Over the past 17 years, I have incorporated numerous types of formative assessments and a significant number of classroom, school-wide and state mandated summative assessments.  The validity of the information gained depended on the grade level, the subject, the circumstances, the modality, but most importantly, the student.

 I can still hear myself consoling a student who failed a quiz, reminding them that the quiz was just a snapshot of that information, on that day.  Formative assessments have a very important role in the classroom, in that they offer the learner an opportunity to show that they understand a concept or not, and to what level.  Some of the types of formative assessments that I use include:  class starters, found on our PowerSchool site, pop quizzes using quizlet, activity stations (centers), partner activity, group work, presentations, class participation, quizzes on BrainPop, thumbs up, thumbs down and exit tickets on Socrative, to name a few.  This allows educators to adjust their lessons and methods of teaching.  It can be fine tuned for a student or groups of students. "Let people make mistakes and learn,: is one of the statements that I liked best and whole-heartedly agreed with from the video Why Is Formative Assessment So Helpful?  Formative assessments give students a chance to take a chance.  I also agree with the one teacher who stated that formative assessments aren't used as a grade in the grade book.  They are essentially another teaching tool.

Technology has opened up so many doors for formative assessments.  Students can use games and subject specific websites to demonstrate their understanding of concepts.  They can also have access to these sites at home and school.  Another wonderful benefit to the internet is that students can find ways to relate concepts to real life experiences.  An example might be learning Pythagorean Theorem.  What is the point?  Who needs to know this?  These are often questions posed by students, but with the ability to research on line, they can find real life professions that give importance to understanding this concept.

Formative assessments allow teachers to lay the ground work for how to approach the curriculum.

Summative assessments are a completely different beast!  I call them beast because they are not always used to directly benefit a specific student or even the group of student that I teach.  There are numerous mandated test used for assessing teachers, school districts and states, as well as, making financial decisions.  They are data gathering sources.   Unfortunately, many of these test take up valuable learning time, not just during the test phase, but in the preparation phase, "practicing for the test."  They eat up time, stress out students and staff and can give students a false picture of their abilities, positive and negative.

On the other hand, summative assessments for a specific group of students is necessary in order to determine the learners understanding of the concepts.  The problem with the way it has been done in the past and still, in many school districts, is a paper and pencil test or a multiple choice, short answer test on a computer.  We, teachers need to have more flexibility in how we assess.  And while I believe common forms of assessment are valuable and provide a sense of fairness, bubbling in answers is not appropriately for all content matter.   Project based learning and blended learning are just a couple of options that allow for more flexibility in assessing a students understanding.

BLOG POST - WEEK ONE AND TWO

Jen Johnson's video on blended learning draws a clear line in the sand between blended learning and technology integration.  You can cross over the use of technology line into blended learning by incorporating some very key features.  The use of technology has to specifically engage a student in the learning process so that there is a connection between what they are doing on line and what they are leaning in the classroom.  There should be collaboration, opportunities for feedback and more student control of learning.

In the past I have used technology to engage students in the learning process, but it was not truly blended learning.  I would have them practice math problems on a specific site such as Cool Math or engage them in a competition, with games like Kahoot or Jeopardy,  but I realized that wasn't helping them learn the content.  While they were having fun and use of those programs helped excite students who don't generally care for math, it did not improve their understanding of the concepts.  I then began using a combination of tools to support a more student centered learning process.  I started by incorporating a flipped classroom approach.  I gave students an opportunity to work at their own pace or with a partner on the computer, using Study Island.  Study Island has lessons associated with the concepts.  Some of the lessons are step by step written explanations and other lessons are a link, connecting the student to Khan Academy. I was able to assign specific concepts and control whether students could play games or practice.  The next day, we would go over the concepts that they learned and I allowed for group discussion at their tables.  We then did practice problems using the integrated board.  Students would explain the process.  I also found a site that gave a visual presentation of graph's so that they could understand the process of graphing lines, finding the y intercept and the x and y coordinate points.  http://www.shodor.org/interactivate/activities/Graphit/  This was a favorite for many students.  It was extremely helpful for visual learners.

One of the wonderful things about using the blended classroom in that you are often automatically differentiating for different learner modalities.