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Ideal for preservice and inservice teachers, this user-friendly resource demonstrates how to use formative assessments to guide instruction and evaluate student learning in standards-based science.
"Proven to be one of the most powerful tools for promoting effective learning, formative assessment enables teachers to capture evidence of student thinking and learning and use that information to adjust instruction. In this concise resource, science educator Elizabeth Hammerman clearly outlines the formative assessment process and provides practical strategies for embedding assessments into the Kئ8 standards-based science curriculum. This research-based book demonstrates how student-centered assessment helps students assume more responsibility for what they learn and how they learn. Teachers can use the various models of formative assessments to monitor student progress and evaluate learning. The author guides readers through discussions, "thought and reflection" activities, analyses of assessment techniques, and applications to classroom practice. Ideal for teachers and science and curriculum specialists, this user-friendly resource provides all the necessary tools to: assess student understanding using observation checklists, questioning strategies, notebooks, reports, graphic organizers, projects, and performance tasks; differentiate science instruction to reach all learners; use rubrics as a means of discovering student strengths and weaknesses; collect student data to inform instructional decisions. With this easy-to-implement guide, any teacher can effectively use formative assessment strategies to enhance instruction and increase student achievement in science."--Publisher's website.
Formative assessment informs the design of learning opportunities that take students from their existing ideas of science to the scientific ideas and practices that support conceptual understanding. Science Formative Assessment shows K-12 educators how to weave formative assessment into daily instruction. Discover 75 assessment techniques linked to the Next Generation Science Standards and give classroom practices a boost with: Descriptions of how each technique promotes learning Charts linking core concepts at each grade level to scientific practices Implementation guidance, such as required materials and student grouping Modifications for different learning styles Ideas for adapting techniques to other content areas
Educators require constructive information that details their students’ comprehension and can help them to advance the learners' education. Accurate evaluation of students at all educational levels and the implementation of comprehensive assessment strategies are essential for ensuring student equality and academic success. The Handbook of Research on Formative Assessment in Pre-K Through Elementary Classrooms is an essential research publication that addresses gaps in the understanding of formative assessment and offers educators meaningful and comprehensive examples of formative assessment in the Pre-K through elementary grade levels. Covering an array of topics such as literacy, professional development, and educational technologies, this book is relevant for instructors, administrators, education professionals, educational policymakers, pre-service teachers, academicians, researchers, and students.
Best-selling author Marcia L. Tate outlines 20 proven brain-compatible strategies, rationales from experts to support their effectiveness, and more than 250 activities in this practical resource.
Education is a hot topic. From the stage of presidential debates to tonight's dinner table, it is an issue that most Americans are deeply concerned about. While there are many strategies for improving the educational process, we need a way to find out what works and what doesn't work as well. Educational assessment seeks to determine just how well students are learning and is an integral part of our quest for improved education. The nation is pinning greater expectations on educational assessment than ever before. We look to these assessment tools when documenting whether students and institutions are truly meeting education goals. But we must stop and ask a crucial question: What kind of assessment is most effective? At a time when traditional testing is subject to increasing criticism, research suggests that new, exciting approaches to assessment may be on the horizon. Advances in the sciences of how people learn and how to measure such learning offer the hope of developing new kinds of assessments-assessments that help students succeed in school by making as clear as possible the nature of their accomplishments and the progress of their learning. Knowing What Students Know essentially explains how expanding knowledge in the scientific fields of human learning and educational measurement can form the foundations of an improved approach to assessment. These advances suggest ways that the targets of assessment-what students know and how well they know it-as well as the methods used to make inferences about student learning can be made more valid and instructionally useful. Principles for designing and using these new kinds of assessments are presented, and examples are used to illustrate the principles. Implications for policy, practice, and research are also explored. With the promise of a productive research-based approach to assessment of student learning, Knowing What Students Know will be important to education administrators, assessment designers, teachers and teacher educators, and education advocates.
Published to glowing praise in 1990, Science for All Americans defined the science-literate American--describing the knowledge, skills, and attitudes all students should retain from their learning experience--and offered a series of recommendations for reforming our system of education in science, mathematics, and technology. Benchmarks for Science Literacy takes this one step further. Created in close consultation with a cross-section of American teachers, administrators, and scientists, Benchmarks elaborates on the recommendations to provide guidelines for what all students should know and be able to do in science, mathematics, and technology by the end of grades 2, 5, 8, and 12. These grade levels offer reasonable checkpoints for student progress toward science literacy, but do not suggest a rigid formula for teaching. Benchmarks is not a proposed curriculum, nor is it a plan for one: it is a tool educators can use as they design curricula that fit their student's needs and meet the goals first outlined in Science for All Americans. Far from pressing for a single educational program, Project 2061 advocates a reform strategy that will lead to more curriculum diversity than is common today. IBenchmarks emerged from the work of six diverse school-district teams who were asked to rethink the K-12 curriculum and outline alternative ways of achieving science literacy for all students. These teams based their work on published research and the continuing advice of prominent educators, as well as their own teaching experience. Focusing on the understanding and interconnection of key concepts rather than rote memorization of terms and isolated facts, Benchmarks advocates building a lasting understanding of science and related fields. In a culture increasingly pervaded by science, mathematics, and technology, science literacy require habits of mind that will enable citizens to understand the world around them, make some sense of new technologies as they emerge and grow, and deal sensibly with problems that involve evidence, numbers, patterns, logical arguments, and technology--as well as the relationship of these disciplines to the arts, humanities, and vocational sciences--making science literacy relevant to all students, regardless of their career paths. If Americans are to participate in a world shaped by modern science and mathematics, a world where technological know-how will offer the keys to economic and political stability in the twenty-first century, education in these areas must become one of the nation's highest priorities. Together with Science for All Americans, Benchmarks for Science Literacy offers a bold new agenda for the future of science education in this country, one that is certain to prepare our children for life in the twenty-first century.
How do you know if students are with you at the beginning, middle, and end of a lesson? Can formative assessment offer a key to better teaching and learning during instruction? What if you could blend different formative assessment moves in your classroom, with intention and care for all students, to help make better instructional decisions on the fly and enjoy more teachable moments? Educators Brent Duckor and Carrie Holmberg invite you on the journey to becoming a formative assessor. They encourage you to focus on these seven research-based, high-leverage formative assessment moves: Priming--building on background knowledge and creating a formative assessment–rich, equitable classroom culture Posing--asking questions in relation to learning targets across the curriculum that elicit Habits of Mind Pausing--waiting after powerful questions and rich tasks to encourage more student responses by supporting them to think aloud and use speaking and listening skills related to academic language Probing--deepening discussions, asking for elaborations, and making connections using sentence frames and starters Bouncing--sampling student responses systematically to broaden participation, manage flow of conversation, and gather more “soft data” for instructional use Tagging--describing and recording student responses without judgment and making public how students with different styles and needs approach learning in real-time Binning--interpreting student responses with a wide range of tools, categorizing misconceptions and “p-prims,” and using classroom generated data to make more valid and reliable instructional decisions on next steps in the lesson and unit Each chapter explores a classroom-tested move, including foundational research, explaining how and when to best use it, and describing what it looks like in practice. Highlights include case studies, try-now tasks and tips, and advice from beginning and seasoned teachers who use these formative assessment moves in their classrooms.
This book builds on the expanding knowledge of what works in classrooms and suggests approaches that can open up individual and group possibilities for science and mathematics instruction, suggesting ways that formative assessment practices can inform differentiated teaching, learning, and assessment.
