Leading Formative Assessment Thursday, August 5, 2010

1. Leading Formative Assessment Thursday, August 5, 2010

2. Correlates of Effective SchoolsLawrence W. Lezotte, Ph.D. • Instructional Leadership • Clear and Focused Mission • Safe and Orderly Environment • Climate of High Expectations for Success • Frequent Monitoring of Student Progress • Positive Home-School Relations • Opportunities to Learn and Student Time on Task

3. Quality & Equity The effective school is a school that can, in outcome (performance or results) terms, reflective of its learning for all mission, demonstrate the presence of equity in quality.

4. “There may be schools out there that have strong instructional leaders, but are not yet effective; however, we have never yet found an effective school that did not have a strong instructional leader as the principal.” ~Edmonds

5. Teacher factors “The impact of decisions made by individual teachers is far greater than the impact of decisions made at the school level.” “More can be done to improve education by improving the effectiveness of teachers than by any other single factor.” ~Robert Marzano

6. Vital Teacher Behaviors for Student Learning • Clear Learning Targets • High Rates of Positive, Descriptive Feedback • Reconceptualization of Learning ~John Hattie

7. Formative Assessments within a RtI Framework Tier III FA are directly targeted to critical learning gaps that exist for individual students with intense needs. • Tier I • FA are the GPS • for critical learning • in all subject areas. • What do the students need to know? • Where are they in the learning process? • What are the impact of adjustments? Tier II FA are directly targeted to critical learning gaps that exist for groups of students. Continuum of Supports

8. 3-2-1 Think-Pair-Share Individually, THINK about the following • What are three ways your teachers are currently using formative assessments? • What two questions do you have about formative assessments? • What one strength can you build upon for the increased use of formative assessments in your school? then PAIR with a colleague and SHARE.

9. A focus on mathematical skill Plot the point (5, 2) on the grid shown below.

10. 21st Century Skills: The 4Rs In our increasingly global community, students must develop critical skills that will enable them to make important, valued contributions to society. In the 21st century, K-12 education must focus on the “4Rs”: • Rigor • Relevance • Relationships • Reflection

11. A focus on mathematical skill Plot the point (5, 2) on the grid shown below.

12. A more recent focus on the 4Rs in mathematics The table shows the number of customers at Malcolm's Bike Shop for 5 days, as well as the mean (average) and the median number of customers for these 5 days. Which statistic, the mean or the median, best represents the typical number of customers at Malcolm's Bike Shop for these 5 days? Explain your reasoning. Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

13. National results, Grade 8 2007 These results are for public and nonpublic school students. Percentages may not add to 100 due to rounding. U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics, National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

14. Rigor: What was expected in Grade 12… The first 3 figures in a pattern of tiles are shown below. The pattern of tiles contains 50 figures. Describe the 20th figure in this pattern, including the total number of tiles it contains and how they are arranged. Then explain the reasoning that you used to determine this information. Write a description that could be used to define any figure in the pattern. Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

15. National results, Grade 12 1996 These results are for public and nonpublic school students. Percentages may not add to 100 due to rounding. U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics, National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

16. Rigor: …is now expected in Grade 8 Each figure in the pattern below is made of hexagons that measure 1 centimeter on each side. If the pattern of adding one hexagon to each figure is continued, what will be the perimeter of the 25th figure in the pattern? Show how you found your answer. Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

17. National results, Grade 8 2007 These results are for public and nonpublic school students. Percentages may not add to 100 due to rounding. U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Education Sciences, National Center for Education Statistics, National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

18. http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/itmrlsx/default.aspx Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

19. The Common Core Rigor, relevance, relationships, and reflection are mandated in the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics through the “Practice Standards”. Students will: 1. Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. 2. Reason abstractly and quantitatively. 3. Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others. Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

20. The Common Core 4. Model with mathematics. 5. Use appropriate tools strategically. 6. Attend to precision. 7. Look for and make use of structure. 8. Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning. Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

21. Essential question for the day Can the use of formative assessments help to provide all of our students opportunities to master the 4Rs and the math practice standards? HOW? As we progress through the day, examining formative assessment, look for evidence of and opportunity for the use of the 4Rs Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

22. Formative AssessmentsFormal vs. Informal

23. Formative Assessments Definition: Formative Assessments happen while learning is still underway. They are conducted throughout teaching and learning to diagnose student needs, plan our next steps in instruction, provide students with feedback they can use to improve the quality of their work, and help students see and feel in control of their journey to success.

