Formative Assessment and giving FeedbackIPGK Batu Lintang2013

General Overview

• These classes have two main foci

Formative assessment (assessment for learning)

Giving feedback (and feed forward)

Sessions Overview

• Starter• Introductions• Context: What is assessment?• Formative assessment (Assessment for learning)• Feed-back and feed-forward• From theory to practice• Review/Evaluation

Context: What is assessment?

• What is assessment?• Reasons to assess• Factors affecting assessment• Principles of assessment• Types of assessment

The word ‘assess’Comes from the Latin verb ‘assidere’ meaning ‘to sit with’. In assessment, one should sit with the learner. This implies it is something we do with and for students and not to students (Green, 1998)

A child’s learning journey has different pathways. Purposeful assessment helps us clear the path for learners so they can see it. Quality assessments are the signposts along the way to indicate to the learner and the teacher that progress is being made.

Reasons to assess.

• Negotiation Activity:

Place each of the ‘reasons to assess’ listed on the small sheet onto the larger sheet of paper under the ‘correct’ heading.

Be prepared to justify your decisions.

Factors affecting assessment.

• Draw a ‘mind map’ to show what things might affect how you would choose to assess children’s work.

• Add factors that might affect their achievement in this assessment.

Principles of assessment

• Teachers value and believe in all students’ ability to learn

• Learning goals and success criteria are shared with students

• Involve students in self-assessment• Provide feedback that helps students

recognise their next learning steps and how to take them

• Be confident that every student can improve• Provide students with examples of what we

expect from them

Types of assessment.

• Assessment of learning: Summative

• Assessment for learning: Formative

• Assessment as learning: Self-assessment

If we think of our children as plants …

Summative assessment of the plants is the process of simply measuring them. It might be interesting to compare and analyse measurements but, in themselves, these do not affect the growth of the plants.

Formative assessment, on the other hand, is the equivalent of feeding and watering the plants appropriate to their needs - directly affecting their growth.

The garden analogy

Assessment for learning.

• What exactly is it?• Why is it important?• Developing success criteria• Peer-assessment• Self-assessment• A ‘toolbox of strategies’

What exactly is it?

• Formative assessment (assessment for learning) is the process of assessing student work, formally or informally, in order to give feedback and feed-forward to the student so that they know what they have learned and what they still need to learn.

• The process also enables the teacher to assess how effective their teaching has been and to make adjustments to their planning and teaching.

Important point!

• A formative assessment activity is not separate from the teaching and learning process. It is part of the process.

• So any teaching and learning activity can, (and should) be

a formative assessment to some degree

Apply this to your teaching!

• You are reading a simple book to a class and you want to know if they understand the story. What ‘activity’ might you do in this situation? How could you use it as assessment for better learning?

• You are doing a unit on ‘instructions’. What activity could you do that would inform you how effective your teaching had been?

Important research

• In 1998 Paul Black and Dylan Wiliam of Kings College, London published their wide-ranging analysis of research into classroom-based assessment:

• Inside the Black Box: Raising Standards through Classroom Assessment

• The article concludes with: “There is a body of firm evidence that formative assessment is an essential feature of classroom work and that development of it can raise standards. We know of no other way of raising standards for which such a strong prima facie case can be made on the basis of evidence of such large learning gains.”

• For the full text of the article, go to: http://weaeducation.typepad.co.uk/files/blackbox-1.pdf

The Black Box: findings

1. Providing effective feedback to students. 2. Students’ active involvement in their own learning.3. Adjusting teaching to take account of the results of

assessment.4. Recognising the profound influence of assessment on

students’ motivation and self-esteem - both crucial influences on learning.

5. Ensuring pupils assess themselves and understand how to improve.

Black and Wiliam’s research indicates that improving learning through assessment depends on five deceptively simple factors:

Prior knowledge for the next bit!

• Curriculum

• Objectives

• Learning outcomes/intentions/goals

Learning Intentions

Both teacher and student need to be clear about what is being learnt.

Can your students answer these questions?

• What am I learning?

• Why am I learning it?

• How will I learn it? (Process)

• How will I know I’ve learnt it? (Product)

Success Criteria

• Success criteria describe how students will go about achieving a learning intention or how they will know when they have learnt it. The purpose of creating success criteria is to ensure students understand the teacher's criteria for making judgments about their work, and so that they gain an ‘anatomy of quality’ for that particular piece of work. If students have been involved in the creation of success criteria they are more likely to take more ownership of their learning, be self-evaluative as they are working, and question the assessed work as it evolves. Measuring whether a single learning intention has been met may involve co-constructing several success criteria.

Success Criteria

Success Criteria are the way that students can judge whether they are successful with the learning.They should be:

concretemeasurableobservable ….. and open to negotiation.

Learning Intention: To write the introductory paragraph for a piece of persuasive writing.

Success Criteria:Opening statement defines the topic.Could contain a ‘hook’ for the reader e.g. rhetorical question, controversial statement, quotationWriter’s opinion is stated.General statement about the content of the essay.

Try your own

• In your groups try to write success criteria for the teaching and learning activity/ formative assessment you have been allocated.

• Be prepared to report back to the class. Choose a person who has not spoken much so far!

Good morning!

• What did you learn yesterday?• Why did you learn it?• How did you learn it?• How will you know you have learned it?

Success Criteria

• Finish work on your ‘success criteria’

• Share your ‘success criteria’ with the class

Feedback (and feed-forward)

• Why is feedback important?

• Eight principles of feedback

• Some examples of feedback.

