Slowing Down to the Speed of Life and Learning

 

Sandra Herbst and I are in New Zealand. We spent a Mother’s Day Sunday in Wellington, which is the capital and has about 500,000 people. The pace of life here and in other communities in New Zealand is remarkable. We spent time at the waterfront market and walked to the parliament buildings. We took the cable car up to the botanical gardens where we enjoyed lunch at their café. There were families everywhere with lots of children. The pace seemed to slow down to us. It was the speed of life and learning. 

Schools are a reflection of society and its values. And there are differences between New Zealand and Canada in terms of the number of children living in poverty, the violence in schools, literacy rates, and overall student success. It makes me wonder.

I wonder about the decisions in Canada that promote educational choice for all when it is really only choice for some.

I wonder about banning testing on animals but increasing testing for children.

I wonder about schools having to teach more and more as we try to stem the tide against obesity, violence, and crime yet we don’t have enough time to teach literacy and numeracy any longer.

I wonder whether Canadians have lost more than we’ve gained in our race for more mobile devices, faster connection speeds, and pursuing our ‘online lives.’ 

Was it just a coincidence that we didn’t hear a cross word spoken to a child or to an adult all day? Or, are people gentler and kinder when time is accepted as the gift it is?

All my best,

Anne

PS Sandra and I have been planning our August events. We are SO EXCITED! There are lots of interesting people coming to both the Canmore, Alberta events and the Fredericton, New Brunswick events. And, with the recent assessment news in Alberta, across Canada, and in the United States, the promise of classroom assessment is outstanding! We are happy to be working in these interesting times.

Transforming Assessment - Focusing on Feedback

Are you interested in Transforming Assessment? So are New Zealand educators.

Today I presented to almost 200 New Zealand educators via the web as an introductory session prior to Sandra Herbst and I presenting in Wellington, New Zealand next month. Participants asked interesting questions regarding rubrics and determining quality.

One participant wrote, "Thanks so much for this morning – it really got me thinking and I was very interested in your ideas about rubrics. I think you are correct re the language, although I’ve never thought about it in that way before."

Another participant wrote, "Rubrics are an interest of mine, but unfortunately much of what I see are almost punitive, except at the very top, and I think of Dweck and fixed mindsets. So I very much appreciated your answer as it fitted my prior knowledge."
 
With thanks to the Learning Network and their generosity, you are invited to view the recording of this 45 minute presentation for a limited time. Click here for access. If you want to register for our session in Wellington, contact the Learning Network. If New Zealand is a little far then think about registering for our institutes in Canmore, Alberta or Fredericton, New Brunswick this August.

To read more about the ideas shared in this presentation, consider reading Chapter 2 in Making Classroom Assessment Work (3nd Ed) and Setting and Using Criteria (2nd Ed) by Kathleen Gregory, Caren Cameron and me, Anne Davies.

Preparing Diagnostic Assessments

Recently Melissa was on our members' site and asked me to respond to the following question, “Can you explain the best method of preparing a math diagnostic assessment?”

When one considers the best method of preparing a math diagnostic assessment, it is important to ask a few questions:

                  1. What is the purpose?

                  2. Who is the audience?

                  3. What kind of evidence (e.g., data or information) is needed?

                  4. How can you ensure for reliability and validity?

                  5. How can the findings be reported?

From a classroom assessment perspective, we think about diagnostic assessment as being about the gathering of “baseline data” through engaging learners in the tasks they are going to be learning more about. The purpose of diagnostic assessment from the classroom perspective is to understand what students know and what they need to know so instructional plans can be made with specific student needs in mind. Two examples:

Task: Students engage in representing their learning in relation to specific learning expectations/intentions. These tasks might be done by individuals, by small groups, or the entire class of students. There are many possibilities for performance tasks  based on grade level curriculum. Tasks could be anything from building patterns using manipulatives, problem solving and representing mathematical thinking in a variety of ways (words, symbols, graphs, equations and so on), or any other tasks that involve the application of mathematical concepts. Powerful performance tasks result in not only a product but also an opportunity to observe students and ask them to articulate their understandings. This collection of evidence from multiple sources collected over time (baseline tasks repeated more than once) provides for reliability and validity.

