Module 3: Formative Assessments Article

Formative assessments are an excellent way of gauging how well students understand the material being presented to them. This particular form of assessment is a great way to drive instruction. When there is part of the content that a majority of the students do not understand then it allows the teacher to modify teaching strategies to aid in the students' comprehension. "In the end—if learning is to take hold—the teacher has to hand over the cognitive work to the student who, in turn, needs to assume responsibility for getting it right" (Roskos, 2012, p. 536). Part of formative assessments requires the students to take responsibility for their comprehension. The student needs to be held accountable for maintaining his/her goals and self-assessments. A teacher can aid in helping a student achieve this by providing useful feedback. For example, Roskos states, "Your story map of Little Red Riding Hood is coming along; it shows the forest and Grandma’s house, but I don’t see how the wolf got to Grandma’s house. That’s important because…. And there are no people on this map…so who might you add? How would you check for that?" (2012, p. 538). Using formative assessments allows teachers to make adjustments quickly to meet the needs of the students, which is ultimately most important.

Module 3: Response to PowerPoints

Overview of Assessments:

I enjoyed reading the PowerPoint on assessments. One particular thing that stuck out to me was the slide that stated, “Primary purpose for assessment is to improve both teaching and learning.” Assessments and the results of those assessments are what drive my instruction. I want to ensure that my students and fully comprehending the content I present to them. All of the assessments I give serve a purpose for my students and me. Throughout student teaching I would frequently use both formative and summative assessments. For example, during a math lesson I would have the students answer a math problem on their whiteboard, showing me their work. If I noticed mistakes in their work, I was able to take a small group and work with those students (if only a few were struggling) or go through the steps with them until they became more knowledgeable about the process.

Literacy Strategies Project:

I loved this PowerPoint! Phonics is something I have personally struggled with understanding in the past. As a young reader I never received the proper instruction when it came to phonics and I believe it affected me as I progressed in reading. Needless to say, teaching phonics is something I like to have extra emphasis on since I have such a connection with it. The PowerPoint pointed out that students should spend 1-2 years developing phonics skills. It is important for teachers to remember not to bore students with worksheets continually. As the PowerPoint mentioned, students can apply their phonics skills through writing. Phonics can be taught all of the parts relating to one another and the whole concept. Students primarily learn phonics through read-alouds, shared reading, guided reading, and individual conferences. It is important to remember when teaching phonics is that the focus should be determining meaning, not to put emphasis on phonics and phonemic awareness. The primary focus of reading to teach phonics as a building block to determine meaning. 

Module 3: Standardized Testing Article

Standardized testing is a hot topic in schools today. Many parents, students, educators, and administrators focus on standardized tests. As stated in Popham's article, "Standardized achievement tests indicate how well a test taker has acquired knowledge and mastered certain skills" (2005). These tests measure which percentile a student falls to. During my undergraduate program, I had a teacher spend multiple class periods on how to read standardized tests and how to explain them to the parents. Personally, I do not like standardized tests. I believe they do not accurately measure how well a student is able to comprehend the material. Often times these tests are set up to trick the student, which I believe doesn't measure their learning. If they are able to perform the steps of a multi-step math problem, but accidentally switch a number, there answer is wrong. This student clearly understands the process, just made an error. Standardized tests not only put an enormous amount of pressure on the students, but "educators must guess about which of this multitude of content standards will actually be assessed on a given year's test" (2005). I've seen many teachers just teach to the test instead of focusing on meeting the needs of the students. 

Reference:

Popham, W. J. (2005, March 23). Standardized testing fails the exam. Retrieved from http://www.edutopia.org/f-for-assessment

Module 3: YouTube Video Responses

Strengthening Students' Phonemic Awareness, Grades K-1 Video

 Phonemic awareness is taught over a long period of time. Students can learn through language play and focusing on he sounds in spoken words. The video showed a variety of strategies that could be used to help teach phonemic awareness within a classroom. The video should students working with small words endings to enhance their knowledge of phonemic awareness. It's important to teach phonemic awareness early for students to become successful readers in upper grade levels. 

Example of Phenomic Segmentation Awareness

The video showed a teacher administering an assessment to an early literacy learner using blocks. The teacher told the student how the assessment would work by demonstrating what she wanted to do by using the word "sit." The student must pull a block from the pile for each sound she hears within the given word. The words started out simple and got harder as the assessment went on. The student may not have known how to spell these words Or pronounce them if she saw them within a text, but she is able to hear the sounds, which is what then assessment is trying to determine. When the student works on the word "shop" she understands the assignment fully when she realizes the -sh makes one sound. The video is an excellent example of performing the assessment, especially since it includes the use of blocks. It's an added benefit for kinesthetic learners. 

