I wanted to share the assessment that I am giving my students tomorrow.  This is what I would consider a "week 1" assessment for those of you that are familiar with my Two Week Model.  I am basically checking in to see if they have gotten the basics needed to continue towards are bigger communicative goal for next week. 

This week, the goal was to be able to identify the correct person based on their description (in Spanish).  In order to do that, we needed to be familiar with a variety of adjectives and know how to match them to the people or things they describe.  This is a Spanish 2 class, so they are theoretically familiar with some adjectives already from Spanish 1.  The words we are studying now are a combination of some of the more important or common adjectives from Spanish 1 with new words to describe personality traits and nationalities added for Spanish 2.

Next week, we will delve a bit deeper into this material as the focus becomes being able to describe yourself and others in both writing and speaking.  This Friday's assessment will allow me to see what I need to really focus on next week to get them ready to meet this goal. 

Here is the assessment:

I wanted to take a moment to answer some of the questions that readers have had about my strategy of assessing and reassessing students as discussed in a former blog post.

1. What kind of homework do you assign and how often? Are the assignments similar to the assessments? Do you go over it during class time? Do you check to see if they did it at all or do the students that didn't do it just sit there if you do go over it?

I typically assign homework on Tuesday and Thursday nights.  I keep the days consistent as I have found that this improves the rate of completion when it is not a class (like math) where there is homework each night.  The homework I assign should take a student between 10-15 minutes to complete and is usually a reinforcement of a weak point they have demonstrated in class performance.  As a result, the type of assignments vary greatly, but may include work with conjugation, memory cues for vocabulary, independent sentence creation or a short writing exercise, or an extension activity. 

The next day in class I go from student to student looking for the homework and I do a quick look through.  Specifically, I am looking for common errors, incomplete sections, or anything fishy.  I am able to immediately comment on these situations and honestly, we know who we have to keep our eye on pretty quickly.  For many students, the fear that drives them to complete homework in the first place is not necessarily the loss of points but the fear of being confronted for not doing it.  Simply having students pass in work or put it in a tray or basket greatly reduces their chance of being confronted, and the fear attached.  This is why I personally go to each student.  It takes less than 5 minutes and students can be involved working on another assigned task as you walk around.  Don't get me wrong, I am not a scary teacher by any means, but they do know that I will know if they didn't complete something and that I will confront them about it.  This keeps most of them honest.

Following my walk-around, I do usually review a part of the homework.  If a large number of students didn't "get" a section, I will review that.  I always collect the homework despite the fact that it does not earn the students any points.  Mentally, this makes them feel as if I am going to scour their paper for errors when I go home that evening. In reality, most of that homework goes straight to the recycling bin.

2. What happens to a student that has reached the grade he or she wants but doesn't want to complete an independent study project?

I have many students who meet the expectations of the course and are just fine with that.  They do not have the intrinsic motivation to design and complete independent study lessons.  There are always enough activities planned for class that the students who are happy with the status quo have plenty to do.  If they want to keep working on something they have already mastered, that is up to them.  I can not require more than what is expected, though I can encourage it - and some will take advantage.  This year I had a group pf boys that played on a summer soccer league together and their coach was Hispanic.  Completely on their own time, they designed a lesson for themselves where they learned the field positions and verbs specific to the game of soccer.  They wanted to use them this summer during games so that players from other teams wouldn't know what was going on but they and their coach would.  I also had a girl who went on a missions trip to Mexico and missed a week of school.  She designed a unit for herself around asking questions about school and life to the girl she would be spending the week with. 

3. What sort of assessments do you give? Are they pencil and paper? Do you focus on all four skills at once or individually? How long are your assessments usually?  What do you do to make a test "cheat proof"?

The type of assessment depends on the week as discussed in this former blog post about my two-week model.  Week 1 tests will focus on reading skills (vocabulary focus), listening skills (vocabulary focus), and grammar knowledge (endings, conjugation process).  While these tests may not be as "cheat proof" as Week 2 tests, they are in large part focused on memorization, so they don't need to be.  The only way a student can cheat is by memorizing the answers (word definitions and grammar endings) - which is exactly what I want them to do in the first place.  It is easy for me to make another form of the test with the questions in a slightly different order which is typically what I will be for re-takes of these quizzes.  Week 2 tests focus on production of the language in either speaking or writing.  Typically, I assess speaking on oral presentations and the week to week tests focus more on writing simply due to the need to be more efficient.  They usually involve a picture or task to write about.  I keep them very open ended so that there really is no way to cheat since no two students would logically have the same answer.  My typical assessment is 1 page, front and back.

