Discussion 1 Week 5
An indepth discussion of Chapter 8 by Mariella Beck
"Assessment is not about you as a teacher; it is about your students”
Share your perspective on Lopez’s quote and statement above.
Lopez’s quote regarding assessment being about the student and not the teacher, holds particular meaning in the age group I currently teach. I am a young toddler teacher ,at a non- profit center and the assessments we conduct at the center( both in the beginning and the end of the year) must pertain to the child. It is particularly important that these assessments pertain to the children because if the results are altered in order to make the teacher appear more impressive ,a child or several children, may be over looked from a developmental stand point.This may be a very dangerous thing considering at the young ages of 18-24 months there are several developmental milestones that children should meet by the age of 24 months , and if they are not met the child may have a developmental delay . If this delay is not discovered and further taken care of the child may fall behind for years and years to come , especially in a more academic and grade school setting. When teaching such a young age group , early detection of a delay is key in a child receiving help and achieving goals, with the least amount of struggle.
Describe how your mind set has been changed or validated.
My mind set has been further validated by Lopez’s quote because it empowers me to continue to note things about my students and keep up with developmental checklists, that are required of me .It reminds me that in keeping up with these simple assessments, I may benefit the life and well being of a child’s future.
Consider the 4 questions Lopez lists under “Defending our Assessment Practices” (p.98). How might you use these questions in your current or anticipated practice?
In order to fully benefit and use these questions to potential I would simply ask myself these questions and apply them to each assessment when the assessment is given to me. For instance, many of our assessments involve a check list of tasks that the teachers are given, that then we may ask our students to perform in some type of engaging fashion. Most of these tasks are pertaining to fine motor skills, gross motor skills, cognitive skills and many other skills required of young toddlers. If I ask myself these questions, when asking my students to perform tasks, it will help me figure out what skills are used and practiced and in what exercise this is accomplished in. Of course if I find no value in a step of assessment ( which is asked in question number 3) and cannot correlate a skill set that is met in the step ,then I disregard the step. Also question number 4 will help me to understand wether or not I am conducting the assessment properly in order to further analyze the behaviors of my children.
What value might it add to your practice by keeping these questions in mind?
The value that is added by keeping these questions in mind is the certainty that I am properly conducting activities in order to better analyze the behaviors and actions of my children , which may affect them for the rest of their lives.
In what ways have you succeeded/failed to make students your partner in assessment?
I have primarily succeeded in making students my partners in assessments because I often times make assessments in to engaging activities so they may not even know they are being assessed ,thus I can get a better read on their progress.
References
Lopez, D. (2013). No excuses university: How six exceptional systems are revolutionizing our schools (2nd ed.). Turnaround Schools Publications.