Guided Response: Respond to a minimum of two classmates’ posts. What perceptions did you share? How did your perceptions differ? Kaitlin McCarthySummative assessment is used to determine a grade

 Guided Response: Respond to a minimum of two classmates’ posts. What perceptions did you share? How did your perceptions differ? 

Kaitlin McCarthy

Summative assessment is used to determine a grade. Formative assessment is used “to improve the teaching/learning process” (Lefrançois, 2013, Chapter 1, Section 1, para. 6).  Benjamin Mook from the School of the Future uses mistakes to assess. He takes problems that are answered incorrectly and gives it to his students to determine where the mistake happened (Edutopia, 2011) and then get determine where his students need help based on if they find the “correct” mistakes. Drew Krandall uses exit slips which have been used for quite some time and these exit slips let the teacher know what they need to focus on more, so all students can understand the material completely.

Formative assessments are FOR learning because the teacher wanted to get the information in the assessments in order for the students to learn more. Ben Mook takes the students mistakes and uses it as a question to pose to students later. This brings their thinking to what they did that was wrong and how to correct it. Drew Krandall uses his exit slips to determine where his students are at and if there are any misunderstandings, he can then plan how to deal with those.

Mr. Mook took his class into the stairwell and asked them to use their knowledge and apply it to real life. He also took the time at the end of the lesson to go around the classroom to see the students’ work. The worksheet that Mr. Krandall gave to use students regarding multiplication was how he determined if the students were understanding the information or not. He also rewarded them verbally by telling them how good of a job they did and rewarded them with a bubble clap, which I love.

The connections I see are that both teachers are using their assessments to see where the students are and then to shape how they bring information back up again. For example, Ben took some incorrect answers and brought them to the attention of his students a few days after the initial lesson was done and saw if the students could identify the incorrect answers and turn them into correct ones. He also took students into the stairwell to make a real-life connection to slopes in mathematics. This could continue and turn into a summative assessment. For Mr. Krandall’s classroom, I could see him turning the exit slip strategy and using the same subject and turning that into a test. One thing I enjoyed seeing was he always reassured his students when the work was not a test. Students are always asking, “Will it be on the test?” and instead of the students focusing on the experience, they are focusing on the work instead.

References

Edutopia. (2011). Keeping it relevant and "authentic" [Video File]. Retrieved from

http://www.edutopia.org/stw-assessment-authentic-relevant-lessons-video

Lefrançois, G. R. (2013). Of learning and assessment [Electronic Version]. Retrieved fromhttps://content.ashford.edu/

Teaching Channel. (2013). Assess and plan with exit tickets. Retrieved from

https://www.teachingchannel.org/videos/teacher-assessment-strategy

Cara Stanley

  Both teachers in the videos we watched modeled formative assessments.  Formative assessments are created for learning, in order to improve the teaching and learning process (Lefrancois, 2013).  Mr. Mook took real-life situations and made them work for his math class.  He was able to ask questions that were relatable to the students at School of the Future so that they could see the bigger picture.  Mr. Crandall used Exit Tickets to get a snapshot of what his students were understanding.  He was able to quickly assess whether what level of comprehension his students had of his lessons.

                The evidence I saw and heard regarding formative assessments being assessments for learning in Mr. Crandall’s class was obvious to the students and to an outsider.  While he was reviewing what he had seen on the students' Exit Tickets, he pointed out one student who had excelled and had him explain a more advanced step that Mr. Crandall was going to explain in the next step.  He was explaining to the students step by step and once he saw that they were ready to move on, he allowed a student to segue into that.  Mr. Mook took a more smooth approach to showing assessment for learning. Once he saw that his students were understanding the concept he was teaching, he added a little bit more while allowing it to become something real and tangible.

                Mr. Mook was able to determine the current progress of his students in relation to mastering their standard by watching groups work in progress, it appeared to me that he monitored work while it was taking place and addressed situations head-on.  He then brought the point to the group without pointing fingers and allowed the group to work through the problem together.  Mr. Crandall looked at the Exit Tickets and created his game plan from there.  He pointed out positives and worked through missing points with a student who needed a little extra help.  By doing this, he was reinforcing learning and motivating his students, which is one of the main components of ongoing formative and diagnostic assessment (Lefrancois, 2013).

                For both teachers, I can see that they are teaching a portion of their unit for a summative assessment.  They were both taking individual pieces of a unit and breaking it down so students could build it up on their own.  I liked that Mr. Mook was giving the students the tools they needed in order to troubleshoot moving forward, as in, if they were stuck on a problem, they could solve it backward and forwards.  Mr. Crandall broke his lesson down for his students and was step by step getting to the bigger picture.  I liked that for young students.  I think both teachers were moving towards a unit summative.

Lefrançois, G. R. (2013). Of learning and assessment [Electronic Version]. Retrieved from https://content.ashford.edu/