In the Beginning....
Before introducing a new topic to students, it is important that teachers know what, if any, prior knowledge our students have. Finding out what students know can be done through a warm-up activity, a class discussion or in formal pre-assessment activity. Because of students' personalities and the fact that some students just like to talk more than others, a great way to pre-assess a class is through a game or quiz. The link below is one example of a very simple pre-assessment quiz that I created for a unit on farm animals for my kindergarten class.
The short quiz lets me know how familiar my students are with the types of animals that live on a farm. It gives me exact numbers of students who know a lot, a little or nothing at all. And, because the whole unit will focus on farm animals, it is good for me to know exactly what my students will need before we start the unit.
The unit that this pre-assessment quiz leads into is a Project-Based unit. The standard this unit is based on is
Literacy in Kindergarten:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.K.7: With prompting and support, describe the relationship between illustrations and the story in which they appear (e.g. what moment in a story an illustration depicts).
Since my Kindergartners will do a reading unit about nonfiction, I will base this project on farm animals. Beginning with the pre-assessment quiz, I will find out what they know so I can begin to help them build their knowledge in an appropriate way for each of them. Then, each student will work with a partner to choose an animal. They will research it through nonfiction books, online videos, games or internet resources that I will provide them with. We will also visit a local farm to see the animals in action. The students can prepare questions to ask the farmers. After finding information about their animals, each group will create a book about its life on the farm, including where it lives on the farm, what it eats, how it is taken care of, and how it helps the farm (cows give milk, chicken gives eggs). They will illustrate their books and write about their animal. The final product will be presented at the "book launch" event with parents and classmates.
With this project, students will apply what they have learned about the connection between illustrations and text to create their own book. Based on research about their farm animal, collaboration, critical thinking, and transposing the information into their book, they create their own final product in their own way.
The Next Step...
After the pre-assessment animal farm quiz, I have a good idea of what my students know. I can differentiate instruction to meet their needs. Let's say that I have three different groups of knowledge:
- Group #1 has the most knowledge and they answered all the farm animal quiz questions correctly
- Group #2 could answer some questions correctly but not all
- Group #3 could not answer any questions correctly
Based on these results, I then create my differentiation plan:
What's Next...
After the pre-assessment and the differentiation strategies to appropriately address each student's level, I would want to see how each group is doing. Part of the tracking progress assessment is seeing the work the students produced when they were working in their groups in the differentiation strategies mentioned above in the chart. Group #1 had a worksheet that they had to come up with two animals that lived on a farm, draw them and answer simple questions about them. Group #2 watched and listened to an online book about farm animals. Then, they chose a farm animal to draw and write one sentence about. Group #3 looked at books about farm animals, then watched a video about farm animals and the sounds they make. Afterwards, they were asked to draw one farm animal, write its name and the sound it makes. Depending on how well they complete these activities after having worked with their group, I will know what the next step will be--more differentiation strategies or working together as a whole class. This is all part of the tracking progress assessment.
Even though I would be observing the groups during their activities, following these activities, I would want to bring the class together and see how they are doing. I would ask my students to come to the rug in front of the SmartBoard. I would ask them to think about the animals they saw with their groups. Then, I would ask them what animals live on a farm. I would also ask them any other information they could tell me about these animals. I would write what they say on the SmartBoard so the whole class could see everyone's answers. After this class discussion I would take note of what students understood about farm animals and which students needed more help for the next lesson. A lot of what we can assess about student progress can be done through observation, but the teacher has to know each student very well.
For the next lesson on our animal farm project, I would begin with an activity to check what they remember from the previous lesson. I would hand out a worksheet with an outline of a farm. A second worksheet would have outlines of various animals--cow, horse, monkey, snake, elephant, chicken, sheep, etc. The students would cut and paste the appropriate animals on the farm. Based on this beginning of class assessment, I can track their progress.
In the End....
Well, there really is no end here. As teachers, we are constantly observing our students and helping them reach their personal learning goals along with common core standard learning goals. From one day to another, students can shift between learning groups and levels depending on the content. Teachers should be flexible and always aware that student ability and knowledge changes. And, to be the best teachers we can be for our students, our techniques and methods should change, too.
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