classroom assessment strategies for ngss earth and space sciences
TRANSCRIPT
Webinar:Classroom Assessment
Strategies for NGSS Earth and Space Sciences
Organizers:Susan Sullivan, CIRES, CU Boulder & NAGT Past PresidentAida Awad, Maine East H.S. & NAGT Past PresidentEd Robeck, AGIJohn McDaris, SERC/NAGT
Webinar overview:➢ Welcome and introductions➢ Presenters
William Penuel (University of Colorado) Kathy Comfort (West Ed) Discussion and Q&A➢ Future Events
Common questions Why is NGSS 3-D Assessment important?
What are some good ways to get started?
Is there anything I should watch out for?
Upcoming Events: Webinars: 2nd Thursdays, 1p PT/4p ET
March 10, 2016April 14, 2016May 12, 2016 Ed Geary, “Building a State
Coalition for NGSS-ESS” 7/18-22/16 Earth Educators Rendezvous-abstract
deadline March 1. Workshop, travel stipend➢ Email list:
http://nagt.org/nagt/profdev/workshops/ngss_summit/index.html
PresentersWilliam Penuel (University of Colorado)
Kathy Comfort (West Ed)
“3D” Assessment in Earth and Space Science
EducationBill Penuel, University of Colorado Boulder
+ Outlines a set of recommendations for 3D Assessment
+ Makes strong argument for beginning with classroom assessment
National Research Council (2014)
+ To adequately cover the three dimensions of proficiency, assessment tasks will need to contain multiple components (e.g., a set of interrelated questions).
+ Specific components may focus on individual practices, core ideas, or crosscutting concepts, but, together, the components need to support inferences about students’ three-dimensional science learning as described in a given performance expectation.
Multi-Component Tasks
Example 1The picture below shows a place on the ocean floor where two plates are moving apart. At this plate boundary (shown at the dotted line), rock material is rising to the surface.
A. Draw on the picture to show what is happening in the mantle that causes the plates to move apart.
B. What is happening in the mantle that helps to explain why the two plates are moving apart?
C. Put an X on the places in the picture above where the oldest rock can be found in the crust.
D. Explain your answer.
+ Example of a multi-component task developed to support formative use of assessment evidence to inform instruction.
+ Can take place in 1 or 2 class sessions, depending on the results of the assessment
+ Co-developed with Denver Public Schools teachers to fit within Investigating Earth Systems curriculum
Example 2: Movement of Water
+Pose question+Students discuss in pairs and small
groups+Teacher asks why each response might
be reasonable+Teacher’s orchestration of discussion is
supported by a set of talk moves: e.g., “Say more,” “Why do you think that?”
+Students re-answer the question
Pedagogical Pattern
+Comes from work of Jim Minstrell of Facet Innovations
+Guide to help interpret student responses (“listen fors”)
+Not misconceptions, but different ideas students have to build on and challenge
Developmental Theory: Facets
Contingent Activity: Developing and Using Models
Here’s a picture showing where a river enters a larger body of water.
Draw on the picture to show where you would expect to find gravel, sand, and clay.
Write a final explanation why you would expect to find gravel, sand, and clay
at the locations you have marked in your diagram.
Student groups write their explanations and submit it to the teacher at the end of the lesson.
+Multiple components+Clicker question +Pedagogical pattern+Contingent activity
+Integrates the three dimensions across tasks+Disciplinary core idea: Clicker
question+Practices of argumentation, modeling:
Class discussion, contingent activity+Crosscutting concept: Models and
System Models in contingent activity
Analyzing the Task
+Tasks are required for all kinds of assessment (classroom, interim, state, etc.).
+Good task design is good task design.+When lots of people need to design
tasks, a template can facilitate consistency and understanding.
Creating Templates for Task Design
DCI Components Scenario / Prompt (SEP, CCC connection)
Sample Student Work
Most continental and ocean floor features are the result of geological activity and earthquakes along plate boundaries.The exact patterns depend on whether the plates are being pushed together to create mountains or deep ocean trenches, being pulled apart to form new ocean floor at mid-ocean ridges, or sliding pasteach other along surface faults. Most distributions of rocks within Earth’s crust, including minerals, fossil fuels, and energy resources, are a direct result of the historyof plate motions and collisions and the corresponding changes in the configurations of the continents and ocean basins.
