Diagnostic Assessment. Unit 1

Diagnostic Assessment. Unit 1 

I will start this personal portfolio making a reflection about the first unit of this course.

a) I believe that effective assessment .....

We started the course using our previous knowledge to describe what the assessment involves. We completed a questionnarie. We should make a cross in agree, totally agree, disagree or totally disagree depending on our thoughts about assessment.

This questionnaire was so useful to record my ideas about assessment and to make me think about them. Some classmates didn´t share opinion, so it was a great moment to start a debate. Listening different ideas than my own was interesting.

From this questionnaire, I started to make up my ideas about assessment and I learnt that it should be always measurable, possitive feedback should be given to students as an essential part of assessment. It is because possitive feedback is those that motivate students and not a simple mark. Also, I learnt that to give students opportunities of redoing their work is so important because in this way they can show that they have understood teacher´s feedback. Talking about that, I realised that I should improve at assessment time and I have to take into account all these things. This knowledge that I learned in the first class will be expanded along the sessions.

Learning to love assessment. Unit 1

Learning to love assessment. Unit 1

In this activity we should read an article called "Learning to love assessment" written by Carol Ann Tomlinson. After reading the article I had to use my own experiences as a student and as a teacher to show the evidences that illustrate the "understanding" in a classroom.


These are my experiences:

*Understanding 1: Informative assessment isn´t just about test.

Assessment can be carried out by different ways, not only though tests. However, most of the teachers use test to assess their students.
-As a student I have suffered multitude of tests to be assessed. I hated tests because I felt so nervous and I can´t show all my knowledge because of the pressure and the stress.
-As a teacher I try to avoid standarded test to assess my students. I assess them through cooperative work, quiz games, daily tasks or questioning. I think that in this way is easier to show what you know.
-In my opinion, Students´ interest and participation should be an important part of the assessment because their effort should be also rewarded.


*Understanding 2: Informative assessment really isn´t about the grade book.
-As a students, I felt so nervious when the teacher told as: "You have made it bad. You have negative point"
-As a teacher, when my students do something wrong, I give them feedback to they can improve. I, as a teacher, try to write in my teacher´s diary every aspect of my students, not only the marks.

*Understanding 3. Informative assessment really isn´t always formal.
-I, as a teacher, try to know my students in a depth way. Their interest and fears, their class relationship, their family situation and the environment where they live. Also, I try to understand them and show empathy. In my opinion, a teacher can´t base the assessment in the students´ grade because an efficent assessment involve more things.
-As a students, I have felt that the most important thing was the grades. If you got better grades you were a better student.

*Understanding 4. Informative assessment isn´t separate from the curriculum.
As a teacher, I always take into account the Spanish curriculum to propose the course objectives. Also, I establish a narrow relationship between objectives and assessment criteria.
As a teacher, I have seen that some colleages don´t teach the essential concepts that students need to know by law, but, they teach what they want and it casuses lack of knowledge in students.

*Understanding 5. Informative assessment isn´t about "after". 
-I, as a teacher, assess the students´ previous knowledge before starting each unit. It is because doing that, I have a clear reference of what my students know and, in this way, I can adapt the new concepts to my students.
-As a students, I can say that not all my teachers have assessed my previous knowledge.

*Understanding 6. Informative assessment isn´t an end in itself.
-I, as a teacher, Assess daily activities of my students. Also, their interest and participation. It is in daily activities when students show what they have learnt day after they and I can see how they have evolved.
-Also, as a teacher, I like taking into account my students´ opinion. Because I know that they are the most important part of the teaching-learning process.

*Understanding 7. Informative assessment isn´t separate from instruction.
-As a teacher, I want that all my students be successful, so I take into account that all my students are totally different and they learn in a different way. My students have different strengths and weaknesses. I as a teacher help my students to overcome their weaknesses and foster their strengths.
-I know that depending on the way that I teach, my students will be more or less successful. For this reason, I try to motivate my students with interesting topics and proposing a variety of activities. I take into account all these activities at assessment time.
-As a students, I can say that I haven´t  been assessed with a test in an isolated way. My teachers took into account the daily activities too.

