Activity 8: Review the complete lesson plan and then discuss the following questions with a table partner:

Are the learning targets important for students to know? Why?

What are the opportunities for most formative assessments?

How might you use most formative assessments to elicit student misconceptions?

Activity 9: Because the size of a bacterium is so small, and the size of the earth is so large, students will probably believe that it will take a very long time for a single bacterium through repeated divisions to become as big as the earth. You can use the most formative assessment of the Crumpled Paper throw to elicit student understanding of exponential growth by asking them to record on a small piece of paper, how long that they think it will take for a bacterium through repeated divisions to become as big as the earth and tell also say why. You can find how to carry out this Most Formative Assessment strategy on the following information.

Commit and Toss Description

Commit and Toss is an anonymous technique used to get a quick read on the different ideas students have in the class. It provides a safe, fun, and engaging way for all students to make their ideas known to the teacher and the class without individual students being identified as having “wild” or incorrect ideas. Students are given a question. After completing the question, students crumple their paper up into a ball and, upon a signal from the teacher, toss the paper balls around the room until the teacher tells them to stop and pick up or hold on to one paper. Students take the paper they end up with and share the ideas and thinking that are described on their “caught” paper, not their own ideas.

Teacher Diagnosis: Students do not have a concept of the properties of exponential growth.

Intervention: Engage students in hands on and minds on activities that will help them visualize and conceptualize the properties of exponential growth. Students will use both physical models and Excel models of exponential growth.

Activity 9: Discuss with a table partner where it might be appropriate to do the Most Formative Commit and Toss assessment strategy.

Activity 10: In order to model, exponential growth, students will need to be able to represent large numbers using scientific notation. Students may exhibit the following error patterns in representing large numbers using scientific notation.

What value below represents the number 0.00036

A.  3.6 x 104

B.  -3.6 x 104

C.  3.6 x 10-4

D.  -3.6 x 10-4

Please produce an answer frequency table using SChoolPlan that shows a 42% selection of letter B and a 40% selection of letter C.

Activity 11: The Exit Ticket is a Most Formative Assessment Tool to gauge how well students are achieving key learning targets.

How might you use this type of tool to measure student understanding of learning targets in your classroom?

How might you use this type of tool to measure student understanding of learning targets in your classroom?

How does Leadership Support for the Use of Most Formative Assessments?

The Fixsen Model for Implementation supports a system that effectively combines Leadership, organizational supports, and staff competencies to ensure an effective implementation of a Most Formative Assessment Initiative.