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https://www.amazon.com/Social-Emotional-Learning-Brain-Strategies-Students/dp/1416629491

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Listen to the recording of the student reading. Follow along using the book images. As you listen, decide what you would compliment, what you would teach and how you would model and coach this teaching point. Record your thinking in the organizer provided.

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Formative assessments matter because teachers make important instructional decisions based on the data they provide.

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Reprint: F0606C

Offering customers too many product choices may decrease their sense of well-being.

Marketers assume that the more choices they offer, the more likely customers will be able to find just the right thing. They assume, for instance, that offering 50 styles of jeans instead of two increases the chances that shoppers will find a pair they really like. Nevertheless, research now shows that there can be too much choice; when there is, consumers are less likely to buy anything at all, and if they do buy, they are less satisfied with their selection.

A version of this article appeared in the June 2006 issue of Harvard Business Review.

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Reprint: F0606C Offering customers too many product choices may decrease their sense of well-being.

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TED Talk Subtitles and Transcript: Psychologist Barry Schwartz takes aim at a central tenet of western societies: freedom of choice. In Schwartz's estimation, choice has made us not freer but more paralyzed, not happier but more dissatisfied.

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https://www.amazon.com/New-Science-Teaching-Instructional-Competency-Based/dp/1943874964

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Risk. Fail. Rise. A Teacher's Guide to Learning from Mistakes

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Risk. Fail. Rise. A Teacher's Guide to Learning from Mistakes

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https://www.heinemann.com/products/e11247.aspx

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3 Keys to Effective Exit Tickets in the Classroom

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How to Differentiate Instruction in Academically Diverse Classrooms, Third Edition (Tomlinson, Carol Ann) (z-lib.org)

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The New Art & Science of Teaching Chapter 2 - Using Assessments

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The New Art & Science of Teaching Chapter 2 - Using Assessments

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The New Art and Science of Teaching Chapter 2 Assessments

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Differentiated Instruction

By considering what students need to know, their interests, and how learning will be assessed, teachers can differentiate assignments.

Planning: Content, processes, and products

Learner access: Readiness, interests, and learning preferences

Environment

Differentiating for the needs of all learners is an important focus that many teachers across the world share. We want our students to have a year-plus growth in courses, whether they're struggling with core basics, are just at the appropriate skill level, or have understanding that exceeds the learning outcomes of the curriculum. These are the key elements to consider in differentiating instruction:

Much has been written to help teachers think about and provide differentiated experiences for learners that align and explain these elements. However, the question and challenge that I hear and observe from teachers most often is: how do we effectively plan intentional differentiation that we can implement and evaluate with the same confidence and understanding as traditional lessons? The answer that follows is based on a change in how to use the planning elements-content, processes, and products-for differentiation, which is finding traction in classrooms that are using this approach.

A Three-Pronged Approach to Planning for Differentiation

Part 1: Content. Content is what students need to know, understand, and do something with. When identifying these outcomes, we also shape the assessment(s) by how learners can demonstrate what they understand. Success comes from teachers accomplishing two steps for this task.

First, identify the specific skills and concepts that students must achieve. This is what gets measured and analyzed through a variety of assessments. Unpacking the skills and concepts enables teachers to track student learning progress for areas of additional support for learners with significant gaps and learners who are ready for complexity beyond the content expectations of the lesson. This understanding enables teachers, instructional coaches, and supervisors to be on the same page as to what students need to learn through intentional differentiation.

Second, collect data on what the students bring to the focused content. Sometimes, this step is viewed as finding strategies for planning differentiation. That is a mistake. Meeting learner needs means knowing what opportunities they bring to the lesson based on what they already know and what challenges exist, based on gaps in core areas of need. Examples of student data to collect prior to planning include life experiences and interests outside of school and academic skills. Using strategies like K-W-L charts or need to knows is one way to find out what learners already know about the topic. Their level of understanding of the content should be factored into the planning. No student feels engaged with a lesson or session that delivers content they have long since mastered. This stage of planning also helps to confirm gaps in knowledge.

Educators should collect information about students' interests and passions that may relate to, or give them background for, applications of the content. This data can lead to rich learning experiences, such as providing informational text to read and analyze from articles about sports or Minecraft if many students identify those as areas of interest.

Accomplishing these two steps helps to ensure that the educators feel well prepared about the specific curriculum expectations at a targeted level. It also ensures that teachers are fully aware of what students bring to the content in terms of opportunities and areas of challenge.

Part 2: Processes. Process is about the different ways that students make sense of the content. Students need frequent experiences of sense-making through a variety of different ways and opportunities. Teachers make this happen through lessons that are made up of a series of activities.