*Understanding 8. Informative assessment isn´t just about student readiness.
-As a teacher, I take into account the student readiness, but also, I take into account other things. In my opinion, teachers should assess  knowledge, student readiness and students´ skills.
-When I was a student, my teachers also took into account my attitude, skills and knowledge.

*Understanding 9. Informative assessment isn´t just about finding weaknesses.
-I, as a teacher, use assessment to accentuate students´ positive aspect rather than the negative ones. So, I give them posssitive feedback in order to my students feel motivated and confident.
-When I was a students, my teachers centred the assessment in correct errors and mistakes. It was really depresed because you only see what you had done wrong.

*Understanding 10. Informative assessment isn´t just for teacher.
-In my labour as a teacher, I realise of my own errors and I try to improve in the teaching-learning process. In this way, I develop a reflection about assessment, as well as my teaching practice.
-Also, I try to link my self-assessment as a teacher to my students assessment to be consecuent. It is because teachers and students are a team. If one of both fails the other part of the team will be harmed too.
-I know that a lot of teacher don´t do that and I think that if teachers don´t carry out a self assessment they are not going to improve in their teaching practice.



Assessment practice inventory. Unit 1

Assessment practice inventory. UNIT 1

In this activity we should use a scale (0-4) to develop a self-assessment about the understandings, relating them to our own experiences.

After completing the chart, I will make a reflection about the marks.

Developing this self-assessment, I have realised that I have to improve the way in wich I carry out assessment of my students. I know the theory but sometimes it is difficult to apply. 

I have to improve about the grade book. I know that I, as a teacher, have to give feedback to my students and take note of every problem that they have, as well as the achievement that they get in the process. However, sometimes it is difficult to carry out because of lacking of time.  

Also, I have to improve in the connection that should exit between objectives and assessment. I have realised that in many occasions, the assessment criteria that I establish don´t have a clear relationship to the targets. It is because I don´t know the law in a hundred percent.

I am not good at relationing the  instruction and the assessment.  I know that my students are totally different and also I try to adapt my way of teaching to them. However, at assessment time, I carry out the same way of assessment to all of them. It is because I want to use the same criteria to assess them, but I don´t take into acount their weakness about this way of assessment.

Finally, I have to improve my way of thinking about assessment. I know that assessment is not to find students´ weaknesses. I try to give my students positive feedback about their assessment task. However, it is difficult for me. 

Reflective journal. Unit 1

Reflective Journal. Unit 1

 In this post, I will express my reflections, questions and thoughts about the unit 1

I would like to learn different materials that teachers can use to assess their students. Normally, I have used the teacher´s diary in which I write the most important things that I observe of my students. Also, I use the teacher´s book in which the teacher writes the students´ grades. Charts in which I make a tick or a cross if the student achieves the subject objective are also usual. However, I would like to be familiarized with more resources that the teacher can use.

Now, I would like to express my thoughts about the assessment of previous knowledge. It is because I learnt the importance of assess the students´ previous knowledge not so many years ago. 

Before discovering that, I thought that it was useless. However, the first time that I worked at a school, I realised that previous knowledge are a really important part of assessment. It is because using students´ previous knowledge, I could adapt the objectives, as well as my way of teaching to my students´ need. In addition, carrying out the previous assessment, I could see the progress of my students in an easier way. Another interesting thing that the previous assessment provided me was that I could see the strengths and weakness of my students. However, I have seen that some teachers do not carry out this important previous assessment. 

Connecting my own experiences. Unit 1

Connecting my own experiences. Unit 1

• Think of a time you yourself were assessed and it was a negative experience. What made it negative?

