Responsible Student Learning
Module Four

Dona Cruikshank - Course Designer
E-Mail:dona@ontarioeast.net

REFLECTIVE QUESTIONS (please respond via e-mail)

1. From student responses to the questions we asked you to pose (last month) on how students learn, what is one thing you learned about how students learn?

(If you have not yet posed the questions, ask your class, tomorrow, to write a sentence describing something they feel they’ve learned at anytime in a previous year (whether it was in school or outside of school) and how they learned it. Collect these student responses, read them, and then respond to the question posed above.)

2. Summarize, in one sentence, your opinion of how students learn.

3. As you reflect on how students learn, what does this suggest to you about what you need to keep in mind as you design classroom lessons?

Self-Assessment/Portfolios

“ If you want to appear accountable, test your students;
If you want to improve schools, teach teachers to assess their students;
If you want to maximize learning, teach students to assess themselves.”
- Stiggins, 1993


Introduction

In your last module activities, you and your students were asked to spend time thinking and writing or telling about how learning took place. You probably found that your students generated thoughtful and insightful responses to the questions posed. What they were doing was beginning to self-assess their learning, and their understanding about themselves and about the way they learn.

Traditionally in our schools, the assessment that has mattered has been almost exclusively that of teachers. As teachers, you design, conduct, interpret and communicate the results of your students’ learning, mostly independently. One group seriously overlooked in this assessment style is the student. Yet, we live in an environment where we are asking them to make evaluative decisions daily. To develop our students as lifelong learners, we must teach them to become their own self-monitors and evaluators. Our ultimate goal is self-assessment of their learning that will allow students to attain their set goals or to independently renew their efforts to reach these goals, and at the same time meet the standards that the district and state have set.

“We must constantly remind ourselves that the ultimate purpose of evaluation is to enable students to evaluate themselves. Educators may have been practicing this skill to the exclusion of learners; we need to shift part of that responsibility to students. Fostering students’ ability to direct and redirect themselves must be a major goal - or what is education for?” (Costa, 1989).

Your fourth module will look at this area of self-assessment with emphasis on the use of portfolios as a means of increasing students’ responsibility for their own learning.

Module Reading

Self Assessment/Portfolios

Self-assessment is a powerful formative assessment method which allows students to reflect and evaluate their own work and focus on the process they use to get to a final piece of work or grade. The aim of self-assessment is to have students assume more ownership for their learning.

To be successful, students should participate in setting the criteria for the evaluation of their work and in creating descriptions of what successful completion looks like. The assessment works best if used for activities that involve a process over a period of time such as a research project, a unit of work, or as simple as creating a piece of writing using the writing process. The criteria can be developed in groups or as a class exercise. The more that students are given opportunities to assess their own learning and their progress, and can understand and internalize criteria for assessing their own work, the less arbitrary assessment -and education- will seem to them.

(If you have done any work with rubrics, this would be a great way to use of this tool.

Portfolios and Self-Assessment

We must look at different ways to record this student success rather than the traditional ways of paper-and-pencil tests and snap quizzes that are simply snapshot photos of a student at that time and place in their learning.

To assess a student’s progress in a manner that provides a continuous display of evidence of learning, the portfolio is like a video recording of student work and progress toward learning. By using the criteria and descriptions that students have created themselves for their own work, the strengths and weaknesses, along with the next steps, are demonstrated in the student’s own words and confirmed by peers and/or teachers.

“A portfolio is a purposeful collection of student work that exhibits the student’s effort, progress, and achievements in one or more areas. The collection must include student participation in selecting the contents, the criteria for selection, the criteria for judging merit, and evidence of student self-reflection.” (Paulson, Paulson & Meyers, 1991)

Whether a portfolio is used for a brief unit of study or a year long record of student learning, it is a significant and powerful instrument for self-assessment. All portfolios require

criteria for including materials;
a table of contents with dates of insertion, revision or deletion;
methods for student reflection and self-assessment in the form of checklists, logs, questions;
regular review of the contents and addition or deletion of items;
an easily accessed central storage area.

Types of Portfolios

There are many different types of portfolios - some require more effort, or a different focus, than others. What type of portfolio you require, and how extensive it must be, depends on your purpose. Here is a description of three types of portfolios:

Showcase Portfolios - a collection of the student’s best work chosen by the student. A good way to get started using portfolios. This portfolio can be kept for a year or from year to year. It also may contain materials that provide evidence of the student’s successes outside the school. The portfolio contents may cross subject areas and contain many kinds of artifacts: writing, videos, memorabilia, projects, awards, etc. In making their selections, students are demonstrating what they believe is important about their learning and what they value. At various times, the portfolios should be reviewed and “culled” to keep the number of items to a manageable number.

Working Portfolios - a collection of student work in progress as well as finished material. This portfolio is usually related to one subject area and is a portfolio that is used daily by students as they move material to a finished stage. The pieces in the portfolio are related to objectives and show student progress towards those objectives. Most well-known of these types of portfolios would be in writing, visual arts and mathematics. They may also be used for a unit of study on a given theme. Students and teachers can use these portfolios to measure growth, strengths and weaknesses over a period of time and readjust future learning activities. Some of this material could become part of a showcase portfolio. This type of portfolio can also be useful to show parents a realistic picture of their student’s progress.

