Planning Assesments

There are two types of assessments that teachers can use in the classroom. The first type is a formative assessment and these are used during class as ways for teachers to gauge how well their students are comprehending the lessons. These informal evaluations help the teacher identify students that need extra help and students who are comprehending the information. The second type of assessment is a summative assessment and these are usually performed at the end of a unit as a more formal evaluation. Grades or point values are usually assigned and towards the student's final grade on an official report card or transcript. According to Rick Wormeli, author of Fair Isn't Always Equal and Differentiation, formative assessments offer better feedback to student's and are a more effective way of evaluating students in real time (Wormeli, 2010).

Objective 

Students should be able to summarize the key incidents and turning points within a story by the end of the unit.

Formative Assessments 

Entrance Tickets: At the beginning of the class, students write down the main incident from the previous required reading on a note card (Dyer 2014). After collecting the note cards, I can use them as a quick assessment at the start of the class to know whether or not I need to review the previous chapter in the text and whether or not students understand the key plot points. High-level students can even color code their note card with a marker (Red: Very Important Incident, Orange: Semi-Important Incident, Yellow: Not Very Important).

Rationale: I like this assessment because it gives me a base from which to start a class so instead of going into it blindly, I can have an understanding of exactly where my student's proficiency level is on the past chapter and go from there. If students can't identify the key incident in the chapter, then I may need to spend some time reviewing it before going any further. Being able to identify a key incident in a single chapter can help students identify key incidents on a broader scale, such  as a whole story.According to Judith Dodge of Scholastic, formative assessments need to vary from lesson to lesson. Variety is the key to consistently good assessments (Dodge 2015).

Draw It: The students are told to draw one incident from the previous required reading that they think is the most important to the story. Then, we go around the room and they can show the drawing to the class and explain why they choose this specific incident. (Dyer 2014).

Rationale: This is a quick a dirty way of getting student's to think of a big idea and I really like this assessment because it gives students some freedom to be creative, have fun, and explain their thinking. I can also use this assessment for another objective, such as identifying key lines of dialog in a story by having students create a comic strip of the most important line of dialog in the chapter.Visual representations help students make better connections with the source material and increases memory comprehension (Dodge 2015).

Carousel Brainstorming: In this assessment, students breakout into small groups and quickly discuss the main plot points from the previous required reading. Once they decide on one, they share with the other groups (Dyer 2014).

Rationale: I like this assessment because it allows for teamwork and for students to compare and contrast their ideas with other group's findings (Dodge 2015). This also allows the teacher to walk around from group to group and listen to the dialog going on between students which is a great way to gauge understanding and comprehension. According to Wormeli, descriptive feedback is vital for students and this would be a good way for the teacher to give it right away by addressing the three main questions with each group: What was the goal? Where are you in relation to that goal? How can we close that gap?

Sources

Dodge,  Judith. What Are Formative Assessments and Why Do We Use Them? Retrieved from http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/article/what-are-formative-assessments-and-why-should-we-use-them; January 25, 2016

Dyer, Kathy. Teach. Learn. Grow. Education Blog, Retrieved from https://www.nwea.org/blog/; January 22, 2015

Wormeli, R. 2010 YouTube Video: Formative and Summative Assessment, Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rJxFXjfB_B4; January 25, 2016