Differentiation through processes is applied in one or more of these activities that make up the lesson. Teachers might start with differentiating one activity. As confidence and experience grows, most lesson activities can be differentiated. The focus of intentional differentiation for process is based on students' content opportunities and challenges. It also incorporates at least one of the learner access elements: readiness, interests, and learning preferences.

Here are two examples.

English: Using details in writing through learning centers. Each center focuses on a different type of detail strategy: example, facts, and sensory detail. Each center includes two options and students choose one to complete.

Math: Understanding the parts and functions of fractions through think dots. Students are put into groups based on their readiness skill level to complete a tiered activity where they all must complete the focus skills. Each group collaborates to solve the six tasks in a random order of choice.

Part 3: Products. Products are the artifacts that students create to show what they know and do not know. These products vary in format both small and large, such as quizzes, reflections, discussions, multimedia, social media tools, and performance tasks.

Intentional differentiation is based on how to leverage what's known about students' content opportunities and challenges. Also, use at least one of the learner access elements: readiness, interests, and learning preferences. These experiences range from practice to learn to assessment checks on progress. There is much flexibility to provide learners with a range of opportunities and experiences to help them make connections and extend their learning while maintaining the content focus.

Driving Forward With Differentiation

Explore this approach for reflecting and planning for students' needs through differentiation. Using content, processes, and products as planning steps provides a clear and concise approach toward choosing strategies and activities based on learner needs that align with the lesson outcomes. This resource curation portal offers ideas to build into your plan, and this differentiation guide offers more insights and a differentiation planning criteria checklist to start your planning journey.

This structure not only empowers student learning but also gives educators common language for collaborative professional opportunities to discuss, implement, and build stronger experiences that meet the needs of all their learners.

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A Practical Guide to Planning for Intentional Differentiation

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By considering what students need to know, their interests, and how learning will be assessed, teachers can differentiate assignments.

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How can a teacher keep a reading class of 25 on the same page when four students have dyslexia, three students are learning English as a second language, two others read three grade levels ahead, and the rest have widely disparate interests and degrees of enthusiasm about reading?

What is Differentiated Instruction?

"Differentiated instruction"-the process of identifying students' individual learning strengths, needs, and interests and adapting lessons to match them-has become a popular approach to helping diverse students learn together. But the field of education is filled with varied and often conflicting definitions of what the practice looks like, and critics argue it requires too much training and additional work for teachers to be implemented consistently and effectively.

Differentiation has much in common with many other instructional models: It has been compared to response-to-intervention models, as teachers vary their approach to the same material with different students in the same classroom; data-driven instruction, as individual students are frequently assessed or otherwise monitored, with instruction tweaked in response; and scaffolding, as assignments are intended to be structured to help students of different ability and interest levels meet the same goals.

Federal education laws and regulations do not generally set out requirements for how schools and teachers should "differentiate" instruction. However, in its 2010 National Education Technology Plan, the U.S. Department of Education lays out a framework that places differentiated teaching under the larger umbrella of "personalized learning," instruction tailored to students' individual learning needs, preferences, and interests. This framework assumes that all students in a heterogeneous classroom will have the same learning goals, but:

"Individualization" tailors instruction by time. A teacher may break the material into smaller steps and allow students to master these steps at different paces; skipping topics they can prove they have mastered, while getting more help on those that prove difficult. This model has been used in iterations as far back as the late Robert Glaser's Individually Prescribed Instruction in the 1970s, an approach which pairs diagnostic tests with objectives for mastery that is intended to help students progress through material at their own pace.

"Differentiation" tailors instruction by presentation. A teacher may vary the method and assignments covering the material to adjust to students' strengths, needs, and interests. For example, a teacher may allow an introverted student to write an essay on a historical topic while a more outgoing student gives an oral presentation on the same subject.

That distinction is accepted by some, though far from all, in the field.

The ambiguity has led to widespread confusion and debate over what differentiated instruction looks like in practice, and how its effectiveness can be evaluated.

For example, a 2005 study for the National Research Center on Gifted and Talented, which tracked implementation of "differentiation" over three years, found that the "vast majority" of teachers never moved beyond traditional direct lectures and seat work for students.

"Results suggest that differentiation of instruction and assessment are complex endeavors requiring extended time and concentrated effort to master," the authors conclude. "Add to this complexity current realities of school such as large class sizes, limited resource materials, lack of planning time, lack of structures in place to allow collaboration with colleagues, and ever-increasing numbers of teacher responsibilities, and the tasks become even more daunting."

Evolution of the Concept

Differentiated instruction as a concept evolved in part from instructional methods advocated for gifted students and in part as an alternative to academic "tracking," or separating students of different ability levels into groups or classes. In the 1983 book, Individual Differences and the Common Curriculum, Thomas S. Popkewitz discusses differentiation in the context of "Individually Guided Education, ... a management plan for pacing children through a standardized, objective-based curriculum" that would include small-group work, team teaching, objective-based testing, and monitoring of student progress.

