Deeper Understanding

        Chapter 2 of the book, Rigor By Design Not Chance, focuses mainly on students learning to question and be curious about their learning. It includes three ways to ask probing questions: question sequencing, Socratic questioning, and genius hour. The chapter also provides different types of effective questioning, such as open-ended and closed-ended questions. In the chapter, I learned that you can plan questions at different Depths of Knowledge levels. In the end, it discusses the stages of the Actionable Assessment Cycle and how to apply the questioning strategies discussed throughout the chapter. 

The Actionable Assessment Cycle consists of six stages: 

  1. Clarify learning targets

  2. Embed short-cycle formative tasks into instruction

  3. Uncover thinking and document evidence of learning

  4. Interpret evidence and frame feedback

  5. Determine the next steps to advance learning

  6. Use performance tasks to assess transfer and deepen learning (Hess, 2023).

An essential aspect of these stages is stage six. It is the stage where students can demonstrate their learning using real-world skills to create, build, write, and perform (Hess, 2023). This process starts with smaller performance tasks and leads to more complex tasks. The figure below shows the process of the performance assessments and how they compare in difficulty to one another. 

The article I discovered also discusses the importance of performance-based assessments and gives a view of what the teacher should do. The Ultimate Guide to Performance-Based Assessments expanded the ideas of performance-based assessments from Rigor By Design Not Chance. The article explained that with performance-based assessments, students will have a product or a performance to display their understanding. However, the final result should be one of many things the students are graded on. It should also be graded on the process to get the result. In the article, it states, “... students should be able to articulate both how and why they ended their assessment in the way that they did” (Hull, 2023). This shows the depth to which the students know the content and helps the students be able to express their understanding. I always feel that you only know it well enough when you can explain it to others. Students being able to implement their knowledge into real-life situations only helps them develop as better academic students. 

The book allowed me to learn the foundations of performance-based assessments, whereas the article expanded and deepened my understanding of how to implement them in my classroom. As a teacher, I must give my students clear expectations and guidelines to help lead them in their exploration. Teachers need to make sure the students know why they are doing the project or performance to understand what they should look to gain from it. The article states, “It is also important for teachers to take the time to help students understand the authenticity of the performance assessment – how developing the skills across disciplines and applying them to the performance assessment will help them tackle similar real-life situations outside of school” (Hull, 2023). Students will be able to apply what they have learned to real-life situations. We can make performance-based assessments a valuable experience for students to take with them. 



References


Hess, Karin. (2023).  Rigor by Design, Not Chance: Deeper Thinking Through Actionable   Instruction and Assessment. ASCD ASSN SUPERV CURR DEV, 2023.

Hull, Chris. (2023). The Ultimate Guide to Performance-Based Assessments. Otus, otus.com/guides/performance-based-assessments/.

Comments

  1. Dr. Beth Walsh-MoormanOctober 29, 2023 at 6:17 PM

    I would love to see more the classroom application that you discussed in here.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Mr. ForsytheOctober 29, 2023 at 8:26 PM

    Hi Megan,
    I loved your explanations of the 6 different stages Assessment Cycle. As you mentioned, the stages play into each other, the first typically being easier and the later stages being more complex. The graphic shown gives a brief description of the breakdown of where each stage applies. You also state a great observation about how important the end of an assessment should dictate the HOW and the WHY. There is a reason for every assessment and our job is to see where individuals are at and how we can improve the student's academic abilities. You said it best, "We can make performance-based assessments a valuable experience for students to take with them." Great work!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Lucy PattisonOctober 30, 2023 at 12:03 PM

    I love the idea of performance-based assessments. I wonder how the teacher can effectively grade the student throughout the process. I also wonder how teachers can incorporate performance-based assessments into their unit plans. I'd like to see if students are more engaged in performance-based assessments that they get to choose rather than given by the teacher. Overall, I am interested in exploring how to implement performance-based assessments in my future math classrooms.

    ReplyDelete

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