Making the Connection: How to Use Assessment to Increase Learning

1. Making the Connection: How to Use Assessment to Increase Learning The Oregon DATA Project

2. “As to methods, there may be a million and then some, but principles are few. The man who grasps principles can successfully select his own methods. The man who tries methods, ignoring principles, is sure to have trouble.” Ralph Waldo Emerson

3. Objectives Establish the intended connection between testing and teaching. Compare current assessment practices to those recommended for identifying student needs, learning goals, and subsequent instructional strategies. Practice linking analysis of assessment results with instructional planning to increase learning.

4. Formative Assessment Living Likert: Read the following statement. Stand at your place along the line. Strongly agree -------> Strongly Disagree

5. Evidence exists that formative assessments positively impact student achievement.

6. Does formative assessment lead to improved student achievement? • Most frequently cited analysis is Black and Wiliam, 1998. • Looked at classroom formative assessment practices defined as point-in-time daily and weekly assessment of student learning in the classroom. • Consisted of informal and formal observation, questioning, quizzes, rubrics, unit exams, etc. • Curriculum based measurement (CBM) and progress monitoring were studied for groups needing intensive intervention or belonging to special populations.

7. Unpacking formative assessment Where the learner is going Where the learner is How to get there Providing feedback that moves learners forward Engineering effective discussions, tasks, and activities that elicit evidence of learning Teacher Clarifying, sharing and understanding learning intentions Peer Activating students as learning resources for one another Activating students as ownersof their own learning Learner

8. And one big idea Where the learner is going Where the learner is How to get there Using evidence of achievement to adapt what happens in classrooms to meet learner needs Teacher Peer Learner

9. Evaluating the Evidence – John Hattie (2009) meta-analysis of over 800 studies...Teacher – Student relationships - .72 Professional development (as a PLC)- .63 Effective Teacher Instruction- .75 Vocabulary programs - .67Assessment as Formative Feedback - .73

10. The CCSS require a paradigm shift toward assessment as a multi-faceted process of formative assessment development.How will you know if each student is learning, becomes a significant question for you and the collaborative team. Tim Kanold, 2012

11. Definitions Assessment refers to all those activities that provide information to be used as feedback to modify teaching and learning activities. Such assessment becomes formativeassessmentwhen the evidence is actually used to adapt the teaching to meet student needs. Black and Wiliam

12. Balancing “of” and “for” Assessment for learning to make instructional decisions and monitor student progress; i.e., formative. Assessment of learning to evaluate students’achievement and overall program effectiveness; i.e., summative.

13. Key Ideas • Formative assessment is much closer to instruction than to assessment. • Formative assessment is something you DO, not something you GIVE. • You have done formative assessment when you can answer the question: “Does each of my students know and can they do what I expect them to have learned today?”with evidence.

14. At the heart of assessment: We use tests or assessments to collect overt (visible) evidence to make inferences about covert (unseen) status of student skills and knowledge. Restated-we use a limited sample of test items so that we can generalize student performance on a content standard. Different ways of interpreting and operationalizing content standards. These may require different types of instruction.

15. Assessment for the sake of assessment? Or, Assessment with a purpose!

17. Testing/Teaching Connection: What are the advantages of connecting testing and teaching?

18. Classroom use of assessments: Decisions about curriculum alignment Decisions about students’ prior knowledge Decisions about how long to teach something Decisions about effectiveness of instruction

20. What happens when we are not clear on the standard or common curricular goal?

23. What is the target?

24. Discuss How is Test-triggered Clarity different from “Teaching to the Test”?

25. Advantage of using tests to clarify curricular goals: • More accurate task analysis-what are my students expected to know and do? • When you begin with the end in mind you have a better chance of getting there! • Can identify “enabling subskills” or “enabling knowledge” AKA unwrapping the standards! • Clearer instruction and explanations • More appropriate practice activities

26. Curriculum Alignment Decisions • To whose interpretation are you teaching? • Clarify expectations using • Sample Tests, Scoring Guides and Work Samples • Test Specifications and Blueprints • Smarter Balanced Assessment • Augment OAKS results with local assessment results to clarify alignment within and across grade levels

28. http://www.azed.gov/standards-practices/mathematics-standards/http://www.azed.gov/standards-practices/mathematics-standards/

30. Using Blueprints Adapting the use of the Ishikawa

31. Ishikawa FishboneAnalysis:Looking for related causes and antecedents that may relate to a specific effect or outcome

32. Ishikawa Fishbone: Cause & Effect Diagram Modified for Task Analysis Content/skills Content/skills Student Engagement Tasks Student Engagement Tasks Standard Student Engagement Tasks Student Engagement Tasks Content/skills Content/skills

34. So many targets, what is a teacher to do?

35. What about generalizability? Scenario 1, page 24 Clarify nature of curriculum content standard by analyzing measures used to assess standard Look at various ways it is assessed Teach toward the skills or knowledge a test represents, not toward test itself. Extend, apply, etc. for generalizability (for more on this tab pages 23-25)

37. Prioritize and align! Objectives for instruction content and skills you plan to teach Actual instruction that preceded assessment content and skills you actually taught Decisions or conclusions you plan to make using interpretation of resulting scores

38. Advantages of assessing prior learning: • Economizes instructional planning • Many standards, not enough time, • teach what is needed, not what is already known by students • Gives teacher the lay of the landscape • Diversity of learners • Diversity of prior knowledge/readiness to learn • Provides connections from which to build new knowledge and skills when you include key enabling skills and subskills or bodies of knowledge

39. Assessing prior knowledge: It’s more than just a pretest Brainstorm with your team a quick list of pre-assessment strategies. Be prepared to share at least 2!

40. Simple, but powerful model…

41. Do you use assessment practices to determine how long to focus on a particular set of objectives? • Economizes instructional planning • Move on when students are ready, not when the unit planner indicates • Many standards, not enough time, “steal” back time where possible • Time saved in an easily mastered unit can be used for units with unexpected difficulty

42. The Dipstick Assessment: How long do I need to teach this set of skills/concepts? • Item-sampling method for quick assessment • Different students complete different subsamples of items from your unit test (a couple of items each) • Takes less than five minutes to administer to students • Gives quick fix on status of entire class—not intended for inferences about individual students

43. Using tests to determining instructional effectiveness: • Use classroom assessment to evaluate your own instructional effectiveness • Use cohort and growth from OAKS to triangulate on instructional effectiveness • Strong inferences come from simple model: • Pretest • Posttest • Compare results

44. Simple, but powerful model…

45. These concepts can be integrated into your action research and data teams processes Data Teams Process: • Examine student work collaboratively observe, hypothesize, predict • Develop interventions hypothesize, predict • Adjust teaching strategies test hypothesis • Monitor results gather data, explain, observe

46. Testing/Teaching Connection: How will you alter instruction as a result of what you’ve learned through assessment?

47. At the heart of a lesson plan • Standard(s) stated in student language • Instructional objectives • Time allotment • Materials and resources needed • Outline of content • Outline of procedures (teacher behaviors and expected student actions) • Plan for assessing objectives

48. Assessment Instruction

49. What do you expect students to know and be able to do? How do you expect them to demonstrate it? Use the standards language to determine content and skills: nouns identify content verbs identify skills & level of cognitive demand