Assessment as, for, of learning & Triangulation of Evidence

The AssessPeel document that we read today on Triangulation of Evidence is a great practical resource to support Growing Success.  The primary focus of assessment is to improve student learning and ideally should be for student self assessment.  However, teachers can also use the success criteria to assess the students.  In theory, teachers should observe their students, have conversations with their students and also examine their products in order to give them feedback about their learning.  It’s important to know what we want the students to be able to say, do, and create and then determine the best tool to use for assessment.

I think that giving names to the processes that teachers generally do intuitively makes us reflect more on our practice.  Most teachers observe and have conversations with their students but this formalizes this process and means that teachers have concrete evidence of student learning.  Teachers have historically been very good at giving feedback and evaluating product.  We discussed that collecting hard evidence in many ways to support final evaluations ensures reliable and valid data which can be defended when talking to administrators or parents.

Learning goals & success criteria are the “student friendly” versions of the overall & specific expectations found in the curriculum.  Learning goals relate to the course expectations and boil down the key concepts & skills that we want students to learn.  They are simplified into student friendly language starting with “We are learning to….”.  Success Criteria are aligned with the learning goal and state what students are able to say, do, and create to demonstrate that they are successful.  The success criteria are written from the perspective of the student, have qualitative indicators and start with “I can…”.   Look for’s are more specific success criteria.  We discussed that in many boards, teachers are expected to post learning goals & success criteria in advance of the lesson but how does a student help to co-create success criteria if they have not yet learned about the topic?  In a math class, it makes sense to provide students with a learning goal based on the mathematical processes at the beginning of the lesson and then co-create success criteria with students at the end of an open lesson or more importantly for rich task process & product.  Assessment should occur when it makes sense and not necessarily on a daily basis.

Today, I learned about Anchor Marks.  I’m not sure that it makes it any easier for me as teacher but marking as levels gives better feedback to the student.  I find it difficult to turn levels into marks and so these Anchor Marks will be helpful.  I’ve also never heard about Task Requirements before, but what a great concept!  These are basic concepts that the student should have already mastered earlier in their learning but which are not part of the current curriculum.  Thus, these tasks need to be done properly before the assignment is accepted by the teacher.  Interesting ideas!  Has anyone used these before?  Any examples to share?

There should be assessment for as, for and of learning.  I really liked the analogy from Damian Cooper that assessment of learning is the game versus the assessment for and as assessment are the practice.  I have also struggled to reconcile the terms diagnostic, formative and summative.  In our discussion, it was explained more clearly that assessment for learning is used to inform the teacher’s approach whereas assessment as learning is for student self-direction.  Both for and as could be diagnostic and/or formative.  Assessment of learning is summative and counted towards the student’s grade.

Our group also had a lengthy discussion about interviews and how it is difficult to feel comfortable using all of these terms when either you have never heard of them or have little real practice using them.  There is always an assessment question as part of any interview these days and so this discussion and day of activities reinforced the current terminology and solidified my understanding of it as well as introduced me to a few new terms.  Being able to say the terms and use them in context will make me more comfortable in an interview setting and also when planning lessons in the future.

How long do you think it will be before the terminology changes again??