Formative Assessment Analysis

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I feel that this model ties in nicely to our current policies and especially ties into the Danielson framework and the Common Core Standards. The easy to follow format of the assessment model made sense and really stuck with me. The fourth resource in the category of formative assessment was a book written by Connie Moss and Susan M. Brookhart titled, Advancing Formative Assessment in Every Classroom published in 2009. This text focused specifically on classroom lead practices aimed at building strategies to improve the formative assessment process. Like many other collected sources, this book stresses the idea that formative assessment improves student achievement and raises teacher quality as well. Besides explaining the formative assessment …show more content…

The main argument put forth in this article is that Nolen believes that “we need to better understand the connections between teachers’ assessment practices and students’ motivation and engagement in terms of the social systems in which they exist.” (Nolen, 320). She goes on to discuss the significance of formative assessments providing feedback and how this feedback can be used to measure the gap between current and desired performance. This article took into account the “balance of multiple purposes for assessing and providing feedback”. (Nolen, 321). Nolen goes on to state how teachers provide useful information to students in regards to self-assessment but are often just as concerned with student’s emotional issues such as motivation to learn. This article illustrated the connection and significance of student motivation and feedback in regards to formative assessments. It was also helpful to read that even when the feedback on formative assessments is clear, the assessment may still not produce the desired effect on student engagement and learning. This is the central focus question I have and will find out regarding using formative assessments with my students. This article reaffirmed the validity of my action research topic and gave me a realistic outlook on …show more content…

Originally this category was titled technology and assessments, but I needed to make the category larger in scope to fit in some of the more “specialized” articles. This article was published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2009 by Edy S. Quellmalz and James W. Pellegrino was simply titled, “Technology and Testing”. Although the focus of this work centered on large-scale testing, there was some helpful dialogue surrounding classroom-based assessments that proved useful. The main idea of this article was that besides the obvious advantage of quick, accurate scoring and feedback, technological applications can be used to provide “rich, authentic tasks that challenge the sorts of integrated knowledge, critical thinking, and problem solving seldom well addressed in paper-based tests” (Quellmalz & Pellegrino, 75). In other words, these two authors strongly feel technological based assessments are superior to paper-based assessments, and thus will yield greater results. They go on to say that this shift in assessment is a crucial part of 21st-century learning and will continue to improve and develop. Already this can be seen within districts as they struggle to implement the PARCC throughout their schools. In their discussion of classroom instructional uses of technology-based assessments, the authors reaffirm the benefits of formative assessments if they

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