 I was in 3rd grade of Primary Education and the Science teacher proposed assess ourselves. We had to write the things that we used to do bad in her subject. She gave us some statements to think. They were about behaviour, knowledge, attitude, science skills and group work. We had to do a self assessment to improve in our science subject. The teacher said to us that we had lack of Science knowledge, we did not understand a lot of science concepts and we had a wrong behaviour. After that, we had to complete the chart about the standards. It is a fact that my classmates and I were not motivated. I thought about how to improve my skills, my knowledge and my behaviour but I thought that I was doing everything bad.

• Which of the five keys to assessment quality were involved in your negative experience?

This assessment didn´t involve an effective communication because it didn´t contribute to increase students achievement. Also, the teacher didn´t avoid circumstances to distort the results. However, it had a clear purpuse, at least, for the teacher, because she wanted that we improvement our science skills. Also, we as sudents were involved in the process because we had to think how to improve.

• What impact did this experience have on you?

This experience had a really bad impact on my because I felt unmotivated and I thought that I was bad at the  Science subject. The teacher fostered my weaknesess instead of my stengths and she only centred her attention in negative feedback which harmed me.

• Now think of a time you yourself were assessed and it was a positive experience. What made it positive?

I remember that my English teacher used to develop students self-assessment when we were on 5th grade of Primary Education. She explained us the aims of the self-assessment in a clear way and an easy language. Also, the items of the self-assessment chart were easy to understand. She explained us that self-assessment wasn´t about finding weaknesses, she involved us saying that our opinion about ourselves were so important and she gave us positive feedback to improve.

• Which of the five keys to assessment quality were involved in the positive experience?

In this positive experience we can see several keys to assessment which are involve:

-Clear purpose: the teacher explained why we was developing the self-assessment and the aim of it. 

-Clear targets: The teacher wrote clear items and she explained each one in a easy way and a easy language adapted to us (children).

-Effective communication: The teacher told us that our opinion about ourselves was so important. She made us to develop our own reflections and after that she gave us positive feedback to help us.

-Students involvement: We (students) felt as active participants because our opinion was important.

• What impact did this experience have on you?

In this case, the self-assessment had a positive impact on me because I felt so motivated. I realized that my opinion was important and it was interesting for the teacher. Any answer that I thought was wrong because it was my personal opinion, ideas and feelings. I made me be better in the English subject because I took into account the positive feedback that the teacher gave me.

Reflective journal. Unit 2.A

Reflective journal. Unit 2.A

In this post, I will express my reflections, questions and thoughts about the unit 2.A

Developing researches about assesment I read that assessment is an important part of education. It shows if the goals of education, indicated by the Curriculum, are being achieved. However, teachers should take into account a lot of things before the assessment.

I think that assessment is a difficult process that teachers have to develop. A lot of teachers think that the students´ grade is based on a final exam. However, the assessment involves more things. It is important to take into account that it involves the process in which the student is progressing, getting different skills.
I am sure that all teachers know this theory, but... Why do teachers continue using tests?

Most of the teachers use tests as the summative assessment, but I think that we have to evolve as teachers. From my point of view, teachers have the power of eliminating the pressure and the strees that students suffer when they have a test. In my opinion, teachers should try to develop different summative activities such as a game, a computer activity or a project to avoid that students feel stressful about some knowledge that they really know but they can´t show because of the nervousness.

Audit your assessment for balance. Unit 2.A

audit your assessment for balance. UNIT 2.A

Assessment criteria for 3rd course of Primary Education. Subject: Science.

The student...

-Recognizes the animal or vegetal origin of specific foods.

-Classifies the foods as natural or processed.

-Gets information from food labels such as the ingredients or the expiry date.

-Classifies foods into the corresponding groups.

-Indicates whether a specific food gives us energy, helps us to grow or helps us to stay healthy.

-Understands the need to wash fruits and vegetables.

The value that has been established to each kind of assessment is the following: 

-Formative assessment: Tasks developed in class, group works, homeworks and participation. 30%

-Summative assessment: Tests. 70%

After having read chapter 2, we think that the percentage given to summative assessment is excessive. We have learnt that both kind of assessment complement each other. 

