Assessment
If I had to name my least favorite aspect of teaching, I would immediately say "assessment." I think the main reason is that it scares me. Personally, I've experienced how sterile thinking can become when it becomes married to grades. Also, assessment scares me because it's very difficult for me, the teacher, to try to articulate a numerical percentage, putting a label on students' learning. I ended up using lots of rubric and working hard to provide lots of descriptive feedback on all writing assignments--not simply being content with giving a evaluative feedback. This was always still a struggle to balance though. Therefore, though I used lots of formal assessments including quizzes, unit tests, and bench marks, and though these forms of assessments were valuable in reflecting a specific type of learning and thinking, I also tried my best to implement a vast amount of informal assessments. It's crucial to me as a teacher to incorporate as many types of assessments as possible so as to capture and value as many types of thinking as possible.
Every other week, students were asked to make written reflections about class in general. I prompted students to think about what was connecting with them in class, what they had trouble connecting with, and any other questions they may have. Students turned these reflections in to me, and through these informal assessments, I was able to gauge student learning as well as gaps in student learning. Also, after difficult lessons or large projects, I directed students to write as a way to reflect on learning that was occurring and a way to express challenges and stumbling blocks to that learning. These types of informal assessments were essential to guide me in my instructions. Some of these informal assessments/reflections can be found under the "Reflections" page under "Student Reflections."
In addition to these types of assessments, I also informally assessed my students and the learning happening in class through simple observations. All of these observations I fleshed out in writing in my daybook. To read more about these, see the "Reflective Practitioner" or "Reflections" page.
