Guiding Question:
How have you applied a variety of strategies and educational technology tools to strengthen assessment in classrooms and schools? How might the involvement in the assessment process by families and other professionals be enhanced using technology?
Assessment
is critical to the success of any program. Education should be data
driven, and it is important that we can document the effectiveness of any
educational strategy or program that we utilize. It’s also critical that
we are able to provide students with an avenue to demonstrate what they’ve
learned and the magnitude of their growth. This information will also
help us plan further programs to meet the students’ individual needs.
Also, since we currently teach in a standards-based educational system, quality
assessments are used to demonstrate success at meeting these standards.
It is of the utmost importance, therefore, that assessments correlate with the
standards we teach to. A complete description of standards across
all grade levels and content areas can be found at the Education World (2007)
website. This site offers a great resource for researching both state and
national standards. There are numerous ways to assess children’s learning
and teacher effectiveness in an educational setting.
In
EDU 511, we discussed the merits of portfolio assessments that have been used in the
field of education for some time. They provide a collection of work for a
student over a period of time. These assessments allow students to
demonstrate improvement and learning in a very hands-on way. During the
course of my learning in the past few years, I’ve begun using electronic
portfolios in my classroom. I’ve done this using a few different
methods. All students’ writing assignments are done using Microsoft
Word. These assignments are saved into a network folder during the school
year. At the end of the year, I have a portfolio of writing samples for
each student. Also, I scan in pictures of student projects and add these
to their network folders. All lab journals in science are saved in a
science folder for each student, along with pictures of them conducting the
experiments. The students enjoy looking at these later in the year, and
get a real sense of accomplishment. Near the end of the year, they choose
some samples of their work from each subject, and create a portfolio using PowerPoint
to show what they’ve learned. This method of portfolio development also
provides a great way of connecting with parents. During the year, I
e-mail the students’ portfolios home to their parents so they can view
them. They love being part of this assessment process, and it helps keep
them in touch with their child’s progress. There are many web sites
available for researching the merits of electronic portfolios and offering
samples of this assessment type. Developing Student Electronic Portfolios
is a site that offers a wide range of information about electronic
portfolios, offers samples of student portfolios, and gives links to many sites
that offer online web based software for portfolio development tools.
While there are some viable web based software options for portfolio
development, I choose to use programs like PowerPoint, Word, or Hyperstudio for
portfolio development.
When
establishing assessments for students, specifically those that are subjective,
it’s important that educators use a rubric for scoring these assessments.
A rubric allows an educator to use a standardized evaluation system to evaluate
whether a student reached certain learning objectives based on standards or a
set of criteria. Current educational technology allows teachers to create
rubrics for their assignments with ease. I currently use Rubistar
to make rubrics for use in my classroom. This online resource allows
teachers to select project types and categories within the project’s
criteria. After selecting various options, a rubric will be created for
teachers use. The user can also edit the field to customize it to their specific
criteria. I’ve used Rubistar to develop rubrics for science fair
projects, essays, book reports, Powerpoint presentations, and much more. Appendix L shows an example of a rubric I developed
for science fair projects.
Students
demonstrate knowledge of writing skills and methods by writing essays or
compositions. In EDU 580, we learned to use productivity tools such as
Word in various manners. I have
students complete their writing assignments on Microsoft Word. This way,
they can save their written assignments in a network folder. This is
great for the portfolio development I described above. I also have had
student with OT issues and difficulty with handwriting. They are often
times so focused on letter formation; they can’t get their thoughts down on
paper coherently. Computers or Alphasmarts can be used as
assistive technology. I’ve found that by allowing these students to type
their work, their writing is for more effective. Therefore, my
assessments are more accurate and meaningful because I know I’m assessing the
students’ writing skills, not their letter formation skills. By having
students’ written work on the computer, I can send it home to parents via
e-mail for them to work on it with their children.
Many
times teachers use chapter or unit tests to assess whether students have
attained certain skills or retained specific content knowledge. While
many tests are available with the text series used in the classroom, often
teachers must make tests of their own. I use Microsoft Word to develop
tests, but have also used online sources for test development. I usually
use EasyTestMaker (2007) to develop tests.
This program makes test creation easy because I don’t need to spend much time
on formatting. With this program, I can create tests with multiple
choice, essay, fill in the blank, matching, short answer, and/or true or false
questions. Also, with one click, I can get an alternate version of the
test for make-ups or retakes. I find this program very easy to use and
effective. I record the scores of these tests, along with quizzes and
other work, on Gradequick, a computer grade book.
Students
in my class also write in reading response journals each day. They
respond to a reading assignment by completing a journal entry on the
computer. I provide different prompts that assess different areas of reading
comprehension. I use technology to attain these assessment prompts.
I use a site located at http://www.middleweb.com/MWLresources/dbova1.html. This site offers a variety of prompts
to students that assess many different areas of comprehension. I can then
assess their reading comprehension by viewing their computer journal.
Microsoft
Excel provides a wonderful way for students to display data gathered during
experiments or math problems. They can display the data in a table and
also create a graph for display. I’ve specifically used this to have
students graph results from lab experiments. I have not used this method of
assessment as often as I’d like, but plan to more in the future. There
are numerous ways to use Excel to enhance assessment. A site located at http://www.sabine.k12.la.us/class/excel_resources.htm
(Sabine Parish School System, 2002) provides guides, tutorials, applications,
and lesson plans that all involve the use of Excel. I’ve also used Excel
to chart test results or display test data about mastery of different concepts.
To
assess students learning in the area of letter writing, I’ve had students write
letters to students in a different school. They wrote these letters using
Word, and then sent them to other students via e-mail. I was able to
assess their skills in writing letters by evaluating their letters and offering
feedback before they were sent.
Each
year, students in my science class have to research a person that works in a
field that uses science. To assess what they’ve learned about this
scientist, I have each students create a PowerPoint presentation. They
use this PowerPoint to present their scientist to the class. The student
orally talks about the person they studied as they go through each slide on
their presentation. This serves as a great way for me to assess their
learning. I use a rubric to score their presentation.
According
to research done in EDU 553, webquests provide a unique way for students to be
assessed. A webquest is an inquiry-based activity that follows a
constructivist approach to learning and assessment. A website published
by the Wildwood School computer lab (2007) has
offered how-to resource pages, sample webquests, and collections of
webquests. Since my program at Eastern began, I’ve used Webquests a few
times and assessed them. They are time consuming to develop, but offer an
alternative way to assess students. I developed a web quest on early
immigration in America and used it with some of my higher students as
enrichment. Appendix M shows a photo of me working
with these two students. There are also many sites that offer pre-made
webquests for educators to utilize. The Webquest Discoveries Archive at Education
World offers many such sites.
One way that involvement in the assessment process by families and other professionals can be enhanced is by using classroom websites. My class web site, Appendix G, offers all sorts of information to parents about my class. It covers class guidelines, calendars, project descriptions, and daily homework assignments. I also provide a place to display student work to parents and members of the community. Parents and other family members can actively view many of the projects students completed as an assessment. They can also contact me through this site. Next year, I plan to include links to online math assessments that are being provided as part of our new math program. Students will be able to complete alternate assessments through web activities, and the results of their work will be sent to my e-mail automatically.
Front Page Narrative Section References Appendices