September 7, 2017

~EDUC 410~
We've had lots of good conversations about assessment this week! We talked about whether or not standardized testing is a good way of assessing students and what assessment really means. We came to the agreement that assessments do not always have to be in the form of tests, but that assessments can be presentations, projects, papers, oral tests, etc. There are various assessment techniques that teachers should use, other than just testing. This aligns with Standard 4h, "Teachers use a variety of methods to assess what each student has learned."

We decided that standardized testing should happen in schools because our kids have to be assessed in some way. However, we also decided that we shouldn't take standardized tests too seriously because there are several factors that can affect a child's ability to do well on the test, even though they may have mastered the material and they may be extremely smart. These factors include:

• Test Anxiety (I know this is real because it is something that I have!)
• If the child did not rest well the night before
• If the child is hungry/hasn't eaten anything on test day
• If the child had to take care of younger siblings and the test is the last thing on their mind
• If something recently happened to their parents that could be occupying their minds, rather than them being able to focus on the test

These are all factors that could make a smart child that knows the material perform badly on a standardized test, so standardized test might not be worthy of all the credit that we give them. I mean really, how accurate are they?

For our seminar today, we had to read about assessment and about an interview of Grant Wiggins, a nationally recognized assessment expert. I read something that he stated about assessment that really opened my eyes to assessing my future students! He said, "So you have to think about how it's [your lesson] going to end up, what it's going to look like. And then that ripples back into your design, what activities will get you there. What teaching moves will get you there?" He said that they call it backward design. This is a method in teaching where the teacher first figures out what they will assess their students on, and then they develop their lesson to cover all of the material on the assessment. This way they can be sure to cover everything they need their kids to know. How awesome is this?! This is an approach to teaching and lesson plans that I had never thought of or heard of before. But I think this is a great way to teach and assess.

(Source: https://www.edutopia.org/grant-wiggins-assessment#graph3)

So what does this mean for my future classroom?

• First of all, I won't let my students think that their standardized test scores, or any test scores for that matter, define them as a person or define how intelligent they are.
• I will use backward design to first figure out what I'm going to assess my students on, and then design my lesson plan based on what they need to know for the assessment.
• I won't just assess my kids with tests- but I'll use other methods, such as presentations, papers/reports, projects, oral tests, etc.