5. How do you go about talking to the students who did better on the assessment than they have been doing in class?

Typically, I will call students up to my desk when the rest of the class is working independently and tell them what I observed on their last test; "You are really improving", "You have been having trouble", etc.  I then usually ask one of two questions; What did you do differently that really helped you to understand this?  or What could I have done to help you understand this better?  Usually you can tell from the students reaction whether the effort and test grade were genuine.  Then I will pick out a couple of questions and ask them to describe to me what they did or what their thought process was.  At that point, it's a judgement call.  Again, the fact that they know they will be confronted is a big deterrent - if they were dishonest and suspect I am on to them, which is what being confronted indicates, they will not likely be again.

6. Do you keep data on the assessments? If so, what sort do you keep? My district is heavily into the whole data fad, so in order to propose something like this, there would need to be a data component.

Our district has also bought into the whole "data craze".  I found a great app called Zipgrade which really helps with the quick and easy collection of data as I discussed in a former blog post.  My Week 1 quizzes, which are more objective in nature, are frequently a multiple choice format done using Zipgrade.  This allows me to quickly identify areas of strength and weakness.  I can shape my instruction for Week 2 based on what I learn from the assessment at the end of Week 1.  Another great way to collect "data", though it's a bit more labor intensive is to keep a Linguafolio which is a collection of their work that can demonstrate growth over a longer period of time (semester, year).  I am adding this feature next year, so stay tuned!

7. If a student is absent the day of the assessment, do you basically just have them do it when they get back even if they missed the teaching of the material?

How quickly you expect absent students to take the assessment is up to you.  The way I see it, since on the day of the assessment we are assessing things they already learned through the beginning of the week, when the student was present, they should be ready to take it immediately.  However, I do not want them to miss new instruction and practice by using class time to take a missed test.  I typically make appointments with them outside of normal class time.  If this is not possible, they take both the old and new assessments the next Friday.  If the student missed the teaching of the material, I still have them take the assessment and then we sit down with it and see exactly what information they are missing.  That test then becomes a guide that shows the student what they have yet to master and they may re-take it once they have made up the missed work on their own time.

8. When do you have them do these retakes? After school? During class?

Every Friday students are taking an assessment of some sort.  Following the scheduled assessment is an independent activity.  This allows for a quiet testing environment for those who take longer and check their work.  It also allows students to re-take tests from previous weeks in lieu of doing the independent assignment which can easily be taken home to complete.  We also have a 30 minute enrichment period each day at our school during which time students may see teachers for extra help.  Most of the students at our school rely on bus transportation since they are too young to drive (I taught 9th grade this year in a jr. high setting).  In former years, while teaching high school, I allowed after school time, but most students preferred to use the time after the test on Fridays.

9. Do you do any assessments using projects? I am a huge proponent of projects and wonder how they fit into your model.

Absolutely, I have students do some sort of speaking project/assessment once per quarter.  Since a quarter is 9 weeks long and I typically teach using the Week 1/Week 2 model that I mentioned earlier, that means that I have an extra week leftover to fill out the quarter (3 - 2 Week Lessons, 1 - 3 Week Lesson).  I attach that extra week onto the topic of my choice which allows for 2-3 extra days to prepare for a project and 2 days or so to present.  Projects are also great examples of things that can be entered into a Linguafolio.  Personally, I like to keep them speaking-based since I feel that is the skill area that is most lacking in my other assessments, but any project you might like to do would fit into this format.

It's finally here!  Final Exam Week!  This week may be dreaded by students, but it is LOVED by teachers.  (You mean I actually will have time to grade papers DURING the school day?). 

Here are some of my favorite final exam tips and tricks:

1.  Bring in a pocket shoe organizer and make all students turn their phones off and place them in a pocket prior to the exam.

2.  Create simple "blockers" by stapling two cheap pocket folders together (I get mine in the summer when Staples and Office Max have sales where they are only a penny, they usually last all year).

3.  Sit BEHIND your students when they are taking their exams.  They won't be able to see if you're watching them or not unless they turn around (which would be far too obvious), so anyone who intended to cheat will be horribly paranoid the whole time and hopefully won't risk it.

4.  Have something for students to do if they finish early.  I usually create a end of the year survey that they can complete.  They give me some valuable feedback but are easy enough to complete that most kids will do it.  Another idea is a drawing competition.  I randomly pick a student from the class, a place, and a verb and have them draw the funniest scene they can (school appropriate of course).  I display them on the board after the test.

5.  Give your students a proper goodbye!  You have just spent a whole school year together (which is a long time in teenage years) - make sure your students know that you wish them luck in the future and that you enjoyed your year with them (even if they were pains in the butt at times and made you consider an early retirement).