In our opinion, the value of formative and summative should be equal, giving a percentage of 50% to formative assessment and 50% to summative assessment. Considering that formative assessment is the process that the student develop to get aims, we think that the value that has been given to this kind of assessment is really low.

We have also reflected about the idea that following these previous percentages to assess our students is easier to pass subjects without developing any effort in the process. As the final test is the 70% of the grade, students who haven´t carried out their tasks or haven´t made any effort can get a good mark. 

However, sharing our experiencies as teachers, we have gotten the conclusion that most of the teachers make the same mistake, giving a high percentage of the grade to summative assessment. It is because teachers think that this kind of assessment is the most important. As teachers, we have learnt the necessity of an equilibrium between summative and formative assessment and we encourage teachers to carry out a reflection about the ratio that they have proposed to assess, as we have done.

Assessment feedback practices. Unit 2.A

assessment feedback practices. UNIT 2.A

In this activity, I should complete the personal inventory thinking about the extent to which each of the characteristics of effective feedback is part of my regular classroom practice. I will use the scale 0-4.

                                      Survey Statement and rating:  

              

1. I communicate learning targets to students in language they can understand, as a regular part of instruction.  Rating: 0

2. I use examples and models of strong and weak work to help students understand key elements of a quality response, product or performance.  Rating: 3

3. I offer feedback that links directly to the intended learning, pointing out strengths and offering information to guide improvement . Students receive this feedback during the learning process and have opportunities to improve on each learning target before the grade event. Rating: 2

4. I design assignments and assessments so that students can self-assess, by identifying their own strengths and areas for further study in terms of the intended learning. The results of assignments and assessments function as effective feedback to students. Rating: 2

5. I use assessment information to focus instruction on a day to day basis. Rating:3

6. I give students regular opportunities to track, reflect on, and share their achievement status and improvement. Rating: 3

¡Making Reflections!

Making a reflection about my assessment practice, I have realised that I don´t communicate the learning targets to my students. Simply, I work about them, but they do not know what they have to achieve, because I don´t explain it them. After learning about assessment in this subject, I am aware of the importance of inform my students about learning targets. Also, I know that I have to use a appropiate language to facilitate the understanding.

About the third item, I offer feedback to my students to guide their improvement. However, I don´t always give my students the opportunity of redoing their works. So, I need to improve in this aspect in order to facilitate the learning of my students.

Another item that I need to improve is to give my students more opportunities to develop self-assessmemt and identify their own strengths. I don´t do that because of lacking of time. However, now I have realised that it is an essential aspect of the assessment and it is so useful for my students, so I will propose more self-assessment opportunities to my students.

Reflect on your learning. Unit 2A

Reflect on your learning. Unit 2.A

In this unit we have learnt to differentiate summative and formative assessment, as weel as the benefits of both. So, I will center my reflections of this unit on the differences of summative and formative assessment.

I will start with my own definition which I have built from the new knowledge that I have gotten in the assessment´s subject:

-Formative assessment is the process to support learning and to get information about or students´ proress along the whole way. Also, it involves feedback.

-Summative assessment is the information used to verify if students have learnt. It should be measurable and it gives us possibilities of showing evidences.

Also, I have to say that the summative assessment can be a formative assessment too.

In my opinion, most of the teachers think that summative assessment is more important than formative. However, it is not true. It is because in the formative assessment the teacher assesses the progress of his students, so he can see the students´ difficulties and how they solve them (helped by the teacher). In this kind of assessment, we, teachers, have to take into account students daily tasks, effort and interest to assess them.

On the other hand, the summative assessment is the final activity that the teacher provides the students. This activity can be a game, a project, a group work or a test. This is the reason why a lot of teachers think that summative assessment is more important. A high number of teachers use a test to assess their students in the summative process. However, Time by time, I have learnt that a test is not always neccesary.

