Standard 2.7 Assessment
Candidates model and facilitate the effective use of diagnostic, formative, and summative assessments to measure student learning and technology literacy, including the use of digital assessment tools and resources. (PSC 2.7/ISTE 2g)
Artifact: OLE Unit Plan
Reflection:
This artifact is the Unit Plan that I created for an online course in ITEC 7480. I designed this course for fourth grade social studies students to learn about the time of the explorers all the way to right before the Civil War. I broke this course up into modules, and each module included multiple assessments to make sure that the students mastered the content that was taught. As a result, this artifact shows mastery of Standard 2.7 - Assessment - which states that "candidates model and facilitate the effective use of diagnostic, formative, and summative assessments to measure student learning and technology literacy, including the use of digital assessment tools and resources." In this unit plan, I listed a wide variety of digital tools to utilize for the purpose of formatively assessing my students' knowledge after each module. In addition, these digital tools will help me develop a clear understanding of each student's level of technology literacy.
In writing this unit plan, I was able to demonstrate the ability to model and facilitate the effective use of formative assessments. Throughout each module, students have to complete a minimum of three different assessments that will measure student learning and technology literacy. First, students are required to take a quiz over the social studies taught in the module. For example, the quiz in module 2 would be over some of the explorers. This quiz will be taken online, so students would receive immediate feedback about how they did.
The next assessment is in the form of a discussion forum. For each module, students will be asked some type of question to support the content being delivered. First, students will write their own post, and then they will have the option to reply to a peer's post if they would like. Students could even upload a picture to support their discussion post if they would like. This discussion post will measure student understanding of the content covered in that module, but it will also tell me a lot about each student's technology literacy. For example, if students format their text to be different colors, sizes, and/or fonts, I would know that they know a lot about word processing online. In addition, if students linked a picture or even a video to their response, I would know that they have a solid understanding of how to attach links and upload photos.
Students are also required to post a reflection on what they have learned in each module to a blogging website called Kidblog. Once students post their own blog, they then have to reply to someone's else's post. This assessment teaches students good digital citizenship. Blogging is a very real-world activity, and students need to learn how to interact with other people online in an appropriate and respectful way. That is definitely a form of technology literacy since students must be able to understand how to use it in the real world.
Finally, the students' final product at the end of the online course is to create a timeline using Timetoast. For this timeline, they are to add information and pictures to each part of their timeline. As a result, students must know how to save pictures and then upload those pictures to their Timetoast project. This timeline will show how well they learned the content covered in the online course, and it will also show how skilled students are in using a Web 2.0 tool to create a final product.
In completing this online unit, I learned a lot about assessments and the different types of assessments that can be given to measure student learning. Assessments come in a lot of different types - they should not just be questions with one right answer. Assessments that require students to write responses and product final products are probably more valuable because they are more authentic and teach the students more real world skills that they will actually be able to apply. If I were to do something like this over again, I would have used some other digital assessment tools that I have recently learned about rather than the assessment tool that is built into our eCLASS system. There are so many other assessment tools such as Quizizz, Socrative, or Google Forms that I'd like to try for this type of formative assessment.
The work that went into creating this artifact improved faculty development because I learned how to formatively assess student learning in a variety of ways. My school is very focused on effectively assessing our students and using assessment data to inform instruction, and doing this through multiple digital tools is very beneficial. Since the creation of this artifact, I have given several professional development sessions on how to use digital tools to formatively assess student learning, and the teachers seem to have greatly benefited from those sessions.
This artifact is the Unit Plan that I created for an online course in ITEC 7480. I designed this course for fourth grade social studies students to learn about the time of the explorers all the way to right before the Civil War. I broke this course up into modules, and each module included multiple assessments to make sure that the students mastered the content that was taught. As a result, this artifact shows mastery of Standard 2.7 - Assessment - which states that "candidates model and facilitate the effective use of diagnostic, formative, and summative assessments to measure student learning and technology literacy, including the use of digital assessment tools and resources." In this unit plan, I listed a wide variety of digital tools to utilize for the purpose of formatively assessing my students' knowledge after each module. In addition, these digital tools will help me develop a clear understanding of each student's level of technology literacy.
In writing this unit plan, I was able to demonstrate the ability to model and facilitate the effective use of formative assessments. Throughout each module, students have to complete a minimum of three different assessments that will measure student learning and technology literacy. First, students are required to take a quiz over the social studies taught in the module. For example, the quiz in module 2 would be over some of the explorers. This quiz will be taken online, so students would receive immediate feedback about how they did.
The next assessment is in the form of a discussion forum. For each module, students will be asked some type of question to support the content being delivered. First, students will write their own post, and then they will have the option to reply to a peer's post if they would like. Students could even upload a picture to support their discussion post if they would like. This discussion post will measure student understanding of the content covered in that module, but it will also tell me a lot about each student's technology literacy. For example, if students format their text to be different colors, sizes, and/or fonts, I would know that they know a lot about word processing online. In addition, if students linked a picture or even a video to their response, I would know that they have a solid understanding of how to attach links and upload photos.
Students are also required to post a reflection on what they have learned in each module to a blogging website called Kidblog. Once students post their own blog, they then have to reply to someone's else's post. This assessment teaches students good digital citizenship. Blogging is a very real-world activity, and students need to learn how to interact with other people online in an appropriate and respectful way. That is definitely a form of technology literacy since students must be able to understand how to use it in the real world.
Finally, the students' final product at the end of the online course is to create a timeline using Timetoast. For this timeline, they are to add information and pictures to each part of their timeline. As a result, students must know how to save pictures and then upload those pictures to their Timetoast project. This timeline will show how well they learned the content covered in the online course, and it will also show how skilled students are in using a Web 2.0 tool to create a final product.
In completing this online unit, I learned a lot about assessments and the different types of assessments that can be given to measure student learning. Assessments come in a lot of different types - they should not just be questions with one right answer. Assessments that require students to write responses and product final products are probably more valuable because they are more authentic and teach the students more real world skills that they will actually be able to apply. If I were to do something like this over again, I would have used some other digital assessment tools that I have recently learned about rather than the assessment tool that is built into our eCLASS system. There are so many other assessment tools such as Quizizz, Socrative, or Google Forms that I'd like to try for this type of formative assessment.
The work that went into creating this artifact improved faculty development because I learned how to formatively assess student learning in a variety of ways. My school is very focused on effectively assessing our students and using assessment data to inform instruction, and doing this through multiple digital tools is very beneficial. Since the creation of this artifact, I have given several professional development sessions on how to use digital tools to formatively assess student learning, and the teachers seem to have greatly benefited from those sessions.