The Effects of Formative Assessments in the Mathematics Classroom
Brant Breeding
Arkansas State University Abstract
Teachers use formative assessments in the classroom to help determine when and how to modify adapt lessons to better serve students. Some examples of formative assessments are questioning, discussions, exit/admit tickets, bell ringers, homework, and quizzes. Formative assessments can be graded, but they are typically ungraded and do not effect a student’s grade. When ungraded they are for the sole purpose of monitoring student progress. It is important to be able to determine whether or not students understand a concept. Do you need to back up, try a different approach, or is it time to move on? Formative assessments
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Some teachers only think of summative assessments that are used for reporting grades. When used this way, assessments do not lead to learning. If teachers will effectively use formative assessments to provide students with timely feedback and individualize instruction based on assessment feedback, it will result in enhanced learning (Brink & Bartz, 2017). In order for this to happen schools need to develop a culture of formative assessment. Teachers need to be trained in the use of formative assessments and administration will need to cultivate this change in culture (Brink & Bartz, …show more content…
One class will be taught with minimal formative assessments. I will plan formative assessments to be used in the other class. I will also keep data on the type of formative assessments used in order to determine which has the strongest effect on student learning. The students in the two classes are juniors and seniors who have qualified for College Algebra by scoring at least a 21 on the math portion of the ACT. There are 23 students in one class and 26 in the other. They are approximately evenly distributed according to gender. The study will take place over an entire semester, so I can record the outcomes of different types of formative assessments. At the end of the semester I will conduct a survey of the two classes asking questions that pertain to their perceptions and attitude toward the
Elwood, J. (2006). Formative assessment: possibilities, boundaries and limitations. Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy & Practice, 215-232, doi:10.1080/09695940600708653
The district is now making all teachers use an assessment tool called iReady. It is a website that assesses students in math and reading. They are first tested on a kindergarten through fifth grade range to find out what they know. Then the program takes that score and determines the right level for the child and they are tested again on the level. Once all students have been assessed the program orders the students from highest to lowest and by average grade level skill they are on: early second grade, middle second grade, late second grade or any other grade. The teacher uses those scores to create her reading groups, math groups and the students she will give extra assistance to. They haven’t officially established how many times and when they will do this iReady assessment but for now they are doing it once a week for forty five minutes. The test also flags if they spent too long or too little time on a question. The ones that spent less than 15 seconds per problem are to go back and do the assessment again.
Current educational policy and practice asserts that increased standardized student testing is the key to improving student learning and is the most appropriate means for holding individual schools and teachers accountable for student learning. Instead, it has become a tool solely for summarizing what students have learned and for ranking students and schools. The problem is standardized tests cannot provide the information about student achievement that teachers and students need day-to-day. Classroom assessment can provide this kind of information.
Formative Assessment- There are a number of formative assessment that are used. The first one is the list created on the first day after reading the passage along with student participation on sharing their findings the following day on day two. Student participation in day six when sharing their papers and the write up of a peer’s paper will be used for a formative assessment. All of these are graded on accuracy and completion and will be worth five points each.
Participation in external professional development, professional reading and shared professional discussion of formative assessment strategies and techniques. Development of physical resources to support the implementation of strategies.
Assessments have always been a tool for teachers to assess mastery and for a long time it was just to provide a grade and enter it into the grade book or report card. Through resources in and out of the course, there has been a breath of new life into the research on how to use assessments. They take many forms and fall within the summative or formative assessment category. Sloan (2016) addresses how formative assessments has traditionally been used by teachers to modify instruction, but when we focus on a classroom that is learner-centered “it becomes assessment for learning as opposed to assessment of learning” (slide 4). The fact is, the students are the ones that should be and are the ones using the data we collect through assessments, since it is our way of providing feedback in order
The purpose of formative assessment is to monitor where students are in their learning, what they need to learn next and which teaching strategies in future (Hodgson, 2010). Formative assessment takes place over a period of time and occurs while students are learning (Raban, 2010). There are many types of formative assessment that can be used, questioning, observation, checklists, brainstorming and card sorting (DET, n.d.). Questioning and observation were formative assessment strategies used throughout the explore and explain lessons. Questioning is an important strategy in eliciting students understanding of a topic, it is also a valuable tool that can be used to provide guidance, feedback and if higher order questions are used engage and motivate students (Overall & Sangster, 2006). It allows the teacher to provide feedback that is timely, individual, and effective which will lead to improved learning and performance (DET, n.d.). Observation is an important assessment strategy as it allows teachers to assess a diverse range of evidence (Maxwell, 2001). Observation also has the advantage of being able to assess students while they are naturally engaged in the learning, it is not external to or separate to the learning (Maxwell,
Kaftan, J. M., Buck, G. A., & Haack, A. (2006). Using Formative Assessments to Individualize Instruction and Promote Learning. Middle School Journal , 44-49.