Test: Other times teachers take an end of unit test or quiz and ask students to do as much as they can and note which questions are easy, which are not too bad, and which are really difficult. It is helpful to ask students to use a common set of visual symbols (e.g., target) or colours (e.g., easy is green, moderate is yellow, difficult is red) to code the test items. Teachers explain to students that they don’t expect them to know everything because this is an END of learning test. Students are being asked to do the test so teachers will know more about what needs to be taught.

Other times the purpose of the diagnostic assessment is to identify trends and patterns across a large group of students so programs can be designed or to identify learning difficulties. These standardized diagnostic tests and tasks have their own quality standards. If these are the kind of diagnostic assessments you are interested in, you might want to read a column by Jim Popham titled, Diagnosing the Diagnostic Test.

Whatever you decide to do, think carefully about your purpose and ask yourself, “Do my planned next steps in terms of the diagnostic assessment support student learning?” If you can respond with a “Yes!” then proceed. If not, revise your plans. After all, diagnostic assessments are about supporting student learning first. Fulfilling the information needs of adults is a distant second purpose.

As teachers plan their classroom assessment in support of student learning, they find it helpful to build an assessment plan. You might want to use the end-of-chapter activities in Making Classroom Assessment Work to build your own assessment plan. This third edition will help you figure out which tasks could be a source of important baseline data for you and your students. I recommend you pay particular attention to the end-of-chapter activities for Chapters 3, 4, 5, and 9.

All my best,

Anne

PS Consider attending one of our summer Institutes in Canmore, AB or Fredericton, NB to find out more about diagnostic assessments and building an assessment plan.

Report Card Planning

Sarah is working on a project related to reporting. (A while ago I tweeted about an interesting blog by Andrew Campbell that you may also want to read.)

As I reflected on the questions she posed, I invited her to get in touch so we could have a longer conversation. And, I posted the following quick comment...

I'm happy to talk some more about reporting... especially when we conceive of reporting as a process rather than an event and when we think about how children can be involved in communicating evidence of their own learning. Technology is beginning to make it possible for students to take control of communicating the evidence of learning and for teachers to communicate their professional judgement in relation to grade level expectations... two thoughts come to mind...

1. The person working the hardest is learning the most...why shouldn't students be working harder (and smarter) when it comes to reporting?

2. Teachers professional judgement is more reliable and valid than external tests when they have been engaged in co-constructing criteria, looking at samples of student work, scoring that work, checking for inter-rater reliability, and so on....

What happens when we help students understand quality, learn the language of assessment, and self-monitor their way to success??? Even young children can do this! We have documentation. We have research evidence. Why not have students deeply engaged in collecting and sharing evidence of their learning?

Why don't you post your thoughts also? Here is the link again.

Cheers,
Anne

PS This is a topic we focus on during our summer Institutes and is often what people ask us to focus on as part of our sessions with schools and districts. Get in touch with me via Twitter (on this blog page) or through Kathy Burns at our office 1.800.603.9888/250.703.2920 if you want to find out more.

Are you a primary teacher? Do you wonder if AFL can make a difference?

A few months ago I had the opportunity to celebrate the successful defense of Nancy Barr's thesis. She is a primary 

teacher in Saskatoon. She focused her research on primary children and their growing ability to articulate their 

understandings of writing. It is a fascinating qualitative study. It clearly shows the difference that assessment for 

learning can make for learning. I encourage you to enjoy it. It is available online.

I am including the abstract below.

All my best,

Anne

PS If you have a study that focuses on assessment for learning, please send me the link! 

I would enjoy the chance to read it.

