What makes an Assessment Really Formative?

2. What makes an Assessment Really Formative? Rick Stiggins

3. LESS IS MORE • Remember that the main problem with curriculum in North America is not that we do not do enough, but rather that we attempt to do too much.

4. reading writing State Standards math Products Skills Reasoning Knowledge

5. We Assess To: • INFORM INSTRUCTIONAL DECISIONS • ENCOURAGE STUDENTS TO TRY TO LEARN

6. Common Assessments • If teachers have not agreed on the meaning and significance of what they are being asked to teach, they will not be able to establish common pacing in their courses and grade levels. Common pacing is a prerequisite for common formative assessments, which we believe are some of the most powerful tools for improvement available to a school.

7. Common Assessments • Common assessments are more efficient than assessments created by individual teachers.

8. Common Assessments • If all students are expected to demonstrate the same knowledge and skills regardless of the teacher to which they are assigned, it only makes sense that teachers would work together to assess student learning. • Common assessments are more equitable for students

9. It is ironic that schools and districts often pride themselves in the fair and consistent application of rules and policies while at the same time ignoring the tremendous inequities in the opportunities students are given to learn and the criteria by which their learning is assessed. Schools will continue to have difficulty helping all students achieve high standards if the teachers within them cannot develop the capacity to define a standard with specificity and assess it with consistency.

10. reading writing State Standards math Products Skills Reasoning Knowledge

11. Accumulating information about a student’s progress to make instructional adjustments You already do this! “Monitor and Adjust” Formative Assessments

12. Are common assessments formative or summative? • The purpose of an assessment is best viewed on a continuum and the same assessment can be both a formative and summative assessment depending on how results are used. Information gathered from a common assessment can be used in formative ways to help guide instruction. Results of a common assessment can also be used in summative ways to identify the information students have mastered at a particular point in time.

13. Formative or Summative • What happens after the test has been given will truly determine whether or not it is being used as a formative assessment. If the assessment is used to ensure students who experience difficulty are given additional time and support as well as additional opportunities to demonstrate their learning, it is formative: if additional support is not forthcoming it is summative.

14. History • 1950s College Admissions • 1960s Districtwide Testing • 1970s Statewide Testing • 1980s National Assessment • 1990s International Testing • 2000s NCLB Every Pupil Testing

15. Our schools were designed to leave lots of students behind- they were to rank us on achievement by the end of high school: • RESULT? WINNERS/LOSERS

16. Stiggins Video

17. Failure or success were not episodes, they were trajectories- tendencies, directions, pathways. Kanter, p.9

18. As performance starts to run on a positive or negative path, the momentum can be hard to stop. Kanter p.8

19. Freedom Writers Clip

20. Successful students (on winning Streaks) • Growing confidence • Optimism rules: Expect a positive result… always • Strong desire • High level of effort • Risk trying- stretch “I can get this.”

21. Failing Students on losing streaks) • Intense vulnerability…Never safe from embarrassment • Pessimism: Expect to fail • Feeling a sense of futility, hopelessness, fatalism • Waning effort with self-criticism • Denial and cover up • Defensiveness: trying is too risky

22. Stiggins Video -2

23. Once I see myself as a “loser,” it’s hard to recover: >I missed prerequisites for later success >If everything counts (is graded), there’s never time to practice--get better

24. Previously, if a student gave up in hopelessness and stopped trying, it was the student’s problem—not the teacher’s or the school’s… • Accountability: provide an opportunity to learn

25. WFISD MISSION STATEMENT The mission of the Wichita Falls Independent School District is to prepare all students to become lifelong learners who are productive, responsible and participating members of society.

26. Priorities change:Society wants all winners! • As we continue to evolve toward greater technical & social complexity, LIFELONG LEARNING SKILLS BECOME ESSENTIAL

27. AND SO, • Reading comprehension • Ability to write effectively • Math problem solving BECOME KEYS TO LIFELONG LEARNING

28. reading writing State Standards math Products Skills Reasoning Knowledge

29. Schools that merely sort no longer meet our educational needs…

30. Freedom Writers Clip -2

31. So society changed the mission of schools: • From: Leave lots behind • To: Leave no child behind Accountability? All students meet standards

32. A New Mission: • All students must hit academic targets • And take responsibility for their own learning • Close the achievement gap

33. Our New Challenge in Assessment Dynamics: • How can we keep winners winning? • How do we get losers back to winning streaks?

34. The Dynamic of Winning? • Regular Success at Learning • Infrequent Failure to Learn

35. Clear Learning Targets • Start with State standards • Deconstruct into scaffolding leading to each standard (local curriculum maps) • Transform into student-friendly versions

36. Stiggins Video - 3

37. Keys to Success? • Locate student on the scaffolding • Establish the value of the next target • Make it appear reachable to them (promote hope) “I want it, and I can get it.”

38. If all students are to meet standards, • All students must believe they can, so they will try • Losing streaks & hopelessness no longer fit into our mission

39. Freedom Writers Video - 3

40. FORMATIVE REQUIRES: Productive Assessment Dynamics

41. Requirements • Assess accurately • Manage and share results effectively, so as to • Elicit a productive emotional reaction to the assessment results from the learner

42. Productive response to assessment results: • I understand the results • I know what to do next • I’m OK • I choose to keep trying

43. The counterproductive hopeless response: • I don’t understand • I have no idea what to do • I’m no good at this, anyway • I give up; I quit

44. It’s Formative When: • Its purpose is to support-not merely monitor-learning • It points up the scaffolding • It provides descriptive feedback • It build confidence, self-efficacy

45. Assessment FOR Learning • Creating a Culture of Confidence

46. Crucial Distinction • Assessment Of Learning: • How much have our students learned in the past? • Assessment FOR Learning • How can we help our students learn more in the future?

47. Overview Assessment Assessment OF Learning FOR Learning Reason Check status Improve learning To inform Others about Students about students themselves Focus Standards Enabling targets

48. Assessment FOR learning occurs throughout the learning process while the learning is happening. So early in the learning, students’ scores will not be high. This is not failure-it simply represents where students are now in their ongoing journey to ultimate success.

49. Assessment FOR learning continuously tracks where that student is at any time on the scaffolding leading up to those standards. They are intended to provide that information both to students and teacher.

50. Teacher’s Role in Assessment FOR Learning • Master each standard • Deconstruct each into enabling targets • Transform into student-friendly version • Transform to accurate classroom assessments • Use those in collaboration with students to track growth- to promote winning streaks