Effective Planning: Step 3

I write assessments all the time, but how do I know they are valid measures of student understanding and mastery?

The diagram below depicts the flow and the core guiding questions effective teachers utilize when planning for instructional and learning success.

Each of these core guiding questions is answered by instructional decision making based on the needs of individual students, their data, desired outcomes, standards, and available tools and resources.

Previously we discussed step 1 and step 2. Let’s delve into step three:

How will I check for understanding and mastery?

What student work, creation or evidence will you accept as progress toward the learning goals of the lesson?  Basically, are they “getting it”? Think about and decide on the balance between covering content (accomplishing your learning objectives) and ensuring that students understand. There is a huge difference between teaching and actual learning!

A Master Planner thinks and plans carefully on how to collect this evidence. Strategically choose from a myriad of assessment types (essay tests, term papers, short-answer quizzes, homework assignments, lab projects, problems to solve, etc.) in order to ensure that you test for exactly the learning you want them to gain.  In other words, sometimes our assessments don’t match our learning goals and we therefore cannot attain the evidence we want.

The following questions will guide your planning:

• What questions will I ask students to check for understanding?
• What will I have students do to demonstrate that they are following?
• Going back to my list of learning objectives, what activity can I have students do to check whether each of those has been accomplished?

This step is crucial for teachers to focus on. Evaluating student outcomes during and at the end of a lesson provides 3 points of valuable information:

• Student Data – Student feedback, performance and observation data
• Teacher Reflection – How did I perform in the successful delivery of the lesson – Which strategies worked? Which students did I reach? Which tools, materials and strategies will help in the future?
• Refinements for Tomorrow’s Plan – What do I need to do tomorrow based on the level of success today?

Planbook Plus allows you to attach and store your assessments right to your lesson plans. No more digging through files and folders. All your student and teacher files are easily accessible and right at your finger tips!