Chapter Five: Text review 

     After reading chapter five in the textbook, I have learned many different things involving organizing the curriculum and how important assessments are in learning. I have learned different things about grading, Why sharing how the student does in school with relatives is important, how valid assessments are, the difference between formative and summative assessments, what authentic assessments are, and different ways to make testing useful. The text states, “Curriculum that is well organized and integrated involves three important elements: outcomes, assessment, and instruction. The outcomes (desired results) which students will demonstrate are planned for first. From the outcomes they identify, teachers develop goals for their students and determine how the outcomes will be assessed. Planning for instruction involves creating objectives that will help students achieve the goal. Meaningful assessments are used to determine the extent to which students have been successful in meeting the goals.6” The curriculum is important because it tells teachers that they are where they need to be as they teach their students material over the year. The curriculum is a guide point for what the teacher should be teaching, how long the teacher should be teaching topics, and when the teacher should be teaching these topics. 

    Assessments are extremely important in the classroom to both the student and the teacher. The assessment tells the student what he knows and tells the teacher what he taught well. It tells the student what he needs to work on, and it tells the teacher what he might need to spend more time reviewing on before a big test. The textbook defines assessment as “one step in the overall evaluation of the student learning process. During assessment, the teacher gathers information about a student’s learning, understanding, and performance in order to plan effective instruction.” Evaluation is also extremely important in the classroom. The text defines Evaluation as “the process by which the teacher determines the extent to which the student has achieved or mastered goals, outcomes, and objectives. After the teacher gives an assessment, he or she needs to evaluate the results of the assessment and use that data to drive his or her instruction in the future.” Evaluation can determine how well a teacher had taught a particular topic and if he needs to change his way of teaching in order to help his students succeed. 

    Chapter five also caused me to realize how important or essential grading is in the classroom. The text explains that “Grading occurs after data has been gathered through assessments. The assessment data is examined to determine its meaning through evaluation. The teacher then ranks or categorizes the level of student performance by assigning some symbol. Examples of grading symbols that are commonly used are: letter grades, percentages, and word description of performance (excellent, good, average, fair, poor). This grading process has been used traditionally to sort the high performing students from the low performing students.” But at the same time, grades should not dictate how high preforming or how low performing a student is. There are some students who have a really hard time taking a test, and there are some students who get extra support in a classroom who still struggle with topics presented in class. There are also some students who have really bad test anxiety and can’t really focus when a test or quiz is presented to them. 

    Chapter five also caused me to realize how important reporting is in a school setting. The textbook explains that “Reporting is the process by which the teacher shares the progress of the student’s learning with the students and appropriate family members in a more formal manner, in addition to the formative feedback that occurs each day.” I believe that as teachers, we should let our student’s families know as soon as there is an issue that may negatively affect their grades. I believe that it does not matter what grade the child is in but that we should always report if we notice a student’s grades dropping. This passage does hit close to home for me. My brother was in his last year of high school and was failing all of his classes. My parents almost did not find out, and he almost had to repeat his last year because of his grades. The only reason my parents found out was due to his report card, and they were very upset that his teachers did not notify them, especially since he was in special education. 

    Chapter five also helped me learn about the Reliability and Validity of Assessments. The text explains that reliability is “the idea that an assessment will consistently measure student achievement. For example, setting a cruise control at 70 mph creates the expectation that the car will consistently go that same speed no matter what the landscape entails (going uphill, downhill, etc). Teachers want the assessments that they give to provide consistent results no matter what time of the day it is given.” and that validity is “essentially whether the assessment is actually assessing what it is intended to. However, just because an assessment is reliable does not mean it is a valid assessment of student learning.” But at the same time, just because something is reliable does not mean it is valid. A student might get everything right on a multiple-choice test but might have trouble applying their knowledge if the question was asked in a written format. 

    The textbook also gave me a refresher on the difference between formative and summative assessments. The text states that formative assessments “should be used to gather information about the students’ progress towards mastering a goal or outcome.” and that summative assessments “should be used to evaluate the level of performance. It is used to determine if a student has achieved mastery of a goal or outcome.” 

    The textbook also helped me learn about authentic assessments. The text states, “Authentic assessments are assessments that require students to show their knowledge of skills and competencies in ways that they actually would in everyday life.1 Examples of authentic assessments include rubrics, portfolios, peer assessment, and student self-assessment.”

    Finally, this chapter helped me realize how we can make the test more useful. The text states, “When students have completed an assessment, it is important for the teacher to analyze the errors that were made. If it is a question that has been missed by several students, then the question could have something in it that is confusing the students. By looking at how students solve problems or answer questions, the teacher can analyze possible flaws in the question or determine where the breakdown in learning occurred. The teacher can reteach the specific skill or address the misconceptions the student may have instead of putting the student in a general intervention they may or may not need.” 

    The text also explains what steps the teacher can take to help students do better on a test. These steps, as stated in the text, are:

1. Use relaxation exercises to get students ready to do their best on the test.
2. Design teacher made tests with features found on standardized tests such as answer sheets, questions in formats similar to those on tests they will be taking, and directions written in vocabulary and style similar to those on test they will be taking.
3. Practice working on timed tests.
4. Help students learn how to reply to questions which offer “all of the above” and “none of the above” as choices.
5. Help students learn to look over the test when appropriate before starting to learn what kinds of questions are being asked and to help them budget their time appropriately.
6. Help students learn to eliminate obviously incorrect responses in multiple choice tests to narrow down the choices and teach them to determine why a choice is wrong so that they can eliminate answers that are meant trick or confuse them.
7. Help students understand when it is appropriate to skip a question and go on and when it is appropriate to make an educated guess.
8. Help students learn to use clues in the test questions to help them choose correct answers.
9. If the students are recording answers on a marking sheet, make sure the students know how to mark their choices accurately and how to erase answers they may want to change.

    The text also explains how important celebration is to the assessment process. If a student gets better at taking tests, the teacher should want to celebrate their accomplishment. The teacher should motivate the student to do better.