LLED 360

When looking at assessments in school, students are constantly worried about their percentages and grades and how they are being marked. This is no exception in physical education as students are constantly asking what they are getting and how they can be improved. In the new curriculum coming out for physical education, one of the changes might be to change the grades in physical education so that there is still letter grades but no percentages attached to the grades.This is a little confusing because teachers will still have percentages of the students when calculating their letter grades. So basically students will receive only letter grades on their report card, but if they care about their marks and want to know where they stand in the spectrum of that letter grade they can just go and ask their teacher. It does not make sense to do this in one subject only and I do not believe that students will be very happy about it. I understand the fact of trying to make school less about grades to make students more intrinsically motivated to do well instead of being extrinsically motivated to get a better percentage. This being said the world we live in you students and young adults is all about grades, therefore students will be extrinsically motivated. To be able to get into a university students need to have extremely high grades to be competitive to get into the programs that they want and the scholarships that they might need. I do not believe that removing percentages in physical education will change anything with the grading because as noted before teachers are still going to have their percentages.

Coming from the subject area of home economics, I definitely do not see how certain types of assessment such as utilizing standardized testing would fit into my subject area. However, thinking about other subjects I feel that it is difficult to completely turn away from standardized testing. Subjects such as Math, Chemistry, Biology, etc. that are subject to provincial examination really puts teacher under pressure of following the same format of assessment during the school year. A teacher that uses other types of assessment, which may be beneficial for certain number of students, can create discrepancy between class marks and provincial exam marks. A student that performs well in oral assessments may not perform well under pressure when answering multiple-choice questions.

A discrepancy that is greater than 40 percent requires that the provincial mark be used entirely to represent the student’s final mark, whereas in regular cases a 40% provincial and 60% class mark is used.  Therefore, if a student really does not respond well to standardized tests however participates and performs well during classes, the classroom mark is still ignored and the standardized test is recognized. Furthermore, standardized testing also makes it difficult for teachers to adopt different teaching styles when they are concerned with covering all materials for students to be able to write the provincial exam. As much as the push for less standardized testing be used in the classroom and more emphasis on depth rather than amount of topics covered in class, the education system seem to still favour the traditional teaching styles and make it difficult for teachers to adopt otherwise.

The class on assessments really got me thinking about what it will be like during my long term practicum and how on earth am I going to assess the kids!!!

During class the group gave students and activity for the students to do. One was to write a ridiculously hard test and the other was discussion based with others at our table and unknown to us the group leaders would walk around and “assess” how we were performing in class. The test turned out to be fun since we understood there was no pressure behind it. I think it was evident from Kathy’s drawing of a cat to answer the last question. It was the second activity that sparked my interest. During the activity a group member walked by and assessed a fellow classmate while I had just finished contributing what I had believed to be valuable insight to the discussion. However, another table member began with, “I believe,” and then was assessed with a contributes well to the group! To be honest I felt slighted after I had just said my piece. Others felt this way too. Ren had been assessed with something along the lines of “not talking about the topic”, which to her seemed like a very unfair assessment. The group explained that this was just one method and it is easy for a teacher to assess incorrectly if they happen to just walk by at the one moment of fault by the student.

Because of this activity it got me thinking about how do I assess kids in drama. I have been a firm believer that, especially in lower grades in high school, it is more important about the process rather than the final product. Some teenagers can work brilliantly when other are working around them and the focus isn’t directed on one person. When a student has to do their final performance they may develop a little bit of stage fright. With that said I believe that it is very important to observe closely how students work on their performances before they present. But how do I do this and not assess incorrectly? Hypothetically with 30 students in a class and working on 2 people scenes how do I make sure that I have assessed these kids correctly and not judge them possibly by one incident? There are the obvious examples if students aren’t focussed if they are talking with other groups or trying to sneak a look at their phones but what if I walk by and a student is telling a story that actually helps to relate back to their scene? A drama class can be like organized chaos and sometimes I just have to accept it!

This class has taught me to properly assess I can’t just walk around the class monitoring and dropping my ear in to groups every so often but really engage with the groups as they work and constantly ask questions to see if they are progressing and them let them continue.

I have several reasons for being wary of giving out grades in school. The effects of grades on the reason for students to learn and the type of learning they engage in is one of the reasons and was brought up by Kohn in his article, “The Case Against Grades.” Another reason that I’m not fond of giving out grades is because the current system of grading evaluates all students on the same scale and assumes that they are all capable of achieving the same success. Marks are given out of 100% but I question whose version of 100% that is. Not all students are able to achieve to the same level so I believe it would make more sense to grade students on how well they are learning compared to their individual potential. Of course, this opens a whole different can of worms about how to determine what a student’s potential is and the dangers of saying that some students have less potential than others.

