Welcome toScience Alliance!

September 27, 2007

Lexington, KY

Science Alliance is supported through Math and Science Partnership (MSP) funds

administered by the Kentucky Department of Education

Group Norms

• Start and end on time• Put cell phones on silent• Be respectful of all comments• Everyone participates• Exercise the rule of “two feet”• Come prepared for the meeting• Keep side conversations to a minimum

Today’s Agenda

• Review example unit using Indicators of Quality tool

• Begin development of Stage 1 for 2007-08 Unit

• Distinguish between assessment OF learning and assessment FOR learning

• Examine some practical examples of classroom formative assessment for instructional implications

Reviewing a Unit of Study using 10 Quality Indicators

• We do…think aloud using 10 Quality Indicators to review a unit titled Structure and Function and determine if there is presence of these indicators in the unit and what feedback to provide to the developers.

You do… Review a Unit of Study

• Using the unit of study example on constructive and destructive forces work in pairs at your table to review the unit in light of the quality indicators and then provide feedback to the developers based on that analysis.

Feedback

• What feedback would we want to provide the design team?

Take Home Message

• High quality units of study require careful design. All parts need to be congruent.

• Careful design and identification of the goals, understandings, assessment, and learning plan before instruction begins can result in student understanding. This careful design and planning can also provide the teacher information to use to help all students reach understanding of targets.

This I Believe: Science Nourishes the Mind and Soul

Brian Greene, Professor of Physics & Mathematics, Columbia University

…just as our experience playing baseball is enormously richer if we know the rules of the game, the better we understand the universe’s rules – the

laws of physics – the more deeply we can appreciate our lives within it.

I believe this because I’ve seen it.

I’ve seen children’s eyes light up when I tell them about black holes and the big bang. I’ve received letters from young soldiers in Iraq telling me how reading popular accounts of relativity and quantum physics has provided them hope that there is something larger, something universal that binds us together.

Which is why I am distressed when I meet students who approach science and math with drudgery. I know it doesn’t have to be that way.

But when science is presented as a collection of facts that need to be memorized, when math is taught as a series of abstract calculations without revealing its power to unravel the mysteries of the universe, it can all seem pointless and boring.

Even more troubling, I’ve encountered students who’ve been told they don’t have the capacity to grasp math and science.

These are lost opportunities.

I believe we owe our young an education that captures the exhilarating drama of science.

I believe the process of going from confusion to understanding is a precious, even emotional experience that can be the foundation of self-confidence…

I believe that the wonder of discovery can lift the spirit like Brahms’ Third Symphony.

I believe that the breathtaking ideas of science can nourish not only the mind but also the soul.

Recurring Q’s for a teacher who worries about learning

• How do you know when they “got it”? Why don’t they get it? What is and isn’t evidence of understanding?

• How can I promote understanding more by design (than by good fortune, native ability)?

• How do we move beyond designing merely interesting activities or textbook “coverage”?

• What is the relation between local design work and state ‘audits’ of achievement?

3 Big Ideas About Understanding

• Understanding: a wise use of knowledge and skill, on one’s own – effective “transfer”

• Understandings are student inferences, designed for, not just more “knowledge”

• Without understanding:– Amnesia– Misunderstanding– Rigid knowledge, no transfer

Summary of Good Design

• Clear goals and explicit performance requirements• Many models and modeling provided• A genuine challenge/problem frames work that stretches you – real

meaningful work, with meaningful purpose/audience/situation• Trial and error, reflection and adjustment are expected and

encouraged and designed in to the learning plan• The teacher is more of a facilitator, coach• Transparency-clarity about the big picture and how current work

relates to it• There is a safe, supportive environment for risk-taking, giving and

getting feedback• Variety, choice, and attention to differences are designed in to all

work• A good mix of group/solo work, collaboration/competition designed in• Active, immersion, multi-sensory experience – not too verbal

UbD Stages

• Stage 1 – Desired Results– Organizer/Hook– Specific PoS and CCA– Essential Questions– Misconceptions– Critical Vocabulary

• Stage 2 – Acceptable Evidence– Formative Assessments– Summative Assessments

• Stage 3 – Learning Plan– Learning Activities

The work is iterative, non-linear

• It doesn’t matter where you begin or how you proceed – as long as the design ends up with all the elements aligned.

Overarching understandings

Knowledge and skill to be acquired

Essential Questions

Organizer/Hook

• Provides meaningful purpose and direction for learning– Life issue– Genuine problem– Question– Challenge– Mystery

• Relevant to students• 30 minutes – brainstorm

ideas for your hook and get feedback from your group

PoS and CCA Identified

• Manageable number of appropriate standards (PoS Understandings, Skills/concepts, and CCA v 4.1) are identified

• Clearly connected to instruction and assessment• 20 minutes – using your CTS and combined

document, make sure you’ve identified the standards the unit will address through assessment and learning experiences (not just “touch” upon) and get feedback from your group

Essential Questions

• Complex and engaging – maybe arguable, debatable – yet in student friendly language

• Answers must be ‘invented’ or ‘constructed’ – not merely recalled or ‘looked up’

• Focuses the learning plan• Open ended in order to

promote inquiry, higher order thinking

• Promote the seeking of evidence

• EQ resources– UbD workbook, pgs.

