Catchup reflections for MYP course

Ok, been a bit of a hiatus while we finished school – too much to do and too tired.  But I’ve had a few days off so ready to catchup now.

Ok, 4th Module – Recording and reporting Assessment Data.

Ok, this is an area that’s a bit of an issue – I find this challenging, or at least the first part, recording.  I’m willing to admit I’m probably a bit limited in the strategies I use here.

I use tests for evaluation of criterion A, that’s generally the main tool, occasionally a quiz but that’s really just a variation of a test.  And I use written assignments which generally take up to 2 weeks to develop for evaluation of criteria B, C, and D.  I have used, and intend to be using again asap, blogs for developing criteria C & D, but I’ve not really done any proper evaluation on them before, though I’ve been seeing how I can do that now (We use moodle at school, it’s going to make the evaluation process a lot easier).

Obviously as a teacher I do lots of informal observation just wandering around the classroom, and I know who’s doing well and who is not, but I don’t keep records of it.  I occasionally make some notes, but not in an organised fashion.  My excuse is that it is time-consuming, and with one class after another when do I have a moment to make notes.  I tried doing this with a checklist rubric years ago, but I found I didn’t like wandering around the classroom with a clipboard.  But maybe this is something I need to look into.  It would be fun to use some sort of handheld for this, but I think I need to play with the idea a bit and see what I can come up with before wasting more money on a fancy toy I might end up not using.

Recording assessment data isn’t an issue – I’ve used Asylum’s Markbook program before which I love but I haven’t found it lends itself amazingly to best-fit MYP rubric based marking, though I’d love to be convinced otherwise.  So I use Excel now, which does just fine, and we have SERCO’s ePortal system at school into which we put that data which will appear on reports.

As for reporting, we do this two or three times a year per grade level, we hold parent conferences a couple of times a year.  Ideally these come just after a report has gone out.  ePortal also permits students to see their grades at any time, I believe, though how much that is being used at present I’m not sure.

So that’s what we’re up to at present at our school.  Be interesting to see what comes out of this module.

Subjective vs Objective Assessment

Question: Are you comfortable using subjective and intuitive assessment strategies – shouldn’t they all be objective and scientific if we are to be fair and transparent in our assessing?

Response

I think it depends on what you are trying to achieve.  I’m also not convinced that subjective means not fair and transparent.  I don’t treat all my students the same, but then they’re not the same.  I see ‘fair’ as meaning ‘reasonable and acceptable for that particular individual’.  Which means I expect more from some students than others, I expect different things from different students.  I can give one student a positive comment for participating with something useful in a discussion, whereas someone else might get a criticism for coming out with a comment like that because it isn’t up to the standards I expect from them.  I also make sure my students understand that, because I think they need to become more socially aware of each others strengths and weaknesses, and we’re not just talking about whether they’re any good at maths.

When working through a unit I think a lot of my assessment is probably subjective.  Who’s doing ok, who needs more help, who needs to come back at break time, who needs a break, who needs to work on their own, who’d benefit from a partner, who’d benefit from changing partners, who can be forgiven for not completing their homework, who needs to be made a real fuss of because they DID complete their homework?  A random question from a student generates an interesting discussion and leaves a few questions open, I want them to come up with responses for next lesson.  Their evaluation – observation of how they do and some personal one-to-one or in front of the class feedback, depending on whether they need a little private recognition or whether it’d really boost their self-esteem to be told ‘well done’ in front of their peers.

This is all very subjective focused mainly, I guess, on approaches to learning as well as content.  I’m trying to get them to focus on the task at hand, cope with the challenges involved, interact more with each other and the subject, as well as learn the concepts.  I’m trying to challenge them in little ways, so they push themselves, so they get pleasure from success.  I want them to make choices – to choose to work because they like the results.

Is this what we mean by subjective assessment?  I don’t generally write down any notes for this sort of thing, it just happens naturally.

I do think, though, that end of unit assessment does need to be objective – perhaps that’s my mathematical nature speaking there.  I’m quite happy using rubrics, but I like there to be clear descriptions of what’s expected.  There are standards to be achieved, and I’m not sure that a subjective assessment really provides the right info.  Having said that – I’ll usually try to have a chat with each student about their grade, especially if it is lower (or higher) than they are used to/expected, to review reasons why it came out that way and what they could do to improve next time, etc.  Does that count as subjective?

I am interested in using a wider range of formal assessments – at present it tends to be end of topic tests and investigative tasks taking 1-2 weeks.  I want to do journal/blog writing, I think there’s a lot of scope there.  I’m not big on using presentations to assess mathematics, generally because my experience is that the ideas the students have are never sufficiently complete – in fact they can end up confusing their classmates, which takes longer to fix later.  But I also have the feeling I’m mistaken in this, I just haven’t worked out how to do it properly.

I think what I REALLY want to develop right now is my students’ reflective skills – because I think if they develop these habits of looking back over what they’ve done they’ll make so many more connections and they’ll start learning faster.  At present it’s so slooooowwwwww, they’re not used to thinking for themselves (lots of reasons for that) so getting them to put two and two together sometimes takes longer than it should.

Why plan assessment in the initial stages of unit planning?

Fairly straightforward I should think – because if I know the tool I intend to use to assess my students learning, then I can ensure that I teach accordingly.  It is also often true that if we don’t plan this early on, we end up falling back on traditional activities that we are used to – a test, a simple project, but we may not experiment much with things.  A bit of forethought enables us to be sure of what skills we want our students to develop, and then we can make a conscious effort to ensure that those skills are taught.

It’s not about teaching to the test, that’s different I think. That’s more content focused, where they need to know certain things.  The MYP idea is more skills-driven.  I can always ensure I cover the necessary content, but if I’m focusing on skills development I need to think about it a bit beforehand.