I believe that the suggestion that Kohn gives is a solution to these issues. Rather than giving grades, give students qualitative feedback. I think this could be great for all subject areas. In many of the classes I have been in, which tend to be math classes, I have often heard the teachers talk about how students should reflect on their grades to determine their level of understanding. While grades may be an indication that students need to continue working on developing their understanding of the concepts, they are typically not very good at telling students exactly what it is they need to focus on. I think that giving qualitative feedback can help give students explicit feedback on specific areas they need to work on which has the potential to be more effective than having students attempt to interpret what their number or letter grade is trying to tell them. I think it is an interesting idea and would love to see if anyone has done research to test the effectiveness of this type of evaluation at the high school level.

Chapter 8

I like the idea that teachers need to teach grammar in context. As a former ELL student, I felt the disconnection between the grammar I was supposed to learn from the grammar worksheets and the essays I was writing in the English and Social Studies classes. One of my former students whom I tutored expressed her concern that while she was able to get correct answers on the grammar practice worksheets, she lacked the skills (ironically) to write grammatically correct sentences for her essays. Furthermore, I like the point that ELLs need to draw linguistic knowledge from good essay models. Teachers need to spend time with the students to point out the qualities that make a good essay for ELLs to model after. Since ELLs do not have the linguistic capital that mainstream speakers have due to their lack of exposure to a wide range of texts, teachers need to provide them the products that they are asked to create. Finally, teachers need to explicitly tell the students the difference between oral communication (which uses basic interpersonal communication skills or BICS) and writing in academic language (which requires cognitive academic language proficiency or CALP). Teachers need to tell the students that while the teacher may repeat key points during the lesson, such repetition is discouraged in formal essays. It is important that teachers do not assume ELLs to naturally pick up on the differences in the rules between the different genres (personal writing vs. formal essay) and modes of communication (writing vs. speaking).

I especially appreciated this week’s reading on assessment because I have found this to be one of the more difficult aspects of lesson planning and teaching.  What type of assessment to use, how frequently, and in what forms are issues that I have been struggling with when it comes to unit planning as well.  One tool of assessment that I have seen being used not only in my practicum school but here at UBC is a rubric.  I believe that rubrics are helpful for teachers and students alike, because they give the teacher a specific set of criteria to use when marking which is not only efficient but fair, and they ensure that students know exactly what is expected of them before they hand in an assignment.  I have heard some teachers say that they don’t want to give out a rubric or specific criteria about what is expected of students because it is like giving away the “answers.”  I don’t agree with this at all; if we let students know exactly what they should be doing and learning, and they are able to produce the desired criteria, isn’t that exactly what we want our students to be doing? Why hide our expectations or make them a guessing game?  I think rubrics can be especially helpful for ELLs by providing clear and explicit criteria for assignments.

A good friend of mine, who was an ELL, had a difficult time in our writing-heavy courses (such as History and English) because of the large essay and research assignments we had. Therefore when I think about writing expository genres, I think of his experiences and how I want to be very conscience of how I approach my writing assignments (as a Socials Studies teacher) and how it will affect differentiated learners. I realize that at times, academic writing can have seemingly arbitrary rules, appear disconnected from life, and flat-out boring. And this is coming from somebody who enjoyed and continues to enjoy writing academic and research papers. Therefore I hope to find the right balance of choosing good expository essays that are highly informative, academically sound, well-organized, rich in content and detail––but also creative in language, in including a more narrative element, etc. I also think about the chapter’s emphasis on always teaching things in context––such as grammar rules––and to not utilize isolated and abstract writing exercises. Therefore the chapter highlights the importance of immersion and how ELLs and students in general just need to encounter good writing, again and again and again. I think that literature or popular fiction can be engaging and informative tools to help with academic writing.

I think therefore I would want to incorporate more examples of popular culture such as screenplays, comic books, TV shows, movies, and other rich narrative elements and sources in my lessons. Through the dissection and analysis of what makes these examples good writing and good stories, my students will learn more about organization, about clarity, about perspective, about setting up a problem or tension––all of which is involved in academic writing. Students therefore need good teachers who are not only passionate about writing, but who can use the right tools, examples, and methods to cultivate the passion and skills in the students for academic writing yes, but also writing in general.