Teachers should take into account that a combination of both kind of assessment is necessary because each student fell more confortable showing their skills though a different method. For example, shy students don´t feel confortable in oral test. 

Reflective Journal 2B

REFLECTIVE JOURNAL. UNIT 2.B

In this unit I have learnt useful things about how to produce the targets. I think that a lot of teachers have lack of knowledge about this aspect of teaching because of that they copy the target from books.

I have learnt that the targets that a teacher establishes should be understandable to students. 

The first thing that a teacher should do is to make a reflection about what he wants that his students learn. However, it is not the only important aspect. The teacher has to be able of establishing a clear relationship between targets and assessment criterias to facilitate that the students can achieve the targets.

These targets can be classified in knowledge (procedural knowledge and conceptual understanding), reasoning (thoughts that the students develop to learn), skills (demostrations are the heart of learning), product (the creaction of a product is the focus of learning) and dispositions (students´attitude, motivations or interest). A good planning should have all these kind of targets in order to students develop a complete learning.

Connect clear targets to assessment. Unit 2B

Connect clear target to assessment quality. UNIT 2.B

In the present task, we should relate our own experience with 3 ways in which clear targets are a necessary precursor to assessment quality. 

Teachers should avoid that their students feel lost. A useful way of solving this problem is to have clear targets. I have thought 3 ways in which clear targets influence the assessment.

*Having a chart with the targets that students should achieve is a really useful way of motivating students. In this way, they don´t forget the targets that they have to achieve and they work to be successful in them. In addition, they get the sense of why each activity that the teacher proposes is carried out. It is because they know that the activies that they perform have a concrete target. 

I can add a personal experience about it. I developed my teaching practices in a "Sek" school. I could see that a chart with the targets was situated in a special place in all the classrooms. I could see that students knew why they were developing each activity, they were motivated and also they had so clear what they had to know to get a high grade. So, in my opinion, the presence of targets close to the students have a successful result.

*Negociating the targets with our students. Students are part of the teaching- learning process, so they should participate taking decissions. Teachers should ask suggestions to their students. Frecuently, teachers change their teaching plans because of the differences between students, but why not to ask our students about the targets that they are able to achieve? Students know their own strengths and weakness, so they can give the teacher the necessary clues to develop clear targets.

I learnt about "negotiating the targets" in the "methodology" subject and I have put it into practice with my students. It has been so successful because thay have felt as an important part of the process and they have gotten a clear understanding of the targets. Also, negotiate the targets give our students the reference to get the goals, getting an assessment of quality.

*Do not follow books. Normally, teachers are centred in finish books which include multitude of activities. However, most of the time, children don´t know why they are doing that. In my opinion, books are a resource which avoid that students have clear targets, having, at the same time, a bad effect in the assessment.

I have had the opportunity of preparing my own material without the necessity of following any book. I prepared each task according to clear targets which I explained to my students. So they understond what they had to achieve. 

However, following or not books is not only a decision of the teacher, the school and also parents have a strong importance in this decisions in some schools. So, most of the time, I have not the opportunity of developing this way of working.

Create student-friendly targets. Unit 2.B

create student-friendly learning targets UNIT 2.B

In this activity, I will change the targets to adapt them to my students understanding.

These are the targets of 3rd course of Primary Education. Science class.

1. To recognize the animal or vegetal origin of specific foods.
2. To classify the foods as natural or processed.

3. To get information from food labels such as the ingredients or the expiry date.

4. To classify foods into the corresponding groups.

5. To indicate whether a specific food gives us energy, helps us to grow or helps us to stay healthy.

6. To understand the need to wash fruits and vegetables.

Step 1 Definition: I will define the words representing the pattern. In some words I will ask my students to use the textbook or the dictionary to define them.

I will define for them:
-Recognize
-Classify
-Indicate
-Animal and vegetal origin.
-Natural and procesed food.

They will use the text book to have a first idea about:
-Labels
-Expiry date.
-Origin.


