Assessment for Learning in the Classroom

The night for ghouls and goblins has once again passed and it is hard to believe that 2/10 of the school year has disappeared along with it.  At this point in the year I have had the privelage of observing and debriefing with each of our new teachers in their classrooms.  Most recently, the SJSD new teachers took part in a professional learning session structured around the topics of assessment and technology.  The day was set up to facilitate numerous opportunities for conversation, collaboration, learning and professional growth.

Our assessment discussion was focused on the Black-William article, Working Inside the Black Box.  This reading provided a wonderful opportunity for new teachers to engage in rich conversations around the topic of Assessment for Learning in the Classroom.   The article provides four clear and specific instructional strategies for  "How change can happen", namely;

1. Questioning
2.  Feedback
3.  Peer and Self Assessment
4.  Formative use of Summative Assessments. 

The teachers were able to engage with the article through a Jigsaw style activity. 
Below is a summary of their reflections.

Questioning:   

• Wait time is critical after a question has been asked of students.  Teachers need to give students "think time" in order to help more students become involved in classroom discussion and the learning process.   
• Teachers should also be mindful of the kinds of questions they are asking of their students.   Design questions that are worth asking, questions that will help to uncover a students' understanding of a particular concept.  
• All answers are purposeful - right or wrong.  Incorrect answers give teachers information needed to inform their next steps for instruction and allows students opportunities for students to improve their understanding in a collaborative manner.  Through the design of effective questions, teachers become leaders of exploration and development of ideas.

Feedback:

• The nature of feedback teachers give to students is critical.
• Feedback should cause further learning & thinking to take place.
• Descriptive feedback provides students with information that supports learning.
• Comments help parents focus on the learning issues rather than the interpretation of  a grade.
• Devote class time for rewritin and revision so that the emphasis is placed on improvement and more learning.
• Students will engage more productively with their work when they are give descriptive feedback.

Self and Peer Assessment

• Students can achieve a learning goal only if they understand the goal and can assess what they need to do to reach it.
• The skill of self assessment needs to be taught and developed.

Formative use of Summative Assessments

• Students can create their own review process plan by using red, yellow, green coding to the list of outcomes to be assessed.
• Students can generate and answer their own questions for a topic.
• Summative assessments should be a positive part of the learning process.
• Students need to understand quality work through examples.