Michael Yang

This class with the inclusion of this book has really helped me develop an awareness of the struggles that English language learners face.  It also points out the significant challenges regular, “non-ELL” students face when it comes to learning and learning effectively.  This chapter dealt with how to create successful lesson plans that are engaging and educational.  It is very easy to overlook the vocabulary that is essential to fully understanding certain academic subjects.

My discipline is art so it is easy to forget to incorporate appropriate vocabulary when teaching.  My experience with high school art is very different from how we are learning to teach in the modern art classroom.  We emphasize the need for self assessment, particularly critiques of artwork.  This can be done individually during various check-in points (formative) as well as at the very end of a project with a group (summative).  Although as a student, I despised going through the critique process and could not wait until my critique was over, I found the experience to invaluable because it allowed me to really reflect on my process and technique.  I was also better able to interpret and critique art produced by others.  The crit process can be very intimidating because it is easy to take things to heart but even with the constructive feedback I received, I was better able to develop my ideas and alter a few things here and there to make it more effective.  Being successful in a crit requires you to be able to talk about others’ work in addition to your own.  This means that mastery of the academic language in relation to the art practice is crucial.  It was not until university that I was actually able to develop my understanding of academic art language and the significance of being able to explain art work.

There are plenty of strong ideas in this chapter including how to successfully prepare for an oral presentation.  Much like standing up there to defend your work in a critique, presentations require attentiveness to the information.  The audience must be engaged and they must LEARN something new.  Contrary to what a lot of the presentations that I have done in and out of this program, I would often present on information that the class already knew.  My job was to reiterate this information in a more visual and dynamic way.  Whether or not I actually achieved this is uncertain.  What the chapter did point out was that it is important to make the information you present “new”.  This could mean expanding on the current readings (if it is a shared class reading) and adding visuals, performances, and activities that would force them to understand the information in a different and perhaps more holistic way.  This is a great tip and I think that having my students do more presentations would be a fantastic way to not only engage the audience (as they see their classmate up there) but also to create mini “experts” out of them.  Teaching is the best way to learn after all.

In relation to https://blogs.ubc.ca/lled360/2013/11/17/chapter-9-lesson-plans-and-assessments/

Though the chapter and overall book has some flaws, I found this text to be incredibly helpful. The information it provided about teaching and understanding ELLs has opened my eyes to new perspectives and new techniques that I had never considered previously. I have found that, out of the numerous texts I have read so far in this program, this text is the most applicable to the everyday classroom situation and has the most practical advice, which translates directly to the management of a classroom and the planning of lessons. The activities and techniques described in this text are applicable to effectively teaching our content areas as well as to the teaching of academic language and I believe that I will use many of the techniques in this book numerous times, as I plan lessons for my practicum and further teaching.

I agree that this chapter (Chapter 9) is particularly helpful because it integrates much of the information from the other chapters into more fully developed lesson plans, which gives readers a clearer idea of how to use these activities and strategies in a broader context.

One of the elements of the chapter that I thought was most interesting was the use of rubrics. I have always viewed rubrics as a method of assessment that defined the criteria for grading. However, this chapter broadened my understanding of what rubrics can be used for and how they can enhance, not just evaluate, learning. Having the students create their own rubrics is an excellent way to discuss expectations for what the students should know about their content area. This helps the students to focus on the most important information when doing research and creating their products. It also works to give the students a sense of autonomy and create a more democratic classroom environment. I also like the idea of having the students assess their own and other students’ works using rubrics. This helps the students to fully comprehend what good quality products are and how to create them. It is especially helpful if the students are able to edit and rework their product before the final assessment of the teacher. These methods of using rubrics will undoubtedly improve students’ learning as well as the quality of their final products.

Melanie Reich

The chapter’s development and focus of lesson plans and assessment strategies I found to be incredibly practical and relatable. It seemed to finally put together all of the theories, strategies, and example activities and how they can be effectively put to practice in different classroom environments.

That being said, I wish that this format and general summarization had been introduced earlier on in the course. Using lesson plans and assessment strategies as a framework to base the various techniques studied would have allowed more tangible ideas and possible activities to be envisioned for future lesson plans. Perhaps this is my own learning bias, but given examples that I can take and reshape to specific classroom settings that I will encounter would have allowed me to better appreciate what has been reviewed.  Providing the structure and the details about how to organize components of lesson plans and incorporate different techniques within different stages, may have better emphasized the significance and impact of activities such as read alouds or visual organizers for example.