The teacher makes a difference!

5 characteristics of effective teachers1. Know the subject, and know how children learn2. Engage in quality classroom interactions3.Give specific feedback to learners4. Are passionate about what they are teaching5. Motivate children to engage in a range of

challenging tasks

Feedback• The most powerful single factor that enhances

achievement.

• John Hattie (Effective Literacy Practice 5-8 p 86)

The purposes of feedback• To affirm• To inform• To guide future learning

The ultimate aim is to enable students to monitor and regulate their own learning.

II think that’s the best one I have seen so far. That’s wonderful – well done.

I notice you’ve checked the punctuation of your piece. But there is something else you need to attend to. Remember that one of your personal writing goals is to check your use of spelling conventions for plural words in your writing.

Billy’s purpose for writingTo create a picture through words in the reader’s mind

of what a winter’s day looks like, sounds like, feels like.

• Select word pictures (images) carefully• Use some strong precise verbs• Order your sentences so that they flow well

Billy’s writing

Teacher feedback• My favourite image is “Tired

trees cling on to pinecones.”• You have used evocative verbs

( cling on to, sends shivers, sways)

• You have created poetic type sentences to good effect. They make me feel the winter’s day.

• You concluded with a great summary sentence. “Now that’s a winter’s day.”

Effective Feedback• Begins with positive comments about the learner’s work• Is specific to the intended outcome and the shared goal for the task• Is always directed towards the intended outcome, and not the learner.• Is primarily descriptive rather than evaluative• Is offered as soon as possible after the task has been carried out• Offers the learner guidance on the next steps in their learning• Invites the learner’s suggestions about what they could do to improve

their learning• The teacher needs to allow time for the students to discuss and act on

the feedback.

Conversations about writing – another exampleYear 7.Shared goal – to “recount a personal experience in a way that has impact on the reader” ; to “share a significant moment in time with the reader”.Jointly developed criteria/ scaffoldFeelings suggested through descriptive actionsExpressive and precise verbs, adjectives and adverbs used to depict atmosphereUse of deliberately selected poetic language features to suggest feelings and atmosphere. ( metaphors, similes, onomatopoeia and alliteration)Main ideas broken into paragraphs,

Jessica’s first draft Brrr! I couldn’t move, I couldn’t talk, my lips and nose were frozen. Who would have thought that an innocent harmless winters walk to school could suddenly turn into a blizzering snowstorm. Maybe I’m exaggerating a little bit. OK a whole lot, but seriously have you been out there?I shiver my way into school and up the stairs. My friends were saying ‘hi’ to me but I wasn’t listening. All I could concentrate on was getting to the heater. I slowly approached the heater and finally clappsed on to it. Warmth! I felt the warmth strain back into my veins. ….

Up to you, but think about the dangers of using too many poetic images – it’s easy to overdo this. Really good strong images throughout Jessica. How do you feel about the surface features?

You’ve indicated that with your underlining – good. I want you to check your paragraphing as well. You’ve done some. Remember that’s one of our criteria

Jessica’s published textA journey through the morning

Brrr! I couldn’t move, I couldn’t talk, my nose was red and my lips were blue. Who would have thought that an innocent harmless winters walk to school could suddenly turn into a blistering snowstorm!My fingers were numb as I shivered my way into school and up the stairs. The pins and needles in my left foot felt like a thousand darts jabbing at me.My friends bounded over from the computer to say‘ hi’ to me but I wasn’t listening. All I could think about was getting to the heater. I slowly approached the heater and finally collapsed. I felt the warmth drain back into my veins like water draining through a sieve. I look over to the whiteboard and remember the horrors of the school day…..

Teacher’s written feedback

Brrr! I couldn’t move, I couldn’t talk, my nose was red and my lips were blue. Who would have thought that an innocent harmless winters walk to school could suddenly turn into a blistering snowstorm!My fingers were numb as I shivered my way into school and up the stairs. The pins and needles in my left foot felt like a thousand darts jabbing at me.My friends bounded over from the computer to say‘ hi’ to me but I wasn’t listening. All I could think about was getting to the heater. I slowly approached the heater and finally collapsed. I felt the warmth drain back into my veins like water draining through a sieve. I look over to the whiteboard and remember the horrors of the school day….

• This writing has impact Jessica. I can feel the coldness of this horrible school morning very clearly, You’ve achieved this by

• Using full descriptions to paint a picture. Eg “my nose was red and my lips were blue”

• Using expressive verbs such as “shivered”, “bounded over” and “slumped down”

• Using poetic imagery reasonably carefully, especially similes and alliteration – though beware that you don’t over-use these because too many can make writing sound insincere.

• You have also begun to experiment with paragraphing clearly.

• Your goal: To make your tenses consistent in your writing. Avoid moving between the present and past tense(unless there is a reason for doing so)

Review: 3, 2, 1

• On your slip of paper write down:

• 3 things you have learned from these sessions

• 2 things you will try to do in your own teaching

• 1 question you have or 1 thing you would like to find out more about

Evaluation

• Please e mail me the answer to these questions: > What was the part of this session that you found most helpful? Why?

> What was the activity that you enjoyed most? Why?

> How could these sessions have been improved or made more helpful? Explain your answer.

john@brightoneducationls.com

Acknowledgments

• This power point contains material developed by the Ministry of Education in New Zealand and freely available on their website. www.tki.org.nz /communities

• This power-point also contains material kindly provided by Ms Sharon Young, Senior Lecturer in English at the University of Otago College of Education, Dunedin, NZ