Using Formative Assessment and Feedback to Improve Student Learning in Reading

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Using Formative Assessment and Feedback to
Improve Student Learning in Reading

• Holly Ellis, Ph.D.
• Kimberly Thomas, Ed.S.

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Formative and Summative Assessment
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Formative and Summative Assessments

• Formative Assessments
• Coaching students to hit a series of learning
  targets to achieve the final learning targets
• Making students a partner in their learning
• Descriptive feedback and part of instruction
• Summative Assessments
• A judgment, usually communicated by a grade or
  score, about how well students achieve the final
  learning targets
• Evaluative feedback and after instruction

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Assessor

• Formative Assessments
• Teacher
• Students as self-assessors of their status on the
  learning target
• Peers of students as part of the instructional
  activity
• Summative Assessments
• Teacher only

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Assessment Tools

• Formative Assessments (Descriptive and Part of
  the Instruction)
• Selected response test as part of instruction
• Performance assessment as part of instruction
• Verbal communication on an instructional task
  students complete during class or for homework
• Written communication on an instructional task
  students complete during class or for homework
• Questioning techniques
• Minute paper
• Red, Green, Yellow
• Etc.
• Summative Assessments (Evaluative)
• Selected response test (multiple choice, true
  false, matching, fill-in-the-blank)
• Performance assessment (writing, speaking,
  producing, etc.)

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What do results tell us?

• Results tell us about the quality of our process.
  As part of our process we
• Must have measurable goals (learning targets)
  that are clearly communicated to students
• Must have good tools (summative assessments) that
  are clearly communicated to students to measure
  learning targets
• Must have blocks of instruction that scaffold
  learning so that students can achieve the overall
  learning targets
• Must have ways to provide continuous feedback to
  students on each block of instruction
• Must have ways to help them when they are not
  achieving a particular block of instruction
• Must create ways to harvest the wins when they
  achieve each step of the way

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What does the research say about getting
results?

• FEEDBACK and COMMUNICATION OF
• EXPECATIONS ARE IMPORTANT

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• Paul Black and Dylan Wiliam (1998) synthesis of
  the research
• Students of teachers using formative assessments
  to coach students to achieve the learning targets
  scored higher on standardized tests than those
  students of teachers who did not practice this
  assessment approach.
• The biggest gains occurred with the lowest
  performing students.

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More from a teacher

• A teacher in a British secondary school conducted
  an experiment. She assessed students in writing
  in three classes in this way
• She provided a grade only.
• She provided a grade and narrative feedback.
• She provided feedback only.
• What students scored the highest on the end of
  year writing assessment?

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Positive!
3 compliments 1 criticism
3 to 1
Neutral
2 compliments 1 criticism
2 to 1
Negative
1 compliment 1 criticism
1 to 1
Source Tom Connellan, Inside the Magic
Kingdom, pgs 91-95
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• Make a Difference in our Schools and Get Student
  Results
• Define, communicate and measure results
• -- Quint Studer
• Results that Last and Hardwiring Excellence

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What else do results tell us?

• Results tell us how well our students have
  achieved the overall learning targets.
• So, why are we assessing?

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What are Learning Targets?

• Define what students will know and be able to do
  when they complete a lesson.
• Should be written to align to benchmarks for each
  lesson.
• Should include a capability verb and action item.

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Qualities of Sound Learning Targets

• Capability Verb
• Describes the type and level of
  performance
• Verb indicates the skill you will be
  assessing
• Examples-state, identify, infer, compare
• Non-examples-know, understand, think
• Action Item
• Describes what action students will do
• ______ the steps of the scientific method
• ______ the letter A

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Learning Targets

• How do we write them in clear and measurable
  terms? Blooms capability verbs
• Measurable
• Measure one thing
• Build from simplest to most difficult
• How do we apply learning targets?

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Chunking or Scaffolding Instruction

• Determine what students need to know at various
  levels before achieving a learning target at a
  higher level.
• For example, if you want students to be able to
  apply the scientific method to solve a real
  word problem, students would need to be able to
• define each component of the scientific
  method
• describe how each component connects to
  the other, and
• distinguish when the scientific method has
  been applied correctly.

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Reading Learning Target

• Main Idea knowledge and skills that build on
  each other
• Knowledge
• Define main idea.
• Define supporting details.
• Given a passage, identify the main idea.
• Given a passage, identify the supporting details.
• Reasoning
• Explain why the ___, is the main idea of the
  passage.
• Distinguish between the main idea and the
  supporting details in a passage.
• After reading a passage without a main idea,
  re-write the paragraph to include a main idea.
• Given three passages, evaluate each to determine
  the paragraphs that include a main idea.

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More Examples of Learning Targets

• Recognize the qualities of a good learning
  target.
• Using capability verbs and action items, create
  learning targets.
• Define the content of a given standard.
• State what it means to chunk or scaffold
  instruction.
• Transform standards into learning targets that
  scaffold instruction.

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How do we determine results?

• Weekly Learning Targets
• Use summative assessments to judge student
  performance.
• Include summative assessments in students grade.
• Learning Targets
• Use summative assessments (benchmark tests and/or
  performance assessments) on all weekly learning
  targets.
• Include summative assessments in a students
  grade consider weighting the benchmark
  assessment higher or replacing other grades with
  this assessment in your grading process if
  students demonstrate higher scores at the
  benchmarking time.

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How do we get results?

• From our weekly learning targets we create daily
  learning targets
• Scaffold the building blocks of learning.
• Coach students by providing continuous feedback
  to help them correct mistakes and harvest their
  wins along the way. Remember 3 to 1.
• Use formative assessments to determine how well
  students are doing.

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How do we get results?

• Just Ask Andie Example

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What Have We Learned?

• An effective teacher is determined by how well
  our students achieve. We must
• Determine when and how to use formative and
  summative assessments.
• Create weekly learning targets that direct how we
  develop our daily learning targets.
• Create clear ways to measure the weekly learning
  targets and communicate the learning targets and
  how they will be measured to students.
• Create building blocks of instruction that align
  to the daily learning targets.
• Coach students to succeed by providing continuous
  feedback on how they achieve each block of
  instruction and harvest their wins using 3 to 1.

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Survey