Here are links to my Final Exam products and Study Guides if you need to save time this Final Exam season:

There is no doubt, in most teacher's minds, that legislators and administrators continue to place an ever-increasing amount of responsibility for students success on the teacher.  Several years ago when I began hearing the word "intervention" more than I heard the word "teaching", my ears perked up and my wheels started turning.  I needed to find a way to help my students own and take responsibility for the learning so that I could spend time focusing on sound teaching practices rather than endlessly begging them to listen, do their homework, put away their cell phones, and pay attention.

I brought up the idea to my team of language teachers of allowing students to re-take tests.  I felt that maybe, if students felt an increased sense of control over their ability to achieve success, that along with that might come increased responsibility.  My idea met with a great deal of criticism, as I expected and welcomed.  My colleagues main concerns were as follows:
1.  If students know they can re-take a test, they will not study in the first place
2.  You will be stuck grading so many additional papers with all of the retakes
3.  You will have to make too many different forms of each test to keep students from memorizing the answers

I listed to everything they had to say, and I went ahead with my idea anyway - not because I wanted to be some sort of rogue, but because I needed to see for myself how my students would react.  I prepared to begin the next school year, new policy in place, by changing my whole assessment structure.  This is what I did:

1.  100% of the points towards the students grade comes from assessments, 0 points will be earned through homework, participation, or classwork
2.  No extra credit will be given unless you are currently earning a 100% in the class and propose & complete an independent study unit
3.  Assessments will occur each week and may be re-taken up until the deadline date for the quarter in which they occur for full credit and replacement of the former grade.  The entire test must be re-taken.  Only correcting missed questions is not an option.

Five years later, I still follow these policies because I have seen the difference they make for the majority of my students.  Do I still have problems with students who have poor attendance, lack motivation, and don't complete homework?  Sure I do, but the number of those students have decreased - not increased.  Here are the differences I have seen in my classroom as a direct result of these policies:

1.  Parents & Administrators have shifted the responsibility of the students grade onto the students as they have become aware of their ability to retake tests
2.  High flyers are able to master the current material and take responsibility for "extra" learning through the proposal and completion of independent study units (differentiation) on any topic of interest
3.  Middle of the road students who are willing to put in the effort have become the high-flyers.  I have many students that come to see me every week to work and be reassessed on topics that they at first had trouble understanding.  Slowly, gaps from the current year and previous years are filled in through their hard work.  By the second semester they do not need to re-take tests because they are getting it the first time.
4.  Low achieving students try for longer and do not give up as easily as in the past.  They do not reach that point where it is mathematically impossible to pass the course as their grade is constantly in flux.  Some of them still fail or give up, but a greater number of them will seek help or re-attempt assessments.  I have a student that has not passed a class since the 6th grade (he is currently a 9th grader), misses school at least 3 days a week, and HE has shown up for help and re-assessment.
5.  Completion of homework and class activities is the means, not the end.  Students don't complete (or copy) homework for the sake of having it done, but rather for the sake of practicing and getting feedback on the path to the larger goal (the assessment).  It is important to note that I have seen no increase in the number of students not completing homework or participating in class as a result of this.  Students who try the "no homework" approach quickly realize that their grade suffers anyway as they are unable to meet the goals measured by the assessment.
6.  No more counting how many days a student was absent or calculating how many days they get to make up tests.  All students take the test on the day it was given.  Since the only real deadline is the end of the grading period, students with recent absences review their original test with me then retake the test after they have had time to grow more comfortable with the material.
7.  I have not had to create multiple forms of tests, but rather have focused on providing "cheat proof" tests that students can't memorize (unless memorization is the whole point and then they're doing what I want them to do anyway!).  If a student ever performs significantly better on the test than I have seen them perform in class, they come and have a test review with me where we discuss strategies they used to learn and practice the material and I can probe more deeply.
8.  Even though I do end up grading more tests, I spend less time entering "gimme" points for participation, classwork, and homework.  Overall, the amount of time I spend grading has not increased, only redistributed.

I know not everyone is lucky enough to work in a school that grants it's teachers the same degree of autonomy as mine does, but never the less, I think this is something that would be beneficial to discuss or consider.  After all, the purpose of a grade is to quantify a students knowledge, understanding, and skills.  Before I switched to this system, a decent portion of my students grades reflected their effort, and that's all.  Now I can look at my students grades and see exactly what skills they are strong in and what skills they struggle with.  I can differentiate, group, and intervene more effectively because their grade tells the story of what they are able to do, not how many papers they turned in or how many times they raised their hand.  It has helped me, and more importantly, them. 

**UPDATE**

I just found this great form on which students can request a retake.  I don't like the added paperwork, but the idea is great.  It really requires students to show that they have taken responsibility for improved learning.  I may toy around with this idea in my classroom next school year, but for now I wanted to provide the link for those of you who do not shy away from more papers as much as I do!

Request to Retest Form