Standard 6 Assessment
The teacher understands and uses multiple methods of assessment to engage learners in their own growth, to monitor learner progress, and to guide the teacher’s and learner’s decision making.
Reflection
An effective teacher uses multiple methods of assessment to make an informed decision that will facilitate a growth mindset among students while monitoring their growth and progress. Assessment is a powerful tool that can help instructional decision to go forward, dial back or change the pace. This can be done by using informal, formal, formative or summative assessment.
Artifact 1 -
The Rhythm Challenge
In the beginning of class for my first and second grade students, I present them with the entry task of what I call “The Rhythm Challenge.” This is an informal formative assessment since I give instant feedback to the students to clarify misconceptions between note values. While this is happening, I do not keep record of where my students are in terms of progress, but I am mindful of it at the given moment. In my content, I do this the most often within my classroom.
I use the website Rhythm Randomizer to do this exercise that helps my students practice the skill of analyzing and interpreting rhythm. It has them look at two measures that feature either a quarter note, eighth notes, half note or quarter rest. It gives them a four-beat count before it highlights the rhythm for them. The students perform through either clapping, patting their knees or tapping while also saying the rhythm.
I have found that in the future it would be best to do one measure at the beginning of the year and then build it up to two measures. Also, another way I could present this is for me to model by playing one of the notes wrong. Then I would have the students tell me which note was wrong, and how to fix it.
Artifact 2 -
Star Wars Rap
As part of my 2nd grade students’ growth goals on recognizing different note values as mentioned above, I assess them through performing on rhythm sticks to the YouTube video of “Star Wars Rap” by Mr. Henry’s Music World. This is a formal formative assessment because I have collected data as we progress through different points throughout the year. As you will see, in the sliding deck to the right, my students made progress in various amounts. Through the collecting of this data, I was able to adjust my instruction in order for them to master this skill. This provided another method to assess this musical concept.
To offer other ways to assess learners with different abilities in my classroom, I would like to use the feature in QuaverEd that allows students access to the material. Which would depend on me making a proposal to my district to offer funding towards this. I believe this would lessen barriers to displaying their knowledge of the content. Plus, it can provide concrete data and assist instructional planning. I would have to investigate to see if the curriculum is offered in other languages. What I could also do is provide a rubric for students so that they understand where they are at. Then we would make a plan, either me assisting them, or one that they create themselves to help them move forward.
