Crystal's Blog: February 2009

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

My Favorite Alternative Assessment

My Favorite Alternative Assessment

I've experienced many assessments as a student. But one assessment came to mind when I thought about my favorite assessment. I did a project during my undergrad work at SUNY Fredonia. The class was called, Composition for Elementary Teachers. As a student learning to be a teacher, we learned how to teach different topics through children's literature. For example, children can learn about the Holocaust by reading "Number the Stars". My professor talked about different ways of assessing children. One way to measure learning was with a performance assessment. To teach us, she had us complete the assessment.

This is going to be hard to explain, so stick with me!

After reading several children's literature books based on different topics such as the Holocaust, immigration and several different wars, we were given the opportunity to pick from a list of performance assessments to complete. For example we could write journal entries from the perspective of a child during the Holocaust or write newspaper articles from one of the time periods we covered. I chose to write a diary as an Irish girl immigrating to America from the potato famine in Ireland.

I definitely thought the assessment was worthwhile. My professor gave us a rubric to follow. Therefore, we had the opportunity to be creative but we were also aware of the criteria to be covered. We had to mention or refer to many historical events. As a student, I knew what to expect and was responsible for my own grade. The rubric helped my professor assess our projects.

I really enjoyed doing this project for many reasons. First, we had the option to pick an assessment we liked and that we found interesting. That allowed us to have some ownership in our learning. Second, I was able to show what I learned through my project. Third, since I used what I learned, the information and the learning experience was more meaningful and memorable. I know I learned more about immigrating to America and the potato famine through this project than I would have through reading a chapter in a social studies book.

This type of project is a bit too complicated for my first graders. I do teach many topics through children's literature. I don't use rubrics. However, I could picture using them to assess writing in the future.

Thursday, February 19, 2009

New York State Learning Standards: Elementary Science

http://www.emsc.nysed.gov/ciai/mst/pub/mststa4.pdf

All under Standard 4: Living Environment

Learning Target 1: Students will be able to identify the parts of a plant.

Key Idea 2: Recognize that traits of living things are both inherited and acquired or learned.

2.2a Plants and animals closely resemble their parents and other individuals in their species.

Learning Target 2: Students will be able to distinguish the job of each plant part.

Key Idea 3: Individual organisms and species change over time.

3.1b Each plant has different structures that serve different functions in growth, survival, and reproduction.

Learning Target 3: Students will determine what characteristics make plants living things.

Key Idea 1: Living things are both similar and different from each other and from nonliving things.

1.1 Describe the characteristics of and variations between living and nonliving things.

Learning Target 4: Students will be able to use background knowledge about themselves to understand the needs of living things.

Key Idea 5: Organisms maintain a dynamic equilibrium that sustains life.

5.1a: All living things grow, take in nutrients, breathe, reproduce, and eliminate waste.

Learning Target 5: Students will be able to describe what will happen if a living plant is deprived of its needs.

Key Idea 5: Organisms maintain a dynamic equilibrium that sustain life.

5.2g The health, growth, development of organisms are affected by environmental conditions such as the availability of food, air, water, space, shelter, heat, and sunlight.

Learning Target 6: Students will be able to display a plant’s life cycle.

Key Idea 4: The continuity of life is sustained through reproduction and development.

4.1a Plants and animals have life cycles. they include beginning of a life, development into an adult, and eventually death.

Learning Target 7: Students will be able to successfully grow a plant providing its common needs.

The successful growth of the plant would depend on all the knowledge learned during the unit.

Key Idea 7: Human decisions and activities have had a profound impact on the physical and living environments.

7.1c Humans, as individuals or communities, change environments in ways that can be either helpful or harmful for themselves and other organisms.

(If students decide not to provide a plants needs in the classroom, there will be a profound impact on the plant)

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Learning Targets Draft

First Grade Science Unit: Plants

Brief Description of Unit: Students will build upon their prior knowledge of plants. They will learn parts of a plant, functions of the parts, if plants are living vs. nonliving, plant needs, life cycle, and grow a plant.

Learning Targets:

1: Students will be able to identify the parts of a plant.
Mastery Learning Target
Verbs: label, match, and select (Bloom) choose, name, point to (Krathwohl)

2: Students will be able to distinguish the job of each plant part.
Mastery Learning Target
Verbs: explain, identify (Bloom) describe, tell, and write (Krathwohl)

3: Students will decide if plants are living or nonliving things.
Mastery Learning Target
Verbs: compare, contrast, explain, justify, and summarize (Bloom)

4: Students will be able to use background knowledge about humans to understand the needs of living things.
Developmental Learning Target
Verbs: diagram, design, compare, contrast (Bloom) generalize (Krathwohl)

5: Students will be able to identify what will happen if a living plant is deprived of its needs.
Mastery Learning Target
Verbs: explain, predict, summarize, demonstrate, show (Bloom)

6: Students will be able to display a plant’s life cycle.
Mastery Learning Target
Verbs: label, diagram, design, create, construct (Bloom)

7: Students will be able to successfully grow a plant providing its common needs.
Developmental Learning Target
Verbs: produce, show, perform, display (Bloom) grow