Present students with an illustration or drawing of volcano formation at a subduction zone, then:Ask students to create a “storyboard” of 3-4 drawings showing what will happen in the future at the zone, labeling the plates and directions of movement in each picture and writing text to describe what is causing the changes [developing/using models; cause and effect].
“The oceanic plate is moving underneath the continental plate. The plate is moving toward the continent because mantle convection from an ocean trench somewhere is driving it that way. It moves underneath because it is denser than the continental plate.”
Developing and Using a ModelPresent students with an illustration or drawing of a scientific process, then:Ask students to label the components, interactions, and mechanisms in the model, and Write a prediction about something that might happen in the future that could be explained by the model
http://tinyurl.com/NGSSTaskTypes
Task Types for Integrating Practices
More NGSS Assessment Resources
NRC (2014): Designing Assessments for the NGSShttp://www.nap.edu/catalog/18409/developing-assessments-for-the-next-generation-science-standards
Achieve’s Classroom Sample Taskshttp://www.nextgenscience.org/classroom-sample-assessment-tasks
More NGSS Assessment Resources
NSTA PDI on NGSS and Assessmenthttp://learndbir.org/talks-and-papers/nsta-2015-pdi-developing-next-generation-science-assessments
STEM Teaching Toolshttp://stemteachingtools.org
National Science Teachers AssociationNSTA Session: How to Make Science Instruction Compelling to Students: Designing Formative Assessments to Build on Learners' Interests AND KnowledgeThursday, March 31 3:30 PM - 4:30 PMRenaissance Nashville Hotel, Fisk Two
Learn formative assessment approaches for discovering and building on students' interests and knowledge in support of 3-D science learning.
Presenter(s): Philip Bell (University of Washington: Seattle, WA), William Penuel (University of Colorado Boulder: Boulder, CO), Katie Van Horne (University of Colorado Boulder: Boulder, CO)FORMAT: Hands-On WorkshopGRADE LEVEL: 1 - 12SUBJECT: General Science Education
Learn more at:researchandpractice
.org
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A Continuum of AssessmentsAssessment of Student Learning
Kathy Comfort, WestEd
1.
Why Do We Assess?
Assessment is the primary feedback mechanism in the educational system…
Provides information to students on how well they are performingProvides information to teachers about how well students are learning and if modifications to instruction are needed Provides information to parents, districts, and policymakers
No single assessment can serve all of these needs
2.
A Continuum of Assessments
A range of different assessment strategies are necessary at the classroom, district and state levels to measure 3-D learning
New assessment systems will need to include a continuum of components:
Short Cycle or Formative Assessments: Assessments designed to inform day-to-day teaching
Medium Cycle or Interim/Benchmark Assessments: To ensure that students are provided adequate opportunities to learn science
Long Cycle or Summative Assessments: Including end-of-course tests and state summative assessments—designed to monitor student learning on a broader scale
3.
A Continuum of Assessments
Short Cycle
Medium Cycle Long Cycle
Formative/Diagnostic
Benchmark/InterimSummative
4.
Classroom AssessmentsShort Cycle:Diagnostic/Formative
• May focus on individual DCIs, SEPs, and/or CCCs or combinations
• Assess students’ prior understanding—what students know and can do before instruction
• Help teachers plan appropriate and engaging instruction
Medium Cycle:Continuous/Formative
• May focus on individual DCIs, SEPs, and/or CCCs or combinations
• Ongoing assessments that provide continuous opportunities for teachers to observe, listen, question, and provide feedback
• The process of seeking and interpreting evidence for use by learners and their teachers to decide where learners are in their learning, where they need to go, and the best way of getting there (ARG 2002)
Long Cycle:Summative
• Focus on measuring DCIs, SEPs, and CCCs through interrelated tasks or assessments with multiple components
• Designed to measure what students have learned after a period of time—at the end of an instructional segment
Classroom Assessments Supporting 3-D Learning
5.
