Standard+II

Teachers design, develop, and evaluate authentic learning experiences and assessments incorporating contemporary tools and resources to maximize content learning in context and to develop the knowledge, skills, and attitudes identified in the NETS for students. Teachers:
 * . Design and Develop Digital-Age Learning Experiences and Assessments **
 * a. ** design or adapt relevant learning experiences that incorporate digital tools and resources to promote student learning and creativity
 * b. ** develop technology-enriched learning environments that enable all students to pursue their individual curiosities and become active participants in setting their own educational goals, managing their own learning, and assessing their own progress
 * c. ** customize and personalize learning activities to address students' diverse learning styles, working strategies, and abilities using digital tools and resources
 * d. ** provide students with multiple and varied formative and summative assessments aligned with content and technology standards and use resulting data to inform learning and teaching

1a. List at least 2 ways in which you could improve how you assess and evaluate student learning.**
 * 1. List ways in which you assess and evaluate student learning.


 * __The first way__ in which I assess and evaluate student learning is through __//summative//__ assessments.**


 * **I administer __//QUIZZES, UNIT EXAMS, WEEKLY SPELLING TESTS, AND WEEKLY READING COMPREHENSION TESTS.//__**
 * **I administer the __//COGAT//__ to assess my second grade students, which is a National IQ Test.**
 * **Three times a year I test students for Oral Reading Fluency, Re-tell Ability, and Word Usage/Vocabulary through the use of __//DIBELS.//__ I report these scores and identify students who need additional assistance in reaching the benchmark goals for second grade at the various times of year.**
 * **I administer __//DISTRICT WIDE WRITING ASSESSMENTS//__ along with rubrics three times each year. The final writing assessment if placed in a burgundy cumulative folder and is passed on to the next grade level.**
 * **I assess my student writing using a rubric outlining the __//SIX TRAITS OF WRITING.//__ I use this for most of my student writing assignments.**
 * **I administer __//AIMSWEB MATH CONCEPTS AND SKILLS//__ tests three times a year. These are cumulative exams designed to assess a student's progress toward the end of second grade standards and expectations.**
 * **I administer __//INDIVIDUAL READING ASSESSMENTS//__ three times a year. These are district-wide and district designed tests, which assess a student's comprehension skills.**


 * __The second way__ in which I assess and evaluate student learning is through __//formative//__ assessments. These types of assessments are more numerous and much more frequent than the summative assessments I use.**


 * **First, I assess my students' reading progress through __//DIBELS//__. Once a month, I am required to use an approved __//DIBELS//__ reading and time students for one minute. These scores are recorded. Then during a grade level meeting with the principal and second grade teachers and support staff, we discuss the results and decide which students are Benchmark, which are Strategic and which students are Intensive (Title 1.) We are assigned to work more intensively with the Strategic and Intensive students and design and implement strategies to improve their oral reading fluency.**

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 * **Second, I use an __//AIMSWEB//__ form of __//MAD MINUTES//__ to continually assess my students' mastery of math facts. This is part of their AM work. This is individualized per student depending on their progress in mastery. Some students will be in addition, others in subtraction, and by the third marking period, some students will be in multiplication. Students may move onto a new set of facts after they have successfully answered facts I ask in an** //__**INDIVIDUAL ORAL EXAMINATION.**__// **Students are tasked to work only on facts they have not memorized. While this method is time-consuming on ny part, it has proven to be very effective. Without parental involvement and assistance in the home, this has become a necessary block of scheduling. This year, by the end of the third marking period, I had an unprecedented 17 of 19 students working on memorization of their multiplication facts.**
 * **Third, I use** **__//SUCCESS MAKER,//__ which is a math software tutoring program used District Wide to assess student progress in grade level skills and tutor students in unfamiliar skills. I have various clubs in Success Maker which is not specifically what the program was designed to do. However, I believe in fun-loving gentle competition and it works! At the beginning of the year, most of my students placed in the first grade curriculum. Now I have 2 students in the race for 600...6th grade math! I also have 6 students in the race for 500...5th grade math, and 9 performing in third grade math skills in the race to 400. What is so effective about Success Maker is that the program keeps track of skills mastered, time spent on each skill, and skills not mastered that need teacher intervention. There are many reports that I can print out regarding individual student and classroom success and needs. Success Maker results are included in student report cards and are used as statistics to determine a need for enrichment and/or learning support.**


