Teacher as Analyst
"When we show up, act boldy, and practice the best ways to be wrong, we fail forward. No matter where we end up, we've grown from where we began.”
Educators understand and use data to drive their instruction and support students in achieving their learning goals. Educators:
7a: Provide alternative ways for students to demonstrate competency and reflect on their learning using technology.
7b: Use technology to design and implement a variety of formative and summative assessments that accommodate learner needs, provide timely feedback to students and inform instruction.
7c: Use assessment data to guide progress and communicate with students, parents and education stakeholders to build student self-direction.
7 A&B : Alternative demonstrations of Competency
In the article Measuring What Matters Chris Frisella explains that as we approach "more personalized, student-driven and inquiry-based approaches to learning, one obstacle that continues to rear its head is the inability of widely used assessment models to successfully measure student learning and growth". Take some time to the article Measuring What Matters. While reading, think about the actual issue. Is it that the tools do not exist to assess these approaches? Is it the lack of an assessment model that is flexible enough or inclusive enough? Is it just a lack of imagination or interest from educators to break free from the norms of assessment and grading?
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Then watch the video embedded above by Reshan Richards on Three Questions to Ask Yourself Before You Assess Learning. His three questions include:
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Immediacy: Is this occurring at the moment of need?
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Authentic: Is there a caring human being behind this?
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Delightful: Is this value-added?
How do you thing technology helps or hinders you as you try and answer these questions about the types of feedback you have used in the classroom?
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All technology tools are not created equally, so like any tool or strategy that you use in your classroom it is important that you are intentional and critical about the intended outcomes and the benefits or harm that tool can have on the learners in your space. Read these blog posts It's time to stop using Kahoot as a whole class review tool,and this one Cons of Using Kahoot (for a more scholarly analysis you might like this article: The effect of using Kahoot!-optional reading). I find that Kahoot is a tool that is always on list as tools for formative assessment, and yet when I stop to think critically I am not sure that it really is useful in that capacity. Now that you are questioning use of Kahoot, what other digital tools do you need to be more critical of before you implement them back into your instruction?
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In the book "The Opportunity Myth", The New Teacher Project states "Students spend more than 500 hours per school year on assignments that weren’t appropriate for their grade and with instruction that didn’t ask enough of them.” This is not just a tech issue, but this is an equity issue. As educators we need to analyze our instruction in on going, systematic ways. Read How to pick the right digital tool: Start with your Learning Goal to consider how to pick tools that will allow your students to demonstrate competency in a variety of ways. (Note: Interestingly you are going to read in this article about Kahoot. Notice the shift away from trivia and more into the creation of the Kahoot (my personal feeling would be that Kahoot is still not the best tool, however the intentional design and use of the tool is what sticks out here).
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7c: Communication and Feedforward
Read the blog post Moving from Feedback to Feedforward by Jennifer Gonzalez. I also suggest listening to the podcast episode at the top of the blog post. How do you think moving to a feedforward approach relates to the ISTE Educator Standard 7c above? What is one way that you commit to incorporating feedforward in your classroom? Share your thoughts with someone in person or on social media. Be sure to use #TCH401 and #feedforward if you use a social media post.