24. Formative Assessment Research 0.7 Standard Deviation Score Gain = • 25 Percentile Points on ITBS (middle of score range) • 70 SAT Score Points; 4 ACT Score Points Largest Gain for Low Achievers

25. Connecting the Dots • If formative assessment done well provides students with timely constructive and effective feedback on well defined learning goals, … • And if student learning is enhanced the most through the use of clearly articulated learning goals and large amounts of positive, descriptive feedback, then … • … the need to lead your teachers to fully utilize formative assessments becomes obvious. Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

26. Goals for Today • Teachers need to be able to create and use formative assessments with fidelity and effectiveness, therefore our goal is to help principals with the following: • Understand and be able to recognize the five keys of effective formative assessments • Understand the needs of teachers to make formative assessments a way of life in their classroom (e.g. professional development, collaboration time, coaching, and feedback) • Create a beginning plan that ties to your school improvement goals.

27. The 5 Keys of Classroom Assessment for Student Learning (CASL) and Understanding by Design (UbD) Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

28. EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION DESIGN ACCURACY EFFECTIVE USE PURPOSE STUDENT INVOLVEMENT TARGET The 5 Keys

29. TARGET Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

30. PURPOSE DESIGN Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

31. EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION STUDENT INVOLVEMENT Danielle Seabold, Mathematics Consultant dseabold@kresa.org

32. Key 1: Purpose

33. What is the purpose for assessment?

34. Two Purposes for Assessment SUMMATIVE • Assessments OF Learning • How much have students learned as of a particular point in time? FORMATIVE • Assessments FOR Learning • How can we use assessment information to help students learn more?

35. Assessments FOR and OF Learning As you watch the video clip of Rick Stiggins discussing the differences between assessments FOR and OF learning: • Track the differences between the two in the chart • What differences did you find to be most significant?

36. Balanced Assessment Formative Formal and informal processes teachers and students use to gather evidence to directly improve the learning of students assessed Summative Provides evidence achievement to certify student competence or program effectiveness Assessment for learning Use assessments to help students assess and adjust their own learning Assessment for learning Use classroom assessments to inform teacher’s decisions Formative uses of summative data Use of summative evidence to inform what comes next for individuals or groups of students

37. Needed Improvements • Increased commitment to high-quality formative assessments (Rigor & Relevance) • Increased descriptive feedback, reduced evaluative feedback (Relationships) • Increased student involvement in the assessment process (Reflection)

38. Assessments for LearningPURPOSE Students are crucial decision-makers; therefore, information must be provided in forms that help them understand … • Where I am going? • Where I am now? • How I can close the gap?

39. The Elevator Conversation Develop a 30 – 60 second description highlighting the difference between formative and summative assessments. Include the reason why it is important to increase the use of formative assessments.

40. Key 2: Clear and Appropriate Learning Targets

41. We Need Clear Targets to. . . • Ensure that there is a common understanding of what needs to be learned. • Know if the assessment adequately covers what we taught. • Correctly identify what students know and don’t know. • Have students self-assess or set goals likely to help them learn more.

42. Clear Targets: Benefits to Students Students who could identify their learning scored 27 percentile points higher than those who could not ~Marzano, 2005

43. Which of these are actually learning targets? • Senior project • Model of a fort • Present a persuasive argument • Research paper • Diorama

44. A Math Example

45. Kinds of Targets • Master content knowledge • Use knowledge to reason and solve problems • Demonstrate performance skills • Create quality products

46. Kinds of Learning Targets with Associated Verbs

47. Converting Learning Targets to Student-Friendly Language • Identify important or difficult learning goal. • Identify word(s) needing clarification. • Define the word(s). • Rewrite the definition as an “I can” statement, in terms that students will understand. • Try it out and refine as needed. • Have students try this process.

48. Student-Friendly Language • Word to be defined: PREDICTION • A statement saying something will happen in the future • Student-friendly language: • I can make predictions. • This means I can use information from what I read to guess at what will happen next.

49. Your Turn… Choose either “analyze” or “describe” and convert it into student-friendly terms • Definition: • Student-friendly language:

50. Critical Learning Target of Unit Students will learn that functions can be represented in many ways using words, tables, pictures/models, graphs, and algebraic rules. Given one representation, students will create the other representations.