 * **Fourth, I use //__EVERYDAY MATH MATH BOXES,__ as well as other __ONGOING ASSESSMENTS__// connected with this program. This program is highly scripted and there is little room for creativity or variation in the assessments used. Math boxes are done daily and corrected individually by me. Each student receives __//INDIVIDUAL COUNSELING//__ regarding errors or confusion for all concepts on the Math Boxes Page. Everyday math has __//UNIT WRITTEN ASSESSMENTS or PROGRESS CHECKS//__, a __//MID-YEAR//__ __//ASSESSMENT//__, and an __//END-OF-YEAR ASSESSMENT//__ as well. I believe the __//END-OF-YEAR//__ __//ASSESSMENTS//__ are used as my report card!**


 * **Another __//FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT//__ I use is //__INFORMING INSTRUCTION,__// This is used everyday when students are asked to complete an assignment at their seats either individually, with a collaborative partner, or a in a small group. As I walk around observing, I correct errors as the student is working on the assignment. I also ask and answer questions of individuals or groups and perform __//ORAL ASSESSMENTS//__ as they continue working. In this way, I can fix misconceptions and avoid future errors on the spot.**


 * **Additionally, I use __//SELF ASSESSMENTS.//__** **I allow students to evaluate their own understanding and mastery of the concepts presented in a unit. There is a form for math, which students complete and check off as to what level of undetstanding they have. 1. I can do this by myself and explain how to do it; 2. I can do this by myself; 3. I can do this with help. In other areas, I use a scoring sheet with questions of higher-order, which will prove an understanding of the material presented.**


 * **I also use __//INTERVIEWS//__, I ask students to explain what they learned, and assess their strengths and weaknesses and decide how to differentiate in order to address each individual student's needs.**


 * **Another assessment tool I use is __//OBSERVATION//__. This is especially useful when students are engaged in activities in pairs or small groups. I not only observe their progress at mastery of the concepts, experiment, or theory being studied. I also observe their interactions with other students and group members. This helps the class to operate in a more efficient way as students are kept on task and misbehaviors are addressed immediately. When students are working individually, I can easily stop at a student's desk, observe their progress, and then correct misconceptions and mistakes or offer praise for the attempt or the mastery.**


 * **Along with this, I use //__SLATE ASSESSMENTS.__// These assessments are used mostly during math, where a quick answer to an algorithm is desired, or during a language arts work work block where suffixes and prefixes are added or when verb tenses or nouns are changed in some way.**


 * **I am a huge proponent of __//AR or ACCELERATED READER//__ for my students. This is software whereby students check out ARTY books from the library each week. Students read these books and then log onto the AR program. The program is designed to check their comprehension of the story by allowing them to take quizzes. The program also grades the results and keeps track of a student's points received. The librarian and I assisted students in setting goals for points and then continued throughout the school year to chart their progress toward the goals. Both the library and I had awards and prizes for students who acheived their goals and for those who went beyond what was expected.**


 * **Finally, I use __//HOMEWORK//__ as a formative assessment. While I do not assign grades to homework and it is not entered as a grade on the report card, I feel it is a very valuable assessment. First, the students get to practice the skills they learned in class that day or week and continue to work toward mastery. Second, in the event that parents do assist, most are capable of helping to re-teach a second-grade skill, reinforce what I have taught or correct a misconception the child may have formed. Third, I correct homework every day. After I have checked it, I call each student up and praise them. At the same time, I take the opportunity to __//INTERVIEW//__ them and to __//ORALLY ASSESS//__ their understanding and to use __//INFORMING INSTRUCTION//__ to correct any errors they may have made. Even if the errors are simple carelessness, it is a great time to discuss how to work more carefully, to show their work, or to double check their work. My final reason is so that parents know which skills we are emphasizing each week and can continue to monitor their child's progress.**