Carol Ann Tomlinson, a co-director of the Institutes on Academic Diversity at the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia, and the author of The Differentiated Classroom: Responding to the Needs of All Learners, 2nd Edition (ASCD, 2014) and Assessment and Student Success in a Differentiated Classroom (ASCD, 2013) argues that differentiation is, at its base, not an approach but a basic tenet of good instruction, in which a teacher develops relationships with his or her students and presents materials and assignments in ways that respond to the student's interests and needs.

Differentiated Instruction Strategies

In theory-though critics allege not in practice-differentiation does not involve creating separate lesson plans for individual students for a given unit.

Ms. Tomlinson argues that differentiation requires more than creating options for assignments or presenting content both graphically and with hands-on projects, for example. Rather, to differentiate a unit on Rome, a teacher might consider both specific terms and overarching themes and concepts she wants students to learn, and offer a series of individual and group assignments of various levels of complexity to build those concepts and allow students to demonstrate their understanding in multiple ways, such as journal entries, oral presentations, creating costumes, and so on. In different parts of a unit students may be working with students who share their interests or have different ones, and with students who are at the same or different ability levels.

During the 1990s, teachers were also encouraged to present material differently according to a student's "learning style"-for example, visual, auditory, or kinesthetic. But while there have been studies that show students remember more when the same material is presented and reinforced in multiple ways, recent research reviews have found no evidence that individual students can be categorized as learning best through a single type of presentation.

Rick Wormeli, an education consultant and the author of Fair Isn't Always Equal: Assessment and Grading in the Differentiated Classroom, instead suggests in a 2011 essay in the journal Middle Ground that teachers differentiate based on "learner profiles": "A learner profile is a set of observations about a student that includes any factor that affects his or her learning, including family dynamics, transiency rate, physical health, emotional health, comfort with technology, leadership qualities, personal interests, and so much more."

Impacts of Technology

Differentiated and personalized instructional models have also evolved with technological advances, which make it easier to develop and monitor education plans for dozens of students at the same time. The influence of differentiation on school-level programs can be seen in "early warning systems" and student "dashboards" that aim to track individual student performance in real time, as well as initiatives in some schools to develop and monitor individualized learning plans with the student, his or her teachers, and parents.

Advocates of hybrid education models, such as the "flipped classroom" -in which students watch lectures and read material at home and perform practice that would normally be homework during class time-have suggested this could help teachers differentiate by recording and archiving different lectures that students could watch and rewatch as needed, and providing more one-on-one time during class.

Professional Development

By any account, differentiation is considered a complex approach to implement, requiring extensive and ongoing professional development for teachers and administrators.

In the 2005 longitudinal study that found no consistent implementation of differentiation, researchers noted that "many aspects of differentiation of instruction and assessment (e.g., assigning different work to different students, promoting greater student independence in the classroom) challenged teachers' beliefs about fairness, about equity, and about how classrooms should be organized to allow students to learn most effectively. As a result, for most teachers, learning to differentiate entailed more than simply learning new practices. It required teachers to confront and dismantle their existing, persistent beliefs about teaching and learning, beliefs that were in large part shared and reinforced by other teachers, principals, parents, the community, and even students."

In the 2009 book, Professional Development for Differentiating Instruction, Cindy A. Strickland notes that most schools do not provide sufficient training for new and experienced teachers in differentiating instruction.

Ms. Tomlinson said that teachers can begin to differentiate instruction simply by learning more about their students and trying to tailor their teaching as much as they find feasible. "Every significant endeavor seems too hard if we look only at the expert's product. ... The success of all these 'seasoned' people stemmed largely from three factors: They started down a path. They wanted to do better. They kept working toward their goal."

Including students of disparate abilities and interests also requires the teacher to rethink expectations for all students: "If a teacher uses flexible grouping lesson by lesson and does not assume a student has prior knowledge because he is a 'higher' student but really assesses and groups, based on need sometimes and other times by interest, the students will get what they need," Melinda L. Fattig, a nationally recognized educator and a co-author of the 2008 book Co-Teaching in the Differentiated Classroom, told Teacher magazine that year.

Critiques

In practice, differentiation is such a broad and multifaceted approach that it has proven difficult to implement properly or study empirically, critics say.

