Assesses Student Learning
Description of Standard: The knowledge of subject matter and students should come together in the assessment of what students know and can do. English teachers align assessments with content goals and plan backwards from summative assessments, while using formative assessments to guide instruction. All of the language arts should be integrated into assessments across the semester or year.
Abstract: Student assessment is a crucial part of teaching. Through thoughtful assessments and constructive feedback, students can develop their skills, track their growth, and strengthen their abilities as readers and writers. Moreover, assessments are also useful for teachers’ growth and practice as well. Assessment results can reveal patterns among students and highlight areas for reteaching or revising. In short, assessments should inform and influence a teacher’s instruction, curriculum, and materials. The following artifacts represent some of the assessments I have used to evaluate students’ knowledge and understanding of the course concepts. In turn, students’ results have helped to shape my practice and future instruction.
Formative Assessment: Figurative Language & Poetic Devices Word Wall
I crafted a Figurative Language and Poetic Devices Word Wall to assess my students’ previous knowledge of terms like simile, metaphor, allusion, imagery, etc. I asked students to work in small groups to find or create one example for each term. Then they wrote their examples on sticky notes and posted them next to the corresponding term on the Word Wall. As a formative assessment, this was a low-stakes activity, and it helped me to see which terms I needed to clarify and spend additional time on. For instance, almost all students were comfortable with similes, but many were unsure about the term apostrophe. After students completed the Word Wall, I asked each group to add a few of their examples to our collaborative electronic study guide. Each group explained their examples, and I answered questions and provided clarification as necessary. In this way, I assessed my students’ understanding of the devices, and individuals were able to recognize which terms they needed to review for the upcoming quiz.
Here are the students' collaborative study guides:
Student Work Analysis: Archetypes Comparison Essay
The Student Work Analysis project below involved analyzing artifacts of student writing to assess student learning, to evaluate my instructional sequence, and to revise and plan for future writing instruction. My Student Work Analysis is centered on the Archetypes Comparison Essay and includes examples of student work and my feedback. This summative assessment required students to respond to one of the following prompts: (1) Compare two texts that feature hero’s journey archetypes (2) Compare two texts that feature creation story archetypes. (Previously in the unit, students engaged in multiple formative assessments regarding these topics, including station exercises, discussions, and concept maps.) Using this summative assessment, I evaluated students’ understanding of archetypes as well as their formal writing skills and recognized areas for improvement and revision.
Inquiry Project: Comparing Note-Taking Strategies
As part of one of my graduate teacher education courses, I developed an inquiry stance towards my teaching and created the Inquiry Project artifact below. This project is focused on the following inquiry question: Which note-taking strategy (journaling forms or sticky note annotations) is more effective in helping students to learn the Aristotelian elements of tragedy? To learn the answer to this question, I required my 3rd hour students to use journaling forms while my 6th hour students received sticky notes for their annotations. I taught these Aristotelian terms in the context of Oedipus the King, and both classes completed a pretest (before the reading) as well as a posttest (after the reading). After collecting and analyzing the data (pre-test, note-taking strategies, post-test), I evaluated students’ understanding of the Aristotelian terms and reflected on the ways in which I could improve my practice and instruction.
Click here to view the "Aristotelian Terms" pretest/posttest.