Step 2 Conversion: I will convert the definition into a language that my students are likely to understand.

-Recognize: To know what it is.
-Classify: To organize each object, word... in the correct place.
-Indicate: To make a croos to demostrate that you know what it is.
-Labels: They are the information that appear in food.
-Expiry date: They are the numbers that you can see in the products. It says when you musn´t eat that product.
-Origin: The procedence of something of someone.
-Animal origin: Foods which come from animals. Eggs
-Vegetal orign: Foods which come from the land. Carrots.
-Natural foods: Foods that have not suffer modifications. For example bananas.
-Procesed foods: Foods that have been modified by humans. For example bread.

Step 3 Rewriting: Rewrite the definition as an “I” or “We” statement: “I am learning to…”; “I can…”;
“We are learning to…”; “We can…”

1. We are learning what is the procedence of foods. We are learning that the foods can come from animals such as eggs or from the land, for example carrots.
2.We can say which foods have been modified and which foods have not been modified.
3.We are learning to check labels and we know when a food can be eaten or not.
4. We can organize foods in groups, depending of where they come from.
5.We are learning what is the function of food.
6.We know the importance of wash fruits and vegetables

Step 4. Trial: Try the definition out with your students. Note their response and refine as required.

My students have understood most of the definitions. They have had problems with the word "modificated" so, I will change the target.

2. We can say which foods have been changed by humans and which foods have not been changed by humans.

Step 5. Practice: Let students try this process, occasionally, with targets they could successfully
define and paraphrase.
I will try to put this step into practice.

Classify, identify... learning targets. Unit 2.B

Classify, identify and desconstruc learning targets. UNIT 2.B

These are the targets of 3rd course of Primary Education. Science class.

1. To recognize the animal or vegetal origin of specific foods.
2. To classify the foods as natural or processed.

3. To get information from food labels such as the ingredients or the expiry date.

4. To classify foods into the corresponding groups.

5. To indicate whether a specific food gives us energy, helps us to grow or helps us to stay healthy.

6. To know the need to wash fruits and vegetables.

Learning targets can be classsified into: Knowledge, reasoning, skill, product, disposition.

From this point, I will try to classify the target of my didactic unit.

1. To recognize the animal or vegetal origin of specific foods: Knowledge
2. To classify the foods as natural or processed: Reasoning
3. To get information from food labels such as the ingredients or the expiry date: Skill

4. To classify foods into the corresponding groups: Reasoning

5. To indicate whether a specific food gives us energy, helps us to grow or helps us to stay healthy: Reasoning

6. To know the need to wash fruits and vegetables: Knowledge

In my opinion, the only target that does not need any modification is the number 6. It is because students can understand every word. The rest of the target will be modified by me in the following way:

1. We are learning what is the procedence of foods. We are learning that the foods can come from animals such as eggs or from the land, for example carrots.
2.We can say which foods have been modified and which foods have not been modified.
3.We are learning to check labels and we know when a food can be eaten or not.
4. We can organize foods in groups, depending of where they come from.
5.We are learning what is the function of food.
6.We know the importance of wash fruits and vegetables

In this way, students can have a clear concep about what the teacher expects from them and what is the goal that the should achieve to be successful. Also, I think that to share the target with students help teachers to see if they need to do some modification in their teaching planning. It is becasue discussing the targets with their students teachers can see students´ strengths and weakness.

To be successful students need to acquire knowledge about foods.Students have to learn what is animal and vegetal food and to know the difference that there are between them. Also, students have to be aware of the importance of washing fruits and vegetables.

In addition, students will need to be reasoning, so they have to be able to think and discuss about different topics. Students need to make reflections about why some foods are natural and others are procesed. Also, students need to discuss about the procedence of food and debate about the function of each kind of food.

Finally, students need to have the skill of getting information from food labels.

It can be seen that productive and dispositional targets are missing in this didactic unit, so maybe it need to be changed in order to it involves every kind of target and students can be successful in every aspect of this topic: foods.