Learning vs. Teaching, part 2 (Assessment)

Hello everyone,

I wrote an email last week about learning vs. teaching. I received a response that really leads into a closely related idea: assessment.

In a message dated 3/22/2007 4:02:20 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time, jeffery.combe@lausd.net writes:

Do your students really learn from you?

TEACHER RESPONSE:

Yes, and I can prove it! They remember what they were taught and they can explain a lot of it back to me.

I like the confidence of the teacher in the ability of the students to explain concepts. That requirement of an explanation is a form of assessment, and it is especially good because it uses upper-levels of Bloom's taxonomy as well as the higher levels of knowledge acquisition (teaching is the highest level; if students can explain a concept, they are close to being able to teach it).

Assessment must be done frequently--often several times a period. Because assessment is so important, I thought it might be useful if I suggested a variety of kinds of assessment, as well as the pros and cons of each.

INFORMAL ASSESSMENT is the sort that you might use on a frequent basis in the classroom. You will constantly adjust your lesson because of the frequent informal assessments you might make. Here is a quick, not at all comprehensive list of some informal assessments.

1. Ask questions. Ask the best student in the class; ask the worst student in the class; ask others in between. Give the students time to answer. Assess their understanding by the answer. Assess the rest of the class using the question (i.e., "Who agrees with the answer?" "Who disagrees?" "Juan, do you agree?" "Why do you disagree?")

2. Have students hold up their hands in front of them. ("If you got the answer right, hold your hand in front of you.") Don't let the manner of holding the hand be too obvious, or students will be tempted to give the wrong response in order to follow their friends.)

3. Have students give thumbs up or thumbs down for answers. ("If this is correct, hold thumbs up. If incorrect, hold thumbs down.")

4. Have students give choral responses ("Everyone, say reconnaissance." Listen for general, not specific pronunciation problems.)

5. Listen in read alouds for good word attack and appropriate expression. (This doesn't always work, and should be coupled with other assessments, but it can be a good, informal indication of at least a basic understanding of some things.)

In informal assessments, I try to make the students comfortable with assessment process. I want them to tell the truth, and I want to be prepared to reteach something they might not have understood.

Asking, "OK?" or "Any questions?" then noting the lack of response is not a good assessment. It rarely gives an accurate picture of what was understood. If your class culture allows for people to ask questions without fear, then "Any questions?" may be a good lead to a decent discussion. However, most of the time the lack of questions or response at the end of something is only a sign of embarrassment about speaking up. If the students have no questions, you ought to ask some to assess them.

FORMAL ASSESSMENT:

1. Tests. We ought to spend an entire day on tests alone. I personally favored essay tests, which are much harder to grade and don't usually work in science and math classes. Multiple choice (25% guess rate, usually), matching (10% guess rate if you match 10 questions), true/false (50% guess rate), and close [fill in the blanks] (0%) guess rate are possible formats. The "guess rates" are the scores that students would get on the average if they simply guessed at the answers with no previous knowledge of the subject. (The guess rate for multiple choice is higher once the students figure out which choice you favor--it's supposed to be "B" in most such tests.)

2. Performances. These are very good, but time consuming and labor intensive. Garfield does a Renaissance Faire every spring that is a very good assessment and requires intense research on the parts of participating students, but it's time consuming and labor intensive. So are videos, skits, and plays.

3. Projects. These can be very good, but it's pretty easy to cheat on them. They probably ought to be coupled with some other form of assessment.

4. Authentic assessment. Students have to show the ability to use their knowledge in a situation similar to something out of real life. Roll playing a job interview is both a performance and an authentic assessment of something that might have been taught in a life skills class.

More later.

Jeff Combe