89-106– UbD book, Ch. 5, pgs.

105 - 125

• 60 minutes – brainstorm possible essential questions and get feedback from your group

• “The art of holding interest lies in “raising questions and delaying the answers…”

– D. Lodge, The Art of Fiction

Misconceptions

• Noted misconceptions are reflected in essential questions, lesson targets/objectives, and/or assessments

• Sources of information concerning misconceptions (see your CTS; Benchmarks, Ch. 15 pgs. 327-377; Making Sense of Secondary Science; Atlas; ‘Probe’ books)

• 30 minutes – review the misconceptions identified from your CTS, revise to include those most relevant to the identified standards, get feedback from your group

Critical Vocabulary

• Connected to the standards• 10-12 words per unit• Critical for transfer vs. volume• Success on unit assessment requires the critical

vocabulary• Best/research-based instructional strategies are

used to develop vocabulary• 30 minutes – identify the critical vocabulary

from the standards and misconception information, get feedback from your group

An Excellent Assessment System

Personal Reflection

• In your notebook, please take a moment to think, reflect, and answer this question:

WHY DO YOU ASSESS?

• Take a few minutes to discuss your answers with others at your table.

The perfect assessment system relies on a variety of assessments

to provide timely and understandable information to

those who need it to inform instructional decisions that maximize student success.

THE FLAWS

Mistaken beliefs about:

Assessment and Motivation

Crucial Decision Makers

New Mission, New Beliefs

• As you view the DVD, keep your considerations about assessment and assessment practices in mind.

• Note any key points that Rick Stiggins makes, where relevant, on the organizer.

• Complete Table 2.1 as you view the DVD.

After Viewing

• Summarization strategy:– Write the ONE word that summarizes the topic in the

DVD (assessment FOR learning).– Explain why you chose that word.– Share your choice with one person at your table.– Defend your choice if it differs from his/her choice.– List your word(s) on your table’s designated chart.

OVERVIEW

Assessment OF

Learning (AOL)

Assessment For Learning (AFL)

Reason Report achievement status

Promote more learning

To Inform Others about students

Students about themselves

Focus Achievement standards

Achievement targets that underpin standards

Assessment OF Learning

Assessment FOR

Learning

Teacher’s Role

Follow test administration procedures

Change standards into classroom targets, inform students, involve students

Student’s Role

Strive for highest score/avoid failure

Strive to see the targets, use results, learn to do better

Primary Motivator

Promise of reward, fear of punishment

Joy and expectation of success

OVERVIEW

Crucial Distinction

Assessment OF Learning:

How much have students learned as of a particular point in time?

Assessment FOR Learning:

How can we use assessment to help students learn more?

ANALOGIES

Working with a partner, complete the following analogies:

• AOL is like _____________________________________________ because ______________________________________________.

• AFL is like______________________________________________ because ______________________________________________.

Formative Assessment in Action:9th Grade Exit Slips

• Background: Physical Science class that meets every other day

• Question: WHAT DO I KNOW ABOUT SPEED, VELOCITY AND ACCELERATION?

• Task: Based on the cards that you have, what do students know and what do they need more help with?

Now what?

• Based on the information from the exit slips….– What do students seem to know?– What do students seem to have problems

with?– What should the teacher’s next steps in

instruction be?

Example 27th Grade Exit Slips

• Background: Meets every day for 55 minutes.

• Question: What would the effect be on a deer population if a new herbivore was introduced to the deer’s habitat?

• Task: Based on the cards that you have, what do students know and what do they need more help with?

Now what?

• Based on the information from the exit slips….– What do students seem to know?– What do students seem to have problems

with?– What should the teacher’s next steps in

instruction be?

Assessment is REALLY formative when:

• Its purpose is to support—not merely monitor--learning

• It points up the scaffolding

• It provides descriptive feedback

• It builds self-confidence, self-efficacy

• It’s “Assessment FOR Learning”.

We ASSESS to:• INFORM instructional decisions

• ENCOURAGE students to try to learn

Research-based Strategies

5 Research-based strategies that significantly improve student learning:• Sharing criteria (clear learning targets with

success criteria)• Questioning• Feedback• Peer assessment• Self-assessment

Today’s Agenda

Reviewed example unit using Indicators of Quality tool

Began development of Stage 1 for 2007-08 Unit

Distinguished between assessment OF learning and assessment FOR learning

Examined some practical examples of classroom formative assessment for instructional implications

Next Meeting

• October 25th

• Continue Stage 1 development

• Deconstruct identified standards

• Begin Transfer Task development

• Continue with practical examples of how to use formative strategies and results to inform instruction.