Strategy: Formative Assessment Probes (Keeley, Eberle & Farrin 2007)
Probe: Mountaintop Fossil
4-ESS1-1: Identify evidence from patterns in rock formations and fossils in rock layers to support an explanation for changes in a landscape over time.
(Evidence Statement 1a.)
Diagnostic/Formative Assessments
6.
7.
Key Strategies and Example Techniques for Effective Formative Assessment (Wiliam 2007, Ch. 9)
MS-ESS1-1: Develop and use a model of the Earth-sun-moon system to describe the cyclic patterns of lunar phases, eclipses of the sun and moon, and seasons. Evidence Statement 1a.i,ii,iii
Continuous/Formative Assessments
Strategy Technique Example
Structuring Effective Classroom Discussions, Questions, and Learning Tasks that Elicit Evidence of Learning
Individual Whiteboards During a middle school lesson on Earth’s, Place in the Universe, the teacher asks the class to draw a model of the Earth-moon-sun system in which they identify the relevant components on their white boards. He asks the class to hold them up on the count of three. Using this kind of “all student response system” helps the teacher to get a sense of what students understand while requiring all students to engage in the task. If all models are correct, the teacher moves on. If none are correct, the teacher may choose to re-teach the concept in another way.
8.
9.
Can consist of multiple measures such as performance tasks, constructed response investigations, portfolios, and interactive computer tasks
Takes place through 5-12 class periods over the course of a unit (10 components)
HS-ESS1-6: Apply scientific reasoning and evidence from ancient Earth materials, meteorites, and other planetary surfaces to construct an account of Earth’s formation and early history.
Unraveling Earth’s Early History — High School Classroom Task (Achieve 2015)In this task, students plot and interpret the same observations and data used by scientists to create their own evidence-based narrative that chronicles the early history of Earth. Specifically, students plot and interpret radiometric age dates, tungsten isotope data and oxygen isotope data from surface samples and meteorites as well as surface lunar crater count data to build evidence for the occurrence and/or timing of planetary accretion, planetary cooling, Earth core formation, formation of the Moon and the end of the “heavy bombardment” period. http://www.nextgenscience.org/classroom-sample-assessment-tasks
Summative Assessments
10.
11.
Teacher Student
• Facilitate student growth, understanding, and learning
• Improve classroom practice
• Plan and adapt curricula
• Develop self-directed learners
• Investigate teaching practices
• Provide effective feedback in a timely manner referencing a specific level of skill or knowledge (Wiliam 2007)
• Partners in the classroom assessment process
• Opportunity to help define criteria by which they will be evaluated and learn how to apply these criteria in identifying strengths and weaknesses in their own work
• Self-assessment, peer-assessment, and self-regulation are research based strategies that assist students in improving their own learning (NRC 1999; Darling Hammond, et al., 1995)
The Role of the Teacher and the Role of the Student in Classroom Assessment
12.
Characteristics of NGSS-Aligned Classroom Assessments – NRC Report on NGSS and AssessmentMeasuring 3-D science learning requires assessments that examine students’ performance of scientific and engineering practices (SEP) in the context of cross cutting concepts (CCC) and disciplinary core ideas (DCI).
Assessments need to contain multiple components—sets of interrelated questions—to focus on individual SEPs, DCIs and CCCs. Multi-component tasks can include short and extended answer questions, well-designed select response, technology enhanced items, and performance tasks requiring students to conduct an investigation.
Together—the components need to support inferences about students’ three dimensional science learning as described in the performance expectations.
Teachers need to use a variety of assessment activities that mirror NGSS aligned instruction
13.
Kathy ComfortSTEM [email protected]
14.
Thank you!
Contact information:Susan Sullivan [email protected], 303-492-5657Aida [email protected] [email protected]
Upcoming Events: Webinars: 2nd Thursdays, 1p PT/4p ET
March 10, 2016April 14, 2016May 12, 2016 Ed Geary, “Building a State
Coalition for NGSS-ESS” 7/18-22/16 Earth Educators Rendezvous-abstract
deadline March 1. Workshop, travel stipend➢ Email list:
http://nagt.org/nagt/profdev/workshops/ngss_summit/index.html