Primary School Children’s Articulation of the Development of Quality in Writing During the Implementation of Assessment For Learning

By Nancy Barr

Abstract

In this qualitative study, I investigated six grade 1 and 2 children’s change in their articulation about the quality of their writing throughout one school year of exposure to Assessment For Learning. The Assessment For Learning strategies included giving and receiving feedback, co-creating assignment criteria, one-on-one and small group conferences, and articulating work with peers and teacher, as well as considering work samples from previous students, supported student writing. In addition, writing samples were analyzed to search for authenticity in what students were saying about their writing and about what makes good writing. The research questions that I was investigating were: 1. In what ways do students articulate their understanding of accomplished or needed improvements in their written work? 2. In what ways is this articulation related to implemented Assessment For Learning practices? Research methods involved both naturalistic inquiry and grounded theory analysis. Data included a semi structured interview, used at the beginning and end of the school year; teacher observations; student writing samples; tape recordings of teacher-student (one on one and small group and whole class) conversations; and samples of student developed criteria. Transcripts were read and re-read to develop themes, searching for how the selected six students articulated their understandings of quality writing. In addition, writing samples were analyzed to search for authenticity in what students were saying about their writing and about what makes good writing The six children were chosen for maximum variation on beginning ability, and gender. Of the six students, all began, in September, by talking about appearance of writing – neatness, spaces between words, etc. By November, they were talking about quality of words, length of sentences, and were articulating methods for improving their spelling, and increasing sentence and story length. By June, the high achieving boy was talking about quality writing having “to make sense”. In this study, the boys improved as much, or more, as the girls. Although no generalizations can be made from such a small qualitative study, this is an unexpected outcome. An important finding of this study is the link between children’s ability to articulate about quality writing from having participated in Assessment for Learning principles, and their ability to regulate their own learning (self-regulated learning). Theory derived from this study points to a relationship between Assessment For Learning and self-regulated writing activity.

Why don't we involve learners in assessment more often???

Who knows! There are so many benefits! But if you don't know why... then you don't do it.... and you and your students don't see the results.
 
If you just want to help people make this change, consider this....
 
Many years ago I learned about a wonderful adult learning strategy that involves having participants be part of a "clapping class" with students, teachers, and criteria. Recently the video clip of Sandra Herbst working with a group and doing the clapping activity was featured as one of our blog entries. I want to share the following email from a colleague in Saskatchewan:

"We have been using the clapping activity in many of our schools this fall. I would love to share with you about a wonderful morning we had a few weeks ago.

We were with a K-12 staff who is looking deeper into self-assessment. We were focusing our time together on setting criteria and self-assessment, using the Knowing What Counts books as our guide. At the end of our time, we introduced the clapping activity. This is a favourite time with staff members – it allows for some craziness and rich interaction while making a powerful point!

Anyway, we were having a lot of fun and there were some amazing clapping performances. After two participants, one of our judges emerged as a bit of a “nitpicky” judge – some of the audience members were feeling a little upset with him. Through a sidebar conversation, we determined it might be nice to have the judge provide an exemplar of what he was looking for. When we asked for an exemplar for our third participant, the “nitpicky” judge was quite reluctant at first but then got into it. He gave a great example of what he was looking for and it turned out what was in his head was not what he had indicated when helping to set criteria with the other judges.

It ended up being a great conversation starter and the conversation went deeper once we got into the debriefing portion, not only with the judges but with the entire group. The talk went well into the lunch hour (we could smell the pizza) but they just had so much to unpack."

Such great evidence of powerful learning. Enjoy the video clip of Sandra and think about using this learning activity with your learners - parents, colleagues, or students.

All my best,
Anne


PS The credit for this clapping activity is hard to trace and therefore credit is hard to give. We did not invent it. We first learned it from colleagues at Rick Stiggins' wonderful summer conference in the early 1990s.

PPS Happy Valentine's Day! Enjoy a day appreciating the love and beauty that surrounds us :-)

What about Fredericton, NB in Atlantic Canada?

YES! Fredericton!! The week of August 12 - 16, 2013... two Institutes! For Leaders. Teacher leaders. School leaders. System leaders. And, you can turn it into a university credit course if you choose.

Usually we do our Canadian summer events in the Comox Valley so it is exciting for us to be off to other places.... like Fredericton, New Brunswick! My grandparents had a farm close to Woodstock, NB so I'm kinda, sorta going home :-)

In partnership with the University of New Brunswick, we are offering two
2½ day Institutes in August. You can find out more here. Here's the first page of the brochure.