Assessment Portfolios - show what students have learned according to a given set of objectives. Students select items for their portfolio based on the content for the activity/unit and record their reasons why this selection demonstrates their achievement of the objectives. Class developed scoring rubrics can be used to help students specify what was to have been done and how well they did it. These portfolios can be used for a unit of work or for an entire year. They can cover one or more subject areas. The portfolio can be used by both student and teacher to discuss attainment of course objectives and serve as both diagnostic and formative assessment.

   Getting Started
  • 1. Develop a Purpose or Focus
      a. Type of portfolio and reasons for use
      b. General curricular focus
      c. Clearly defined objectives arrived at jointly by teacher and students
      d. An emphasis on student ownership
  • 2. Decide What to Collect
      a. What will be collected? Required items, optional items
      b. Discuss a range of possibilities of items: research project, essay, photos, test results, video, science log, rating scales
  • 3. Decide on Criteria for Assessing Portfolios
      a. Will this portfolio have criteria for assessment?
      b. Create criteria for success with students using actual work. What does a good performance look like? What does a poor one/incomplete one look like?
      c. Create criteria for assessing the portfolio as a whole. Who decides? Quality of pieces, quantity, variety, growth in performance, student self-assessment
      d. Include mechanisms for student self-reflection
  • 4. Decide How to Collect the Information
      a. Who will select the specific samples for the portfolio?
      b. Schedule times for updating contents, reflecting on selections and meeting of criteria for success.
      c. Develop a table of contents for the portfolio and date material when submitted.
      d. Provide information about the selection: first draft, significance, removal, etc.
      e. Decide what will be used for the portfolio: file folder, scrapbooks, boxes, disk, etc.
  • 5. Decide How to Store the Portfolios
      a. Find a location easily accessed by students but relatively secure
      b. Decide who will have access to the portfolios
      c. Decide what happens to the portfolios at the end of the unit, term, year.
  • 6. Model Self-assessment with your students by creating your own portfolio for this course.

Activity for Module 4

Have your students start to design a portfolio within the next few weeks.

a.. Be sure the portfolio meets the five objectives listed in this article.

b. Be sure the portfolio addresses the six steps listed under “Getting Started”.

If you have never done a portfolio before, keep it simple. Relate it to something your students will be learning in the next few weeks.

If you are already using portfolios, compare their design and usage to the information above. Modify and/or add where necessary.

Additional Reading and Resources:

To read how one teacher got started with portfolios, click on the link below:
http://teacher.scholastic.com/professional/assessment/studentstandards.htm

To explore electronic portfolios, check out this site:
http://ericir.syr.edu/ithome/digests/portfolio.html

Course Product

One component of each internet course is the creation of a course product. When you started this course you were asked to consider what that product might be that would demonstrate an authentic presentation of your learning in this course. Some suggestions were: cd rom, portfolio, video, journal, audiotape, visual display, etc. The product should be completed by April 28 and brought with you to the final session for Roll-Out teachers on April 30, May 1, or May 2. PGP and Pilot teachers should aim for the same completion date.

By the end of this January, you should have a fairly good idea of what that product will be. When you have some idea of your product, please email Don Mesibov or myself a brief description. Use the email link at the top of the Module.

Note: If your idea for a final product changes, that's OK, but please indicate what you are currently.

Additional Resources

provided by: Tara A. Demers - "4" Project

Brooks, J. G., & Brooks, M. G. (1993). Considering the possibilities. In search of understanding: The case for constructivist classrooms (15-22). Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

McCaslin, M., & Good, T. L. (1993). Classroom management and motivated student learning. In Tomlinson, T. M., Motivating students to learn: Overcoming barriers to high achievement (pp. 245-261). Berkeley, CA: McCutchan Publishing Corporation.

Treffinger, D. (1978). Guidelines for encouraging independence and self-direction among gifted students. Journal of Creative Behavior, 12(1), 14-20.

Understanding Learning Styles / Multiple Intelligences

Gardner, H. (1997). Reflections on multiple intelligences: Myths and messages. Phi Delta Kappan, 78(5), 200-207.

Tomlinson, C. A. (1999). What is a differentiated classroom?. The Differentiated Classroom (pp. 1-8). Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Tomlinson, C. A. (1999). Elements of differentiation. The Differentiated Classroom (pp. 9-16). Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Tomlinson, C. A. (1999). Rethinking how we do school-and for whom. The Differentiated Classroom (pp. 17-24). Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Tomlinson, C. A. (1999). Learning environments that support differentiated instruction. The Differentiated Classroom (pp. 25-35). Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Wolffe, R., Robinson, H., & Grant, J. M. (1998). Creating multiple procedures from multiple intelligences. Catalyst for Change, 28(1), 15-16.