In a 2010 report by the research group McREL, author Bryan Goodwin notes that "to date, no empirical evidence exists to confirm that the total package (e.g., conducting ongoing assessments of student abilities, identifying appropriate content based on those abilities, using flexible grouping arrangements for students, and varying how students can demonstrate proficiency in their learning) has a positive impact on student achievement." He adds: "One reason for this lack of evidence may simply be that no large-scale, scientific study of differentiated instruction has been conducted." However, Mr. Goodwin pointed to the 2009 book Visible Learning, which synthesized studies of more than 600 models of personalizing learning based on student interests and prior performance, and found them not much better than general classroom instruction for improving students' academic performance.

Both in planning time and instructional time, differentiation takes longer than using a single lesson plan for a given topic, and many teachers attempting to differentiate have reported feeling overwhelmed and unable to reach each student equally.

In a 2010 Education Week Commentary essay, Michael J. Schmoker, the author of the 2006 book, Results NOW: How We Can Achieve Unprecedented Improvements in Teaching and Learning, says attempts to differentiate instruction frustrated teachers and "seemed to complicate teachers' work, requiring them to procure and assemble multiple sets of materials" leading to "dumbed-down" teaching.

Likewise, some advocates of gifted education, such as James R. Delisle, have argued that advanced students still are not challenged enough in a differentiated environment, which may vary in the presentation of material but not necessarily in the pace of instruction. He argues that "differentiation in practice is harder to implement in a heterogeneous classroom than it is to juggle with one arm tied behind your back."

"There is no one book, video, presenter, or website that will show everyone how to differentiate instruction. Let's stop looking for it. One size rarely fits all. Our classrooms are too diverse and our communities too important for such simplistic notions," Mr. Wormeli said in an interview with Education Week blogger Larry Ferlazzo.

"Instead, let's realize what differentiation really is: highly effective teaching, which is complex and interwoven; no one element defining it."

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Definitions vary for differentiated instruction, a popular approach for teaching children with a range of academic strengths and interests.

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Differentiation means tailoring instruction to meet individual needs. Whether teachers differentiate content, process, products, or the learning environment, the use of ongoing assessment and flexible grouping makes this a successful approach to instruction.

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Viewing Problems & Mistakes as Opportunities

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Viewing Problems & Mistakes as Opportunities

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Teachers are excited to study a problem that occurs in the work of many of their students, and they welcome the idea that this problem is a reflection of their teaching. One senses that these teachers feel that pinpointing the problem is a big step toward not only helping their students but also improving their own teaching.
This quote from Lucy Calkins' Leading Well captures what I believe to be the heart of the work I do as a literacy coach - supporting teachers as we dream up possible solutions to problems that arise during writing workshop.

There is no master playbook for writing workshop. We will never have it all figured out. The true art of teaching is in moments when we recognize a need and then explore ways to find a remedy. Sometimes the fix works and sometimes it doesn't. More dreaming and experimenting are often required.

A pivotal moment in my life as a teacher of writing came a few years ago. I had my narrative checklist in hand when I stepped into Leigh-ann's classroom. She had been teaching a unit on small moments and her first graders were eating it up, living like writers and capturing their stories.

I sat next to a writer and we began to work through the checklist together. "Did you put more and more details on your pages?" I asked, reading straight from the checklist.

She looked at me, puzzled. Silence. Then, "What's a detail?"

The question. Her puzzled look stopped me in my tracks. What's a detail? We had spent a significant amount of time throughout the unit teaching elaboration strategies. How many times had I said to writers, "Add more details." How many times had I heard other teachers say this to their students? Could it be that the students had no idea what that even meant? A little probing and I know this writer was not alone. It was at this moment that I recognized that this was a problem with our instruction. We were doing the teaching but the children weren't fully accessing our instruction. There was room to grow in connecting the dots of our teaching. While we had taught several elaboration strategies over the course of the unit, we had failed to be explicit in helping the students to understand why this work mattered. Our words were floating in the air, aimlessly, never landing in a place of understanding for the students.

Reflection led to a realization. The first-grade team and I knew we had to adjust our teaching. Together, we cracked open the checklist we had been using so that kids could better access and understand. We expanded the section that asked writers to reflect on the details they had added and inserted the actual strategies we had taught. This expansion of the checklist allowed writers to think about the strategies they had been taught and whether or not they had tried them.

Clever Leigh-ann even began referring to this piece of the checklist as a menu. I can hear her words, "You would never go to a restaurant and order everything on the menu. The same goes with your writing menu. You would probably never use every kind of detail. But, you can use your menu to choose the kinds of details you want to add to your piece."

The menu soon became a valuable addition to the writing workshop. With the guidance of their teacher, students found new ways to use this tool. Leigh-ann told them, "Just like when you go to a restaurant and always order the same thing. You know it's good, but maybe you try something else and you find out it's just as good or even better." Students began tallying the kinds of details they added across their pieces. They celebrated the work