Kravetz, Ari S.

Student Assessment Fall 2012

The course I am teaching is entitled Freshman English. This courses overarching theme is the development of identity and coming of age, and it surveys classical works in American literature such as The Glass Castle, To Kill a Mockingbird, Romeo and Juliet, stories of creation, and The Catcher in the Rye. The unit is split up into the units as follows: memoir with The Glass Castle, coming of age with To Kill a Mockingbird, coming of age and identity with Romeo and Juliet, and finally identity and society with The Catcher in the Rye. This is a high school freshman class for students who are on the regular track. Grading and this course will be based on a combination of both formative and summative assessments. These assessments will be fair, accurate, consistent, defensible, and transparent. To ensure that these golden rules are met, fairness of assignments will ensure that the assignments given will not be too easy, nor too difficult and will give students reasonable amounts of time to do the required work. The assignments will be written in a clear way and will not be meant to trick or confuse students. Their accuracy will also be both in regards to the material presented and their ability to be reliable in regards to the rest of the assignments and the material that is covered in class or as homework at home. Additionally, consistency will be achieved through constant measuring of student work and ability, they will follow an established schedule from which deviation will not happen, and the assignments, tests, and quizzes, will be evenly spaced out. The material for the formative and summative assessments will be chosen using the reading and the lecture notes to ensure that these assignments and assessments test what is actually being taught and this will aid in the assurance of validity. This means that the assignments will also have a clear purpose for being given and extending thinking outside the classroom. Finally, the assignments will achieve transparency by being clear, understandable,

Kravetz, Ari S. Student Assessment Fall 2012

and the comments and grading will also be clearly written out so that it is logical where points were given and/or taken off. When appropriate, this will be done through pre-determined rubrics that are given to students at the time that the assignment is being given so students know what to expect. The purposes of this grading policy are to ensure objectivity and ethicality across all assignments and students. This means that each student will be held to the same expectations, unless in the case of an IEP or 504, and be graded in the same way according to the same standards that are established. This type of grading also establishes precedence among grading for other assignments and students will understand the expectations and how to tailor their assignments to fulfill the necessary requirements. In addition, grading will provide feedback for students and also inform parents about student performance. Not only would grading feedback be useful for students and their families, but would also be useful for administrative and guidance purposes. Even more, grades establish student accountability and motivation for success. This means that providing grades would fulfill the student needs of wanting to attain high grades, passing tests, compete with other students, and avoid failure. The types of assessment that would be present in this English class will incorporate written journal responses, written in-class work such as worksheets and note sheets, class presentations, essays, speeches, projects, and tests. These assessments would give the class a writing component which is also important in English classrooms and also work to build students capacity and ability to write well. Additionally, these assignments are meant to help students create connections outside of class and work on their analysis abilities. Even more, many of these assignments seek to prepare students for continuing education and help students become

Kravetz, Ari S. Student Assessment Fall 2012

better critical thinkers. Furthermore, these assignments also aim to help students in their social development and ability to work with other students while sharing responsibility for a common goal. Affective factors will also account for a portion of the grade, but it will not be the majority of the grade. The reason for this is because the English class will be heavily based on participation and student involvement. Additionally, it is difficult to have class and make progress when students are absent. Obviously, excused absences are okay, but students will be held accountable for obtaining the notes, meeting with the teacher, and getting caught up. A class depends on everyone understanding the material and being able to engage in the class work, if many individuals are not able to contribute and are asking questions about things that were covered already because they are absent, then they are effectively also holding back the rest of the class from progressing because time has to be spent on catching them up. Participation would be graded on a class-to-class basis and on a weekly basis. This means that students would get credit for being involved in class either actively (participating in discussion and in-class work) or passively (actively paying attention and taking notes). In order to create transparency in grading participation and maintaining an accurate physical record of this, the teacher is obligated in tracking discussion participation, collecting and/or grading work done in class, and recording when students choose to turn in their notes instead of participating in discussion. Students who are uncomfortable participating as much verbally may choose to turn in notes so that they still get participation points even if they did not talk, to show that they were engaged in class these note sheets should be copied and placed in the class file should proof become necessary later..

Kravetz, Ari S. Student Assessment Fall 2012

Journals allow students to extend the discussions in class and provide deeper analysis. Additionally, it gives students the opportunity to reflect and provide personal contexts to the readings or compare some of the readings and their themes. Even more, constant journals give students the ability to write more and have more practice writing to improve their skills. Worksheets and class note sheets give students a structure for paying attention to particular ideas during class. This focuses the reading or activities of the day into a tangible medium that allows students to engage more actively with certain ideas that the teacher is highlighting. Class presentations, speeches, and projects, give students a means for engaging with the material being learned in a more creative medium while at the same time extending knowledge of the class content. Essays, on the other hand, provide students with practice in writing longer and more analytically while at the same time practicing for college. Even more, essay writing is a necessary skill for many jobs and essays also force students to extend their analysis outside of the basic, surface level, analysis. All of these aforementioned projects are also meant to push students in their ways of thinking and how to engage in critical thinking and analysis. These projects also give students practice in communicating through different mediums. The assignments present above will be judged on varying degrees and largely based on rubrics that are composed both by the students and the teacher. Students will be graded on process, product, participation, and understanding; while these categories are broad, they will be specific based on each assignment and will change accordingly. The weights for the class will have a break down as follows: 40% Participation, 30% Homework/In-Class Work, 20% Essays, 10% Attendance. For an English class that is rooted in discussion, participation is very important. Especially since student can choose to participate by

Kravetz, Ari S. Student Assessment Fall 2012

handing in notes of the day in, there are not many excuses for not participating; even more when my class is so fun! Participation will come in a variety of ways and as long as students are engaged, doing the work, and helping move class discussions along and answering questions, they will be fine. Following participation is Homework and In-Class work. These types of assignments ensure that work is being done in class and they allow for the teacher to use them in assessment of the class and the teaching. They allow the teacher to track student and class progress, and see areas in which addition additional instruction is needed. Additionally, in regards to participation, homework and class work are the areas in which most time is spent following participation. For this reason, this area is weighted following participation. Next, come essays. Essays are a substantive part of the grade because they require a lot of work and time to complete, and will also be used as greater summative assessments that require significant analysis. Since essays will cover substantive material and have a lot of analysis, they will have the next amount of weight. While these are substantial, they are not the main focus of the class. Last is attendance. As a teacher, I do not have a lot of control over the attendance of students, but I can encourage them to come to class and to be on time. That is essentially what this grade is for. Having this grade also allows parents to see how the students effort and grade are related to them being in class and being there on time. Final grades will be assigned based on the final score that students earn based on the weighted percentages. While some assignments may be assigned a norm-referenced curve based on performance after the fact, the class as a whole will not be curved based on a norm nor criterion referenced basis. The reason is because weights have already been assigned to the grades and students will have earned grades according to the golden rules of grading. This being

Kravetz, Ari S. Student Assessment Fall 2012

done, the assignments and their grades will already be reflected in their final grade. If students are on the border and have a grade of X.Y%, where Y is greater than, or equal to .5, students may be rounded up to the next highest letter based on an individual conference that looks at overall progress, work done over the semester, and physical evidence of consistent effort and participation. In order to promote self-advocacy and maintain a record of the petition for rounding, students would be required to present a written argument that justifies the reason for their petition.