Both work samples were given as a formative assessment on the same day. I placed students in various groups according to their abilities and provided a different instruction on coins. This shows my ability to use “multiple and appropriate types of assessment” for
This article sheds light on how important it is that tests contain “context-rich” tasks to better prompt student’s conceptual understanding. The physics education research community believe the curriculum and testing should build on prior knowledge. Physics education researchers are trying to encourage the use of formative testing; “formative assessment refers to a wide variety of methods that teachers use to conduct in-process evaluations of student comprehension, learning needs, and academic progress during a lesson, unit, or course. Formative assessments help teachers identify concepts that students are struggling to understand, skills they are having difficulty acquiring, or learning standards they have not yet achieved so that adjustments
Assessment is a process that aims at setting certain goals and standards that the teacher needs to meet during the teaching process and thereafter gather and analyze evidence from the feedback realized from the students to determine if the performance by the students matches the expected goals and standards. Evaluation is a process of collecting data and analyzing it in order to establish if there are any strengths and weaknesses in the strategies in the teaching process. I found the link between testing, assessing and teaching most relevant to me. This is because they all supplement and depend on each other. Good testing strategies assists the teacher assessing the usefulness of the strategies and consequently affects the approach the teacher has towards teaching. If the assessment shows the strategies are good, the teacher will keep the strategies and if they seem not to yield whatever goals he had, he will abandon them. I found the different types of assessments in this reading most enlightening. Often, people think that all assessments have the same goal but this perception is wrong as seen in this reading. Formal assessments use data to make conclusions from a test. For example, results from a test may make the teacher conclude that a student is reading below average in a certain area. Informal assessments concentrate on the content and are not data driven. The difference between the two types of assessment are important because they determine the purpose of assessment. Formative assessment is assessment that takes place as the unit of instruction goes on in order to monitor ongoing progress for example in the middle of a lesson. The teacher is able to realize immediately any weaknesses in the students. Summative assessmen...
Although somewhat vague compared to summative assessment, several key features help frame formative assessment. First, formative assessment happens while learning is taking place as opposed to at the end of content delivery. Rather, this is considered “assessment for learning,” (Chappuis, J., Stiggins, Chappuis, S., & Arter, 2012, pg. 5). The format is formal or informal, but the outcome in its use is an in-progress check of what students know and what students do not know. Chappuis, Stiggins, Chappuis, and Arter (2012) define formative assessment as, “Formal and informal processes teachers and students use to gather evidence for the purpose of improving learning,” (pg. 24). Second, this type of assessment is used to make instructional strategy adjustments. If student learning did not happen via one instructional method, the teacher must make the necessary accommodations to reteach the concept or skill. Next, it is not only used by teachers for feedback on instruction, but formative assessment is also used for providing timely, descriptive feedback to students and extends to allow for student self-assessment (Chappuis, J., Stiggins, Chappuis, S., & Arter, 2012; Popham, 2008). Formative assessment provides opportunity to provide specific feedback to students on where they are currently in their learning, and where they should be headed.
Through assessment students and teachers are able to determine the level of mastery a student has achieved with standards taught. Both formative and summative assessment should be purposeful and targeted to gain the most accurate data to drive further instruction (Ainsworth, 2010). While this syllabus does a good job of identifying the need for both formal and informal assessments, the way in which this is communicated does not provide enough detail for understanding. Simply listing assessment types does not give any insight into how these assessments fit in the learning process of this course. While some of the assessments mentioned could be common assessments chosen by the school or district to gain insight into the effectiveness of instruction, the inclusion of authentic assessments is most beneficial to students and demonstrates learning in a context closer to that of a work environment (Rovai, 2004). Unfortunately, this particular course, according to this syllabus, relies heavily on quizzes and traditional tests and essays to form the bulk of assessment opportunities. While other activities, such as formative assessments, journaling and discussions are mentioned as possible avenues for scoring, they are given a very low percentage of the overall grade. This shows that they are not valued for their ability to show progression and mastery. If this is indeed the case, this puts the students as a
In spite of the importance of assessment in education, few teachers receive proper training on how to design or analyze assessments. Due to this, when teachers are not provided with suitable assessments from their textbooks or instructional resources, teachers construct their own in an unsystematic manner. They create questions and essay prompts comparable to the ones that their teachers used, and they treat them as evaluations to administer when instructional activities are completed predominantly for allocating students' grades. In order to use assessments to improve instruction and student learning, teachers need to change their approach to assessments by making sure that they create sound assessments. To ensure that their assessments are sound they need include five basic indicators that can be used as steps to follow when creating assessments. The first of these indicators and the first step a teacher must take when creating a sound assessme...
Cauley, K.H. & McMillan, J.H. (2009). Formative assessment techniques to support student motivation and achievement. Clearing House, 83(1), 1-6.