Ch. 14 Assessment

Think of a lesson plan from your licensure area. Knowing that assessment is an integral part of teaching, explain at least four informal and formal assessments that you will use in your lesson plan to provide you with feedback and involve the students in assessing their own learning. 

As we have learned in class and read in our textbook, assessment is a very important part of being an effective teacher. Assessments allow us to observe a student's behavior or academic achievement and draw inferences from those observations about the student's knowledge and abilities. I know everyone thinks of multiple choice standardized tests when the word assessment comes up, however there are many different ways that teachers can assess their students. Assessments are most effective when a variety of them are used to determine a student's knowledge, abilities, and behavior. As a teacher, I will make sure I use a variety of assessments to observe my students because it is important to remember that my classroom will be made up of different learners who demonstrate their learning in a variety of ways.

Using a Science lesson plan on friction for a 4th grade classroom that I recently created, I will explain how I would use both informal and formal assessments to provide myself with valuable feedback that I could use to reshape the direction of my teaching and also keep track of my students' learning while involving my students in assessing their own learning at the same time. The objectives of this lesson are that students will discover that friction is a force that resists motion by observing the effects of friction on a moving object, students will discover how lubricants reduce friction between an object and the surface, and students will suggest additional ways to reduce friction between objects.

4 Informal Assessments I will use:

1. Questioning: I will use this type of informal assessment at the beginning of this lesson and during this lesson to gain insight on the degree and depth of my students' understanding of friction and motion. Using questioning at the beginning of the lesson will allow me to see what preconceptions my students already have about friction and motion and what they do/do not already know. This will allow me to adjust the lesson to most effectively meet the needs of my students. Questioning during the lesson will allow my students the opportunity for deeper thinking. 
2.  Observation: I will use the assessment strategy of observation during the lesson while students work in groups to complete the activity, since a large part of this lesson is student-led. While students are working in groups, I will walk around and take notes on how well each student performs physical tasks, reflect on a specific aspect of their learning, note specific behaviors when working in groups, etc. By keeping a notebook of my individual observations on each student, I can furnish a picture of student learning over time. 
3. Write daily or weekly entries in their journals: I will use this type of informal assessment to further expand my students' understanding of the lesson on friction while also tying in a connection to Language Arts/Writing. Our Language Arts lesson for that week or day might be on short stories and poems and so to connect to this skill, I would have my students write about either what life would be like in a frictionless world or describe other ways to reduce friction between objects. This type of informal assessment would provide me with feedback on my students' understanding of friction after learning about it in the lesson and show me what they still need work on. 
4. Peer/Self Assessments: This type of informal assessment would allow students to evaluate their own learning. These are important because when students are required to think about their own learning, articulate their understanding, and what they still need improvement on, their overall achievement improves. One way I would use this assessment would be the "Two Stars and a Wish" peer assessment strategy. After writing in their journals about friction, each student would be paired with another student and would read to one another what they have written about friction. Each partner must then identify two things the author did well (stars) and one suggestion for improvement (wish). This type of assessment is great because it creates a classroom community and it also allows students to see where they could use improvement while also learning from their peers. 

4 Formal Assessments I will use:

1. Oral Presentation: For this assessment strategy, I will have my students present an oral presentation to the class on either sports in which friction plays an important role or ways that scientists have used their discoveries about friction to improve transportation. This presentation can be done either with a partner or individually, which allows the students some sense of control over how they are assessed. This will provide feedback on the students' understanding of the lesson and show what they are capable of doing. This type of task is meaningful, thought provoking, and authentic. 
2. Multiple-Choice Test: While this is not my favorite type of assessment, it will still provide useful feedback on what my students know and still need improvement on regarding the topic of friction and motion. I would use this assessment at the end of the unit on friction and motion to test my students' overall knowledge in this content area. This would show how effective both my teaching and the lesson were on furthering their understanding of friction. 
3. Conducting an Experiment: At the end of the lesson, I would have my students get in groups and discuss with one another an experiment they could conduct on friction and motion. This could be an experiment that shows how objects have different amounts of friction when rubbed against different surfaces. This type of performance assessment will give me feedback on what my students really know about friction by showing me rather than writing it out for me or telling me. By applying their knowledge of friction to conducting an experiment, I can see their level of understanding they gained from the lesson and adjust my teaching from there. 
4. Short-Answer Quiz: I will inform my students before starting the lesson that there will be a quiz when the lesson is finished. This type of formal assessment provides feedback on a student's understanding of friction by having them put into their own words what friction is, how friction stops motion, and how lubricants help assist objects in motion. I plan to use this assessment format to provide me with an overview of what my students learned and didn't learn through the lesson. This will give me a guideline of what concepts need to be further explained and worked on before I give my students the multiple-choice test at the end of the friction unit. 

Through using these different types of assessment, I can most effectively gain feedback that is both valid and reliable. 

West Virginia Department of Education 

This is a link to a great website on formative assessments. It provides a variety of ways for you to assess your students and describes why each type of formative assessment is valuable and useful. I found so many great resources on this site that I plan to use in my own classroom that will provide me with great feedback on my students' progress. I think it is important to utilize all the ways that you can assess your students in order to gain reliable and valid feedback.