Rubrics: Another Tool for Improving Student Performance

1. Rubrics: Another Tool for Improving Student Performance Part I: Learning More About Performance Assessments

3. Why do we need to test – or “assess”? Evaluate student performance Communicate results to students, parents, and communities Motivate students Evaluate the effectiveness of our teaching (methods and content) Make adjustments to ourcurriculum maps

4. Types of Assessments Standardized Tests – also known as ISTEP Alternative Assessments Traditional teacher-created pencil and paper tests Performance assessments

5. How Are They Different? Standardized: Gives a snapshot view of a student’s learning at one point in time Good for giving a “big picture” assessment of curriculum from year to year Can be used in conjunction with performance-based assessment (writing part on ISTEP) Alternative: Traditional paper and pencil tests. These are teacher created tests that change from year to year. Types of questions include multiple choice, true false, short answer, and matching Performance Assessments – evaluating students on certain tasks

6. Examples of Each Standardized Although most standardized tests are “paper/pencil” we’ll begin testing using technology as it become available. It’s quicker to score and as research is proving, more “real world” as students demonstrate their writing ability using a word processor. What’s the most important aspect of standardized testing? They must remain the same from year to year in order for comparisons to be made. Alternative Teacher-created tests and quizzes Student observation Written compositions Oral presentations Projects Experiments Portfolios Demonstrations

9. Paper/Pencil Assessments Benefits Quicker to create test or quiz Quicker to grade the test or quiz Adequate for testing memorization of facts (dates, key people, location, etc.) Drawbacks The “type of knowledge” and/or skill that can be tested is limited: Conceptual - it’s likely that paper/pencil tests won’t reveal a lack of understanding of concepts or reasoning Communication - to truly assess writing/speaking, paper/pencil tests are inadequate. There is no substitute for actually evaluating that task. Skill - tough to assess “dribbling a ball” unless the child is dribbling the ball Affective/Behavioral Areas - behaviors like respect, courtesy, conduct cannot be evaluated by apaper “test”

13. Benefits Encourages improved student work. By using a rubric students know exactly what is expected. Gets the teacher thinking more about what exactly the learning goal, how to best evaluate a student’s progress and what steps are needed for mastery Promotes higher level learning skills such as application of knowledge, evaluation and reasoning skills, etc. Improved communication with parents (provides more information in what areas students are excelling or need more work) Facilitates professional dialogue between educators – possible cross curricular applications, technology integration, etc. Drawbacks Assessments can be more time consuming to create May take more time to evaluate student work Many times rubrics are a “work in progress” and developed over time unlike an answer “key” for a paper/pencil test that is used year after year. Performance Assessments

19. Part I: The Performance Assessment In our next workshop we’ll learn more about rubrics; how to create them and score them and some more benefits to using them. Before going on, please take the post slideshow survey. It can be found by navigating to the Teacher Page on the Gab from the Lab website