Module 3 Reading Responses

Chapter 7 discusses the importance of assessing students in primary grades and teaching early literacy. Assessing a students early literacy is important to gauge a students readiness.  First to assess a students literacy level you provide the students with a selected text. It should not be a cold read. Often times when I've assessed students I've been told to just pull a text, give a brief overview of the story the student will be reading and then assess how the student performs. This is not a good way of assessing students fluency in early literacy. There are several different assessments you can use to help early literacy learners. Yopp-Singer provides the teacher with the students' knowledge of phenomic awareness. For a student to be a successful reader, they must be proficient in both phonological awareness and phenomic awareness. It's important for students to receive extra assistance when struggling with reading. Early intervention provides students with the opportunity to become successful in reading with specialized instruction. Using a variety of assessments, teachers can determine a students' needs easily. 

Throughout chapter 8 I was able to take away the importance of running records and other oral assessments. During my student teaching experience I had the opportunity to assess several students using the DRA. It provided me with the information I needed to know and helped me to place students in guided reading groups based on their needs and reading levels. The listening capacity test is something I had never heard of before reading this chapter. I believe it's important to know how are students are listening since much of their comprehension comes through listening. I can't even count how many times I've repeated myself in the classroom or during a read aloud and how many students miss what I've said. I would definitely like to try the listening capacity test in my own classroom.

Teaching phonics is something I'm really excited about, so chapter 12 was very interesting for me to read. Many teachers focus on just emphasizing phonics through worksheets, but the text provided excellent exercises of how to teach phonics. I believe students primarily learn phonics best through read-alouds, shared reading, guided reading, and individual conferences in a comprehensive literacy approach to reading.  It is important to remember when teaching phonics to focus on determining meaning, not to put emphasis on phonics and phonemic awareness.

Module 2: Article & Optiz Text Comparison

Chapters 5 &6 in Optiz's text discussed informal and formal assessments. The text provided many examples of formal and informal assessments that can be used, and that most teachers most likely already use day to day in their classroom. Personally I've used checklists, reading attitude surveys, running records, interest inventories, and interviews with my students in the past. I'm also currently using several of these with my tutee. Informal assessments provide the teacher with the opportunity to assess the student easily and drive instruction. The article stated, "are not data driven but rather content and performance driven (Weaver)." "Authentic assessments help teacher measure the students abilities using procedures that simulate the application of these abilities to real life situations (Opitz, et, al., 2011, p. 64)."

Where do the ideas seem to merge?  What differences can you discern?

The text and the article both seem to state the same thing. Informal assessment and performance based measures should be used to inform instruction. The article stressed assessment used needs to match the purpose of assessing. I didn't notice any strong differences between my article and the text, however, the text provided excellent examples of formal and informal assessments that could be used with students.

References:

Opitz, M., Rubin, D., & Erekson, J. A. (2011). Reading diagnosis and improvement, assessment and instruction. (6th ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Weaver, B. (n.d.). Formal versus informal assessments.

            Retrieved from http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/formal-versus-informal-assessments

Module 2: PowerPoint Reflections

Assessing students is always an important part of education. I've always enjoyed using rubrics as a form of assessments with my students. The students are always able to know what I expect from them while working. Whenever I assigned a writing assignment with my students, I provided them with a rubric. For me, it is important for them to know they are meeting all of the requirements within an assignment. It also makes the student responsible for his/her own actions while working. The PowerPoint also mentioned using portfolios to assess student's writing. Personally, I love implementing journaling into class time. It allows the student to write about what ever they want. During student teaching, from time to time my CT and I would collect the journals and monitor the student's progress from their journal entries. Their journals also provided writing samples to use during parent-teacher conferences. When I collected their journals, I always tried to leave positive feedback, as well as constructive criticism and ways the student could improve in their writing.

Module 2: Response to Reading Inventory Demo Video

This video is an excellent example of how a teacher can gain information about the student through simple dialogue. The conversation between the teacher and student reminded me of the Garfield Reading Survey. It's a quick, simple way to gauge how the student feels about reading and what topics may interest them. Using simple conversation and the Garfield Reading Survey I hope to determine a wide variety of books and topics that will interest my tutee. The word list used by the teacher also allows for the quick assessment and determine the tutee's reading ability/level. One particular thing I liked is when the teacher told the student to read at her own pace. There was no added pressure on the student (which can happen to many students when reading aloud) and I plan on using it with my tutee. He often feels embarrassed reading aloud and I want to make sure the atmosphere we work in feels comfortable and safe for my tutee. As I work with my tutee I hope his interest and feeling towards reading will improve.

References:

Reading Inventory Demo -- Part One
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHAZyRKKbic