Response 1
Michelle Hampton
RE: Discussion 2 - Module 4
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Introduction
Most states and school districts use a combination of tests and assessment tools to identify gifted and talented students. Relying on a single test or instrument to identify gifted students is uninformative and disadvantageous. To do so leaves too much room for error, such as missing students who do not test well and ignoring or discounting test bias. A multidimensional and multimodal assessment approach that collects information in a variety of ways and from a variety of sources is more accurate and equitable in the identification of GT students (Heward et al., 2022). Because of their diverse needs, it is important to asses gifted and talented children in order to give them a meaningful learning experience.
Scenario
Luke is a 10-year-old boy in Grade 5. He has not been formally psychometrically tested. However, Luke’s results from his school-based standardized tests and evidence from the teachers indicate that he performs well in classwork. Since Grade 1, look has been performing well, and his mother suspects that Luke is gifted. He asks a lot of questions, shows a lot of interest in progress, have in-depth information on many things, often want to know why, why not, or how something is so. Luke’s mother is worried that his son might be an underachiever if not given the appropriate learning environment. What is one of the possible assessment tool for Luke?
Reference
Heward, W., Alber-Morgan, S., and Konrad, M. (2022). Exceptional children: An introduction to special education. Pearson
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Response 2
Chukwunonyelum Eneje
RE: Discussion 2 - Module 4
Top of Form
Module 4-discussion 2-EDDD 8083
According to Banerjee & Luckner ( 2013), it states that early childhood educators are most effective when they gather and use assessment data to provide teaching and services to children with and without exceptionalities and their parents. Also, educators should use assessment and intervention to design and apply appropriate programs and service delivery to the children they work with within their setting (Banerjee & Luckner, 2013).
The scenario-
During the writing activity time in the school and other activities that involves writing. A child, Jaina, aged seven years, always writes big letters and words on her paper for every sentence, she wants to write. She finds it difficult to write a word or some words that need to be written in small letters into big letters. Also, mathematics was a struggle and so were writing and reading. When the educator gives her homework to do that is supposed to take her twenty minutes, she spends over two hours, especially in mathematics. The educators always notice that she will just sit there not understanding anything. She loves stories and telling stories but when she is told to read a book, it takes her many weeks or even months to read it because it is hard for her to focus on lines when she reads. And often she skips letters, words or even sentences. The child that was discussed in the scenario was diagnosed. And it was found she has a learning disability, Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity disability (ADHD).
My question is, ‘What are the intervention strategies that could be used by the educators and other professionals to support her learning?’
Reference
Banerjee, R., & Luckner, J. L. (2013). Assessment practices and training needs of early childhood professionals. Journal of Early Childhood Teacher Education, 34 (3), 231-248.https:/doi.org/10.1080/10901027.2013.816808.
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Today’s lesson: Self-directed learning . . . for teachers
William M. Ferriter and Nicholas Provenzano November 1, 2013
Young educators are replacing professional development sessions and conferences with Twitter, blogs, and Edcamps as their preferred ways to learn and share new ideas.
Feeling frustrated by the lack of professional innovation around him, Nicholas Provenzano made a life-altering decision in January 2010: He started a blog and signed up for a Twitter account.
“I’m a 30-year-old English teacher who is currently working on my master’s degree in educational technology,” Provenzano wrote in the first post on his blog, The Nerdy Teacher. “I spend tons of time helping other teachers in my building to incorporate technology into their teaching and thought it would be nice to share these new concepts with the world out there. . . . If you have any thoughts or ideas you would like to share, please feel free to email me or post a comment. Let’s see where this thing takes us” (Provenzano, 2010).
Three years later, “this thing” has taken Provenzano to the pinnacle of his profession. He is a thought leader with nearly 30,000 followers on Twitter — a number that leaves him humbled every day. He is a critical friend of educational technology companies. He is an author and a consultant providing guidance to districts rethinking what today’s classrooms should look like. This year, the International Society for Technology in Education named him its Outstanding Teacher of the Year, an honor given to a practitioner who has “demonstrated outstanding achievement in and understanding of educational technology implementation.”
But if you ask Provenzano, he’ll tell you that what really matters is that “this thing” has given him the opportunity to develop relationships with like-minded peers. He sees himself as an average guy lucky enough to stumble onto the power of networked learning earlier than many of his colleagues. He describes his closest digital friends as family. “Social spaces aren’t about followers,” he says. “They are about connections — and my connections make me a better teacher and a better person every day” (Provenzano, 2012).
Avoiding these self-created intellectual echo chambers depends on educators who intentionally seek out dissenting voices to learn with.
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Networked learning has also pushed Provenzano’s practice in ways that traditional professional development couldn’t. Time spent sharing on his blog, learning from others on Twitter, and participating in nontraditional education conferences called Edcamps have left him constantly exposed to new thinking. By making connections with teachers around the world and seeking professional development specific to him, Provenzano has been able to grow in the areas he needed, not the areas his district decided the majority needed. Personalization has left Provenzano better prepared to help every student in his classroom.
For example, Provenzano devised a project for his students at Grosse Pointe South High School in Michigan that connected students across time zones with Van Meter High School in Iowa to explore and discuss Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” in a new and exciting way. By using his connections on Twitter, Provenzano was able to find another teacher who shared his passion for English language arts and also was looking for a new approach to the classic play. Their students rewrote the play and filmed their own version that was webcast across the globe during a joint world premiere. Throughout the project, members of Provenzano’s network provided conceptual guidance and technical support, giving him the courage and skill necessary to create a new learning opportunity for his students.
The ‘adjacent possible’
Provenzano’s growth in response to the intellectual challenge provided by peers in new learning spaces mirrors the slow, steady innovation that happens in the natural world. Theoretical biologist Stuart Kauffman calls this evolutionary progress responding to the “adjacent possible.” Detailing the adjacent possible in his book Where Good Ideas Come From, author Steven Johnson says the adjacent possible tells us:
[T]hat at any moment the world is capable of extraordinary change, but only certain changes can happen. The strange and beautiful truth about the adjacent possible is that its boundaries grow as you explore those boundaries . . .
Think of it as a house that magically expands with each door you open. You begin in a room with four doors, each leading to a new room that you haven’t visited yet. Those four rooms are the adjacent possible. But once you open one of those doors and stroll into that room, three new doors appear, each leading to a brand- new room that you couldn’t have reached from your original starting point. Keep
opening new doors, and eventually you’ll have built a palace (Johnson, 2010, pp. 363, 372).
Provenzano and thousands of teachers just like him are exploring the boundaries of their practice together on Twitter, in blogs, and at seminars, and they represent a new generation of educators who are actively redefining how innovation occurs in the schoolhouse.
Starting with Twitter
For many of these educators, exposure to adjacent possibilities — the first step toward innovation — starts in the strangest of places: Twitter. The frequently misunderstood service that enables users to post short public messages to the web is often seen as nothing more than a digital home for attention-starved celebrities and political egomaniacs.
But ask around the next faculty meeting, and you’ll find practitioners who swear that the service has become the cornerstone of their professional learning. As John T. Spencer (@edrethink), a 6th-grade teacher in Arizona and Kappan’s Teacher columnist, explains, “Twitter is where I go when I want to talk to teacher friends who are also trying to do project-based learning in environments that are test-obsessed. . . . It’s also a place where people challenge my groupthink and push me to rethink my practice” (Spencer, 2012).
At the most basic level, Twitter allows users to curate content for one another. Drawing from a collection of over 500 education specific hashtags, thousands of practitioners are posting links, blog entries, and lesson plans at any given time. Want to learn more about project-based learning? Visit Twitter and search for #pblchat. Care about school leadership? Try #cpchat or #edleaders. Teach elementary school? Your digital colleagues are using #elemchat to organize.
Twitter can become much more than a tool for simple sharing, though. Connected educators recognize that behind every profile picture is a person walking through similar professional doors. Following other teachers — a one- click commitment that makes important content easier to find by delivering updates directly to a Twitter user’s homepage — can start long-term relationships with thoughtful peers who are willing to serve as professional sounding boards whether they know you in “the real world” or not.
Teachers who use Twitter to build professional networks often want to learn more about and from the people they interact with online. Doing so means embracing RSS feed readers, which educational leadership expert Scott McLeod (@mcleod) calls the most important tool you probably don’t know (McLeod, 2011). Like DVRs, RSS feed readers are free web-based tools that automatically
retrieve new posts from frequently updated blogs for users, making it possible to explore the thinking of other practitioners from one online home. Filling feed readers with the blogs of peers that they follow in other social spaces allows connected educators to think deeply with one another — something that isn’t always possible in an ever-changing Twitter stream.
Symbiotic relationships
The relationship that develops between blog writers and their regular readers is symbiotic. Writers publish thinking designed to challenge their peers, and peers push back in the comment sections of posts, helping writers refine their initial positions. Over time, this intellectual give-and-take strengthens the understandings and professional relationships between authors and their audiences.
Once practitioners discover that social spaces can make customized learning possible and that informal relationships developed online can be powerful, their view of what education conferences should look like changes. Instead of accepting that conferences have to be expensive corporate-sponsored events, connected educators have started holding their own reimagined teaching conferences called Edcamps. Proudly touted as “unconferences,” Edcamps are almost always hosted on school campuses, planned by teams of teachers who have grown to know one another online, and free to attend.
Unlike traditional conferences that can inadvertently stifle innovation by lining up predetermined slates of sessions months in advance, Edcamps start with blank agendas. While participants arrive, practitioners use sticky notes to suggest ideas for sessions. Once strands of interest start to take shape, popular topics are identified, meeting rooms are assigned, and facilitators volunteer to lead individual sessions. After the agenda has been filled, teachers select the topics they want to learn more about. Edcamps are different because presentations are openly discouraged. Instead, sessions are designed to be conversations between like-minded peers. “Attendees are called participants because sessions are expected to be interactive, not simply one person standing at the front of the room lecturing while the audience passively listens and struggles to stay awake,” explained instructional technologist Jennifer Scheffer (@jlscheffer) after attending her first Edcamp in the spring of 2013 (Scheffer, 2013).
In a sense, unconferences are physical representations of the self-directed, evolutionary learning that takes place in social spaces like Twitter. Highly motivated participants give up personal time to connect over topics that are relevant to them. Edcamp Cincy organizer M.E. Steele-Pierce (@steelepierce), a
retired Ohio educator, says the personal, social, and voluntary nature of the learning at Edcamps mirrors the changing nature of learning in today’s connected world. “Unconferences matter,” she writes, “because they harness the power of authentic learning” (Steele-Pierce, 2011).
Unconferences are also physical opportunities for educators to meet digital peers for the first time. Relationships that start online are cemented in person, and relationships cemented in person continue in digital networks long after unconferences end. “One of the most powerful aspects . . . was online community turned real community — that in 140 characters on Twitter, bit by bit, you create connections with other educators,” said Carolyn Foote (@technolibrary), a librarian in Texas, as she reflected on nontraditional teaching conferences. “When you meet them, it’s like you are just picking up the conversation where you left off, not like meeting them for the first time” (Foote, 2008).
Harness the power of connections
Educators who have embraced new learning spaces often display a passionate commitment to the tools, the process, and their peers. Some have said they learn more in shorter time periods in their Twitter stream or at Edcamps than hours in professional development sessions. So what is it that makes social spaces and unconferences powerful forums for spreading innovation?
Instead of signing up for staff development sessions scheduled weeks in advance, advice in social spaces is literally a Tweet, a blog post, or an unconference away.
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The answer is that innovation happens when minds come together to share ideas. Traditionally, that sharing required people to be in the same place at the same time. Today, sharing ideas can happen anytime, anywhere. Whether they are poking through Twitter streams on smartphones before the morning bell rings, reading blog entries on iPads while sitting in waiting rooms, or extending conversations started at unconferences on laptops while unwinding after a long day of work, digitally connected teachers are tapping into what Clay Shirky and Dan Pink call “the great spare time revolution.” As Shirky explains:
Somehow, watching television became a part-time job for every citizen in the developed world. But once we stop thinking of all that time as individual minutes to be whiled away and start thinking of it as a social asset that can be harnessed, it all looks very different. The buildup of this free time among the world’s educated population — maybe a trillion hours per year — is a new resource. It’s what I refer to as the cognitive surplus (Wired, 2010).
New learning spaces are also personalized. Instead of sitting in staff development sessions designed to deliver one message to entire faculties, practitioners learning in new social spaces are exploring their own professional boundaries, customizing their learning in a way impossible to replicate in traditional settings.
Finally, new learning spaces provide teachers with instant answers to questions and instant access to up-to-date information curated by practitioners with expertise. Teachers with a strong network of digital colleagues — or a spare Saturday morning to spend at an Edcamp — can get support for any challenge. Instead of signing up for staff development sessions scheduled weeks in advance, advice in social spaces is literally a Tweet, a blog post, or an unconference away.
Challenges of being connected
As powerful as the changing nature of innovation has been, practitioners who embrace new learning spaces need to be aware of the following pitfalls.
Balance: The greatest challenge for teachers drawn to social spaces or unconferences is recognizing that personalization — customizing streams of information that resonate with our own vision for what teaching and learning should look like — can leave us with professional blind spots.
“By rights, the Internet should be doing more than anything else to open our eyes to new perspectives and experiences,” said technology writer Allan Martin. Instead, he adds, “We’re moving away from that: As the web becomes increasingly tailored to the individual, we’re more likely than ever to be served personalized content that makes us happy and keeps us clicking. That happy content is seldom anything that challenges our viewpoint, and there’s a risk that this distorts our view of the wider world outside our browser” (Martin, 2013).
Avoiding these self-created intellectual echo chambers depends on educators who intentionally seek out dissenting voices to learn with. The primary goal of social spaces should be to challenge, instead of to simply confirm, what we already know and believe.
Accuracy: While the Internet has given everyone the power to publish, no one is actively policing content created for the web. As a result, ideas that are poorly researched or advanced by individuals with agendas can spread quickly in today’s connected learning ecology. That means teachers must become critical consumers of the information that they come across in any learning space.
Recognition: Teachers also must note that most educators don’t view learning in social spaces or at unconferences as valid forms of professional development. If connected educators want this to change, they must systematically document the
effect that nontraditional learning opportunities are having on their practice. Archiving individual Twitter messages or blog posts that led to meaningful changes in instruction can provide the tangible evidence that districts need in order to officially recognize time spent in networked spaces as formal learning.
And if school leaders want this to change, they must understand that professional development isn’t an all-or-nothing proposition. Districts that fear their chosen professional development path will be undermined by new learning spaces are missing the bigger picture. Instead of squaring off against Twitter, blogs, and unconferences, districts should be partnering with the leaders of new learning spaces to create additional opportunities for their faculties to be exposed to innovative ideas.
Paying it forward
Nicholas Provenzano had a simple goal when he started Tweeting and blogging: He wanted to share what he knew about his classroom with the world. In return, the world has shared what it knows with him. Nontraditional learning spaces have allowed him to connect to individuals, ideas, and opportunities that have improved his practice. Provenzano is convinced that his new skills would not have developed within the traditional model of schoolhouse innovation, where his growth plan would have been determined by someone else, his learning time would have been scheduled months in advance, and his access to ideas would have been limited to the expertise of people he was learning with in person. Blogs, Twitter, and unconferences have let Provenzano regain his intellectual agency and take ownership over his professional growth.
There has never been a better time for educators to take ownership of their learning. Too often, educators are treated like students, argues educational consultant Dean Shareski (@shareski). “If we want students to take ownership of their learning,” he writes, “shouldn’t we want the same for teachers?” (Shareski, 2013). Preparing an ever-changing student population for an ever- changing world requires a highly skilled workforce. No teacher can single- handedly meet the demands of today’s classroom. Instead, teachers must rely on the expertise of others to improve their craft. And no school system can single- handedly meet the developmental needs of every teacher it employs. With shrinking budgets and more time dedicated to testing, districts should instead support practitioners who use new tools and spaces to find sources for intellectual challenge. Organizational capacity increases when control over learning is handed to motivated learners.
References
Foote, C. (2008, January 28). Picking up the conversation where we left off. Not So Distant Future. http://futura.edublogs.org/2008/01/28/picking-up-the- conversation-where-we-left-off/
Johnson, S. (2010). Where good ideas come from: The natural history of innovation. New York, NY: Riverhead Books.
Martin, A. (2013, May 1). The web’s “echo chamber” leaves us none the wiser. Wired UK. www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-05/1/online- stubbornness
McLeod, S. (2011, September). The most important tool you probably don’t know. The School Administrator, 68 (8), 8.
Provenzano, N. (2010, January 2). The nerdy teacher. The Nerdy Teacher. www.thenerdyteacher.com/2010/01/nerdy-teacher.html
Provenzano, N. (2012, May 28). Where I am and how I got here. The Nerdy Teacher. www.thenerdyteacher.com/2012/05/where-i-am-and-how-i-got- here.html
Scheffer, J. (2013, May 6). Thoughts from an Edcamp rookie: Educators connecting and making progress. The Future of Educational Leadership. http://jennscheffer.wordpress.com/2013/05/06/thoughts-from- an-edcamp-rookie-educators-connecting-and-making-progress/
Shareski, D. (2013, June 21). Professional development is not that complicated. Ideas and Thoughts. http://ideasandthoughts.org/2013/06/21/professional-development- is-not-that-complicated/
Spencer, J. (2012, November 21). Twitter isn’t a tool. Education Rethink. www.educationrethink.com/2012/11/twitter-isnt-tool.html
Steele-Pierce, M.E. (2011, March 7). Unconference: Revolutionary professional learning. Powerful Learning Practice. http://plpnetwork.com/2011/03/07/unconference-revolutionary- professional-learning/
Wired. (2010, May 24). Cognitive surplus: The great spare-time revolution. Wired. www.wired.com/magazine/2010/05/ff_pink_shirky/
CITATION: Ferriter, W.M. & Provenzano, N. (2013). Today’s lesson: Self-directed learning . . . for teachers. Phi Delta Kappan, 95 (3), 16-21.
4
Effective Selection and Planning for Assessment
Institution
Professor
Student
Date
How to Assess Play
Kindergarten
The kindergarten group consists of young children aged between two and four years. The kindergarten children are also known as "playgroups" because they spend much time at the gardens for the purpose of play and companionship. Play is essential in kindergarten because it builds imagination and creativity, fosters cognitive growth, and builds the children's behaviors and emotions. Play improves children's literacy levels, promotes independence in daily activities, and improves physical fitness to enable the children to lead healthy lives. The benefits of play outweigh the risks; thus, parents and educators should encourage the kindergarten group to engage in more play (Rowley, 2015).
Play builds creativity and imagination when the children create make-believe games and get lost in pretend worlds. The children imagine themselves in a fantasy world and act out different solutions to boost their confidence and survive in the imagined worlds. Play enables children to imagine one subject as another and uses objects to represent other objects; for example, they can use a stick instead of a spoon or a bowl for a pot. Play promotes brain development by increasing neural connections in the brain to enable children to think and act with maturity. They play to reduce anxiety, irritability, and stress and boost joy and self-esteem. Like adults, kindergarten children require activities to acquire behavioral and emotional benefits (DeLuca et al., 2019).
Play improves literacy by helping the children learn new words from the play environments as described by adults. Children pay more attention to classwork and other daily activities after unstructured play. They develop independence by deciding what to do during play instead of waiting for direction from the teachers and parents. Play enables students to create their own experiences and learn how to live with others, and tackle other tasks together. Physical play promotes children's physical fitness and development. They sharpen reflexes, improve gross motor skills and increase cardiovascular function. Play improves a kindergarten's mental system (Danniels et al., 2020).
The developmentally appropriate practices related to kindergarten play assessment include determining the children's ability to master letters and numbers, know the sounds of each letter, and identify sight words. Assessment in play will include the teachers observing the children as they play alone or with others and analyzing their reactions based on various play activities. The assessments enable teachers to determine appropriate play-based interventions. Teachers gather authentic assessment data based on how children solve problems, regulate emotions and interact with peers. Assessors respect each child's age and individual needs to create a sense of belonging and involvement and boost the children's cognitive and mental fitness. Other practices include model reading and writing behavior, responsive conversations, and nurturing individual children's relationships (Pyle et al., 2020).
The assessments are looking for authenticity and conceptual benefits of kindergarten play. The teachers learn the children's cognitive development and measure objective behaviors by examining cross-domain kindergarten relationships. Assessment enables teachers to determine kindergarten's social-emotional, learning approaches and language developmental areas and support the children through the various growth stages. The assessments help the teachers communicate important children's development milestones to the parents and guardians or directly to the children. Parents and teachers work together to improve children's welfare mental and cognitive skills. Kindergarten evaluation is essential in determining children's growth and functioning. Assessment tracks children's growth and development and helps teachers and parents to make informed decisions about improving their children's lives (Kelly-Vance & Ryalls, 2020).
References
Danniels, E., Pyle, A., & DeLuca, C. (2020). The role of technology in supporting classroom assessment in play-based kindergarten. Teaching and Teacher Education, 88, 102966.
DeLuca, C., Pyle, A., Roy, S., Chalas, A., & Danniels, E. (2019). Perspectives on Kindergarten Assessment: Toward a Common Understanding. Teachers College Record, 121(3), 1-58.
Kelly-Vance, L., & Ryalls, B. O. (2020). Play-Based Approaches to Preschool Assessment. In Psychoeducational Assessment of Preschool Children (pp. 160-177). Routledge.
Pyle, A., DeLuca, C., Danniels, E., & Wickstrom, H. (2020). A model for assessment in play-based kindergarten education. American Educational Research Journal, 57(6), 2251-2292.
Rowley, B. (2015). Kindergarten assessment: Analysis of the child behavioral rating scale (CBRS).
Discussion
Student’s Name
Institutional Affiliate
Date
Readiness, Emerging Content Knowledge, and Intervention Assessments This article will explore evaluations that target kindergarten readiness abilities, developing topic understanding, and intervention. This article will describe in detail how these evaluations are utilized to address the three categories mentioned above. This information may be utilized to influence teaching and learning for the selected age range, as well as shared with families. Modifying developing subject knowledge exams for dual language learners and children with impairments will also be discussed.
Assessing a child's preparedness is critical to effective education. Preschool readiness tests are one way to measure kindergarten preparedness. Preschool readiness is measured in four domains: language and literacy, arithmetic, physical development, and social skills. Readiness checks are credible and trustworthy judgments (NAEYC, 2011). Readiness tests assist instructors vary teaching and overcome learning gaps by identifying children's strengths and shortcomings. During the first several weeks of school, instructors assess each child's preparation for kindergarten by observing, asking questions, and assessing performance (Ready at Five, 2020). Readiness checks are associated with the early learning and developmental standards and coincide with the state content requirements for kindergarten. This form of evaluation gives the instructor a picture of a child's knowledge compared to peers. Observations are another useful tool.
Teachers might use observations to learn more about a child's classroom behavior. Observations help instructors learn about a child's growth, interests, and needs. Observations are not one-time appraisals of a child's ability. Teachers may gather data on a child's habits and activities by continuously observing them. For example, a teacher could notice a youngster doesn't connect with books or write, and wonder what it means for the child. Observations enable instructors to gather information on a kid's development and needs across several domains, enabling them to see the child as a whole (Gillis, West., & Coleman, 2010).
Observations help instructors change classroom procedures, diversify education, and offer accommodations for kids. In order to better fulfill the needs of children, teachers might use observation data to "reflect on the classroom atmosphere, curriculum, and teaching practices" (Gillis, West, & Coleman, 2010, para. 12). A teacher may acquire statistics regarding a child's growth and development by observing and recording their work throughout a year. This information helps instructors to arrange successful tailored education for each kid.
Exams are not the greatest or most progressive way to evaluate pupils, particularly kindergarteners. Students are at varying levels and talents at this time. Student-led conferencing is one technique to evaluate kindergarteners' topic understanding. Student-led conferencing is a kind of student-engaged evaluation (ASCD, 2014). Individual meetings with pupils allow instructors to concentrate on their specific needs and talents. Through conferencing, instructors may learn more about their students' thought processes, what they know, why they struggle, and how they might help them. A reliable evaluation delivers dependable data to the instructor.
Anecdotal notes are another technique to evaluate kindergarten children' increasing topic mastery. These are brief narrative descriptions of student actions in relation to curriculum, arts, social and emotional development, and physical development (Bates, Schenck, & Hoover, 2019). Anecdotal notes enable teachers to swiftly take notes without disturbing pupils. These comments might help students monitor their development over time. These comments may be used to evaluate student work and track student progress toward objectives. Anecdotal notes drive teaching and help teachers decide modifications required for particular pupils.
English language learners often have a firm command of their native language by kindergarten. When evaluating ELL kids, teachers must recognize their unique obstacles. The pupils' capacity to acquire and display information may be hampered by their inability to comprehend and utilize English. The tests employed by teachers must match the child's language ability (Government of Ontario, n.d.). Portfolios may be constructed to test skills and subject understanding.
Portfolios are meant to be comprehensive and honest (Gomez, 2000). Portfolio assessments for ELL students may give a comprehensive picture of their abilities and development. Portfolios may be used to evaluate student work throughout year. Portfolios may be used to gather descriptive records of student work throughout the year. Portfolios include information, work examples, and assessments of student progress (Colorn Colorado, 2016). Portfolios may aid in teaching. A teacher can rapidly assess a child's needs by looking at their work. When dealing with ELL students, teachers should provide them chances to demonstrate what they know and can accomplish in English. Portfolios allow teachers to illustrate students' progress in a number of ways.
Examining pupils with impairments is difficult. Students with learning difficulties struggle with testing and cannot finish examinations. However, assessing all pupils is vital because it allows them to display knowledge, competence, and comprehension (Watson, 2019). Checklists may be used to examine kids with learning impairments. Checklists are a great approach to track a child's growth. Checklists may assist teachers evaluate whether or not students with learning difficulties have reached or are fulfilling their goals and learning objectives. These checklists may help teachers plan future lessons to meet students' requirements.
When evaluating pupils, it is critical to tell parents of their child's development. Parents may use the techniques given to evaluate all pupils to track their child's growth, analyze their strengths and shortcomings, and plan how to help them at home. During kindergarten, instructors must report the child's progress and success in relation to the learning requirements.
References
ASCD. (2014). When students lead their learning. Retrieved from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar14/vol71/num06/When- Students-Lead-TheirLearning.aspx
Bates, C., Schenck, S., & Hoover, H. (2019). Quick and east notes: Practical strategies for
busy teachers. Retrieved from https://www.naeyc.org/resources/pubs/tyc/oct2019/practical-strategies-teachers
Colorín Colorado. (2016). Using informal assessments for English language learners.
Retrieved from https://www.colorincolorado.org/article/using-informal-assessments- english-language-learners
Gomez, E. (2000). Assessment portfolios: Including english language learners in large-scale assessments. Retrieved from https://www.ericdigests.org/2001-3/large.htm
Government of Ontario. (n.d.). Supporting english language learners in kindergarten: A practical guide for ontario educators. Retrieved from http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/document/kindergarten/index.html
Gillis, M., West, T., & Coleman, M. (2010). Assessment in early childhood. Retrieved from http://www.getreadytoread.org/screening-tools/supportive-materials-for- elors/assessment-in-early-childhood
NAEYC. (2011). Developing kindergarten readiness and other large-scale assessment systems. Retrieved from http://nieer.org/wpcontent/uploads/2012/03/Assessment_Systems.pdf
Ready at Five. (2020). How is school readiness measured? Retrieved from https://www.readyatfive.org/school-readiness-data/how-is-school-readiness- measured.html
Watson, S. (2019). Assessing students with special needs. Retrieved from https://www.thoughtco.com/assessing-students-with-special-needs-3110248
2
Observation Reflection
Name
Department, Institutional Affiliation
Course
Instructor
Date
Observation Reflection
There are various strengths and weaknesses that I found about the instruments that are utilized to observe children play in early childhood education and assessment settings. The instruments, for instance, offer comprehensive data about the children’s details and demographic characteristics. They also facilitate the process of easy documentation of evidence in a sequential and organized fashion. Moreover, the tools provide objective, subjective, and descriptive evidences that can be used to inform the process of developing the appropriate interventions for improving the learning, growth, and development process. More specifically, the tools are appropriate for gathering baseline data regarding the children’s interests, capabilities, and skill levels. This is especially important when it comes to designing structured, free flowing instructions for improving both their cognitive and intellectual capabilities.
While these instruments provide efficacious strategies for observing and assessing children playing, they have many shortcomings. The tools are, for instance, time-consuming. This is especially the case since it is difficult to keep up and follow along as children move speedily form one activity to another. Moreover, they may not easily offer practical techniques for educators to be keen to understand the concepts behind the observed phenomena. More importantly, the behaviors that are observed may not necessarily typical for that observation day as compared to other days. This problem can potentially affect the validity and reliability of the observed findings.
I believe that the instruments should be modified to take into consideration factors such as time, date, and settings of the observed behaviors. This should include the details of the children being incorporated into the observation process. The instruments should also be adjusted to incorporate different observation methods in order to gather reliable and accurate data. Further, the modification should take into consideration the cultural factors that may pose obstruction to the gathering of accurate information about the observed behavior of each student group. Finally, the observation instruments need to accommodate environmental rating scales into the evaluation process. These scales may be based on state standards, and utilize evidence-based guidelines, procedures, and actins for evaluation and recommendations.
To promote fair assessment, the proposed instruments will have clearly stated learning outcomes, which are shared to all learners. This will enable them understand the most important goals that are to be take into consideration in the overall evaluation process. The assessment exercise is also going to be matched with what is being taught and vice versa (Scott et al., 2014). If, for instance, the students are expected to demonstrate effective reading skills, then the evaluation will not prematurely assume that they have all undergone the entire learning process or program to train those skills that have already been developed. Fairness and equity will also be promoted by utilizing different measures and outcomes. This strategy will be accompanied by the incorporation of appropriate measures for engaging all the student groups. To that end, the performance of field-dependent students, and those who tend to think more broadly than analytically, may be impacted by the entire classroom’s expressions of confidence in their capacity. Therefore, positive contact with the students from non-western cultures will be helpful in optimizing their levels of engagement, and overall performance and productivity.
The instruments will also promote developmentally-appropriate (DAP) assessment and learning in various ways. To that end, they will include both formal and informal tools for monitoring their progress, especially when they know where each child is with regard to learning goals. This will be done by utilizing developmentally, culturally, and linguistically responsive ways that authentically evaluate their learning outcomes (Goldstein, 2015). This can be done by analyzing all aspects of development, including cognitive, emotional, and intellectual skills. Additionally, both formative and summative evaluation techniques should embraced to attain DAP standards.
References
Goldstein, L. S. (2015). Using Developmentally Appropriate Practices to Teach the Common
Core: Grades PreK–3. Routledge.
Scott, S., Webber, C. F., Lupart, J. L., Aitken, N., & Scott, D. E. (2014). Fair and equitable
assessment practices for all students. Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy &
Practice, 21(1), 52-70.
Assignment 3: Learning Outcomes Project Components Revision and Organization
To prepare:
· If you have not done so already, examine carefully any feedback from your Instructor for each part of the Learning Outcomes Project listed for this Assignment. Revise and edit as needed and make sure each element required has been addressed. Use the rubric for each assignment as a guide. Cite and reference using APA guidelines, adding new resources as needed.
As you organize and review these parts into one document, reflect on the topics and themes of your research and work and how you might introduce the content covered in Parts 2 through 4 for your readers.
Note that the Introduction and Part 1 of the Final Paper/Learning Outcomes Project will be completed during Module 5 in Week 10, at which point you will submit the final MA for the course, including all assigned parts.
Collect and organize the previously assigned Parts of the Learning Outcomes Project into one document:
Part 2: Effective Selection and Planning for Assessment
· Assigned in: Module 2 Week 4, Assignment 1
Part 3: Developmentally Appropriate Assessment Practices
· Assigned in: Module 1, Discussion 1, Initial Discussion Post, Module 2 Week 3, Initial Discussion Post, Module 3 Week 5, Initial Discussion Post
Part 4: Assessments for Readiness Skills, Emerging Content Knowledge, and Intervention
· Assigned in: Module 3 Week 6, Assignment 2
By Day 7 of Week 8
Madaus, J., Rinaldi, C., Bigaj, S., & Chafouleas, S. M. (2009). An examination of current assessment practices in northeastern school districts. Assessment for Effective Interventions, 34(2), 86–93. .
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