 * There are many ways that I could improve how I assess and evaluate student learning.**
 * **First, I plan to use many more rubrics. While I have used several this year for large-scale projects, they were so sporadic, the students did not get comfortable with them. It is my intention to use rubrics more frequently and in place of other more conventional summative assessments. With my newfound knowledge about tools for rubrics found on the Internet, I will not worry as much about the content or the time involved in developing them. I know that with the advent of LFS in my classroom, I will be developing many more projects and research assignments which will lend themselves to higher order thinking and rubric usage.**


 * **I also plan to utilize portfolios that I have not used in the past. I observed another teacher using portfolios this year, and I realized that the students and parents were thrilled to have the student work in a collection which was organized, catalogued, assessed, and which would remain a keepsake for many years to come. I now know that they help children to reflect on their growth in any subject over the year. I feel the use of portfolios will also help me to understand and document the students' growth.**


 * 2. List ways in which technology plays a role in helping you and your students monitor student growth and/or achievement.**
 * **Tracking student progress and needs in Math through the use of __//SUCCESS MAKER SOFTWARE.//__**
 * **Tracking student progress and needs in Oral Reading Fluency through the use of __//DIBELS.//__ Students' scores are stored and are available on-line along with charts and graphs for individuals, classrooms, schools, and districts.**
 * **I use __//FIREFLY SOFTWARE//__ as my grade book, which stores grades, computes grades for report cards, and tracks skill levels for all subjects.**
 * **__//ACCELERATED READER SOFTWARE//__ tracks student scores for comprehension after reading books. This also tracks points received by each student. In addition, many reports are available for teachers to track a student's progress, strengths and weaknesses in reading comprehension.**
 * **__//AIMSWEB SOFTWARE//__ tracks my students' scores in both math facts, which are tested three times a year as well as Math Concepts and Skills which are, likewise, tested three times a year.**
 * **//__READ NATURALLY SOFTWARE__// is used for Title 1, Intensive Reading Students who have not reached benchmark for their grade level. This assists in the learning process and keeps track of their progress.**

2a. List 2 ways in which you could better utilize technology to assess students.
 * **First of all, next year I plan to utilize many more web tools to assess my students. For example, I will definitely use __//RUBISTAR//__ to create rubrics and already have once this year for my class.**
 * **I also plan to use __//DISCOVERY EDUCATION//__ for lessons and for quick quizzes to assess student understanding of the material presented.**
 * **In addition, I will use __//UNITED STREAMING//__ provided I get a classroom projector. Otherwise, I will use it only in the computer lab so all students can access the programs.**
 * **I also will use __//PALS,//__ which is __//PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT LINKS IN SCIENCE.//__ This is an on-line standards based, continually updated, resourse bank of science performance assessment tasks. These tasks are all indexed by the National Science Education Standards. Included on the site are; administration procedures, tasks with student directions, scoring rubric for assessment purposes, technical quality information, AND...examples of student work. I have been looking for something like this site, as the push for science standards and PSSA's to include science creep toward the lower grades.**
 * **I also plan to use __//SURVEY MONKEY//__** **to ascertain the needs and concerns of both students and parents.**
 * **I will continue to use __//DIBELS, SUCCESS MAKER, READ NATURALLY, AIMSWEB, ACCELERATED READER, and FIREFLY.//__**


 * 3. List resources that will help you grow in this area. **


 * **Projector for computer**
 * **Web cam for computer**
 * **Projector screen**
 * **Smart Board**
 * **Computers in the classroom**
 * **More frequent computer lab time**
 * **I-Phone, or Internet access on my cell phone**
 * **Lap top so I can work anywhere**
 * **Digital tools such as Survey Monkey, PALS, United Streaming, Rubistar, Discovery Education, QuizStar.**

4. Write a summary statement of 1a and 2a above in the form of an action you can take to incorporate digital learning experiences and assessments. Add this statement to the Action Plan.


 * I will incorporate more authentic, formative assessments using a plethora of digital tools and resources to promote student learning, mastery, and creativity.**