Chapter 8 is titled "What Do I Do with All These Sticky Notes?" Assessment That Drives Instruction. This chapter was really interesting to me because I agree with a lot of what Tovani says and learned a lot also. One statement Tovani made which stood out to me was "as a classroom teacher, I can say that districtwide and statewide assesments are not very helpful." This is something most of us may agree with, including myself, but reading it in this book really impacted me.
Tovani goes on to discuss starting points of assessment. Goal setting is extremely important to promote learning and alternative ways of assessing students. She would also place charts in her classroom to remind her students about both theirs and the teacher's goals. Her next strategy is using conversation calendars. These calendars are meant for students to write down what they have learned throughout the month or the unit. Reading response logs are also essential because they allow the teacher to see what the students are thinking about their readings.
Tovani's best assessment tool is quick conferences. These work nicely because it gives her a chance to get to know her students more individually and what they are thinking. She feels that through these conferences, students are able to confide in her with any problems they may be having. This is, in her opinion, the best and most efficient way for her to get on the same page as her students.
Assessments on a national level or even on a statewide level are not fair to the individual school. But knowing the standard that we need to raise our students too is a good thing also. We need to raise our level of play to reach those goals. Now have a conference with the students by themselves is a great idea. Talking to the students to see how class is going for them is good to learn. Knowing what is going on the student’s heads will show us how we can improve our lesson plans.
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