ELEMENTARY CURRICULUM UPDATE
October 21, 2013
Upcoming Dates to Note:
October 21: Survey for Grade 3 Unit 2 sent to teachers
October 28: Survey for Grade 3 Unit 2 dueOctober 28-31: Fifth Grade Math Placement Test Window
October 30: Grade 3 Quarter 1 Revision meeting (C Building room 114; sub code 053)
November 1: District PD Day
November 20-21: Math Pilot Follow-up meetings (C Building Room 232; sub code 053)
K-2 Reminder to Teachers for Unit Revisions
Mastery Connect and Unit Information by Grade Level
For all grade levels, I want to remind you that while you will see both Summative and Formative Assessments in your trackers, the Formative assessments do not have to be put into MC (but should all still be given). If you want to remove them from your tracker, you do have the option to delete the formative assessments.
When using a rubric, I have set up each category as a separate question, using the highest number of points for "A", with "B" being one less, and so on. For example, on an assessment that uses the district writing rubric, the first section, organization and focus, would be marked "A" if they child received a 3 in that section, "B" if they received a 2, and "C" if they received a 1. I am trying to add this information somewhere in the system so that teachers can see it when they access the assessment, but there is currently not a way to do so. I have contacted Mastery Connect and they have forwarded the request to their product development team, so we may have an answer to this soon. In the meantime, I will add these type of directions to the rubric document, which will be on HowellNET.
Kindergarten:
- The Summative Assessments for Units 3 & 4 for 2nd quarter, as well as 3 formative assessments should have been added to your ELA tracker.
- If you want to include your Formative 1 for Unit 3 (Sequence the Seasons), you will need to add a tracker aligned to the Missouri Course and Grade Level Expectations for Science. This is a formative assessment, so it is up to you whether or not you put it into MC.
- The Summative Reading and Writing Assessments for 2nd quarter, as well as 2 formative assessments will be added to your ELA tracker this week.
Second Grade:
- In order to see the pre- and post-test on map skills for Unit 3, you will need to add a tracker aligned to the Missouri Course and Grade Level Expectations for Social Studies.
- In order for MC to accept this test, I had to re-number the questions. You will find the updated assessment, with that re-numbering, in your resources folder on HowellNET and on MC.
- LOOKING FOR SMART NOTEBOOKS? Beginning with Unit 3, the SMART Notebook files have moved. While one of the writers has been doing a lot of work to put these together, they are not an official curriculum document, but will be available in the Teacher share area in your Unit file on HowellNET.
- The Summative Reading and Writing Assessments for 2nd quarter, as well as 4 formative assessments will be added to your ELA tracker this week.
- Some of you are still working on getting your assessment information in MC for 1st quarter. Here are the tips that might help as you are doing that.
- #1-8 multiple choice answers are in MC.
- #9-11 scores on opinion of product comparison. See scoring guide in Mastery Connect for requirements for each question and scores. (A= 4, B= 3, C= 2, D= 1, E= 0)
- #12 postcard with 4 details about Greece. See scoring guide in Mastery Connect for requirements of each score. (A= 4, B= 3, C= 2, D= 1, E= 0)
- When you get to the 2nd quarter assessment, # 1-10 will be graded with a rubric. This rubric will be available on HowellNET this week. #11-12 are multiple choice, and the answers will be in MC.
Student IBD Reports available on HowellNET
Dr. Williams has placed the student IBD reports on HowellNet. You can find them by going to the Elementary Collaboration Site> Elementary Student IBD Reports> 2013 IBD Student Reports – Final (Elementary Copy).
Article: when and how to group students
A question that frequently arises in our classrooms is whether to group homogeneously or heterogeneously. My preference has always been heterogeneously grouped classes in which children receive reading instruction at their level in some combination of:
- guided reading groups
- individualized reading with one-to-one conferencing
- flexible grouping based on needs or interests
- literature circles.
http://teachersnetwork.org/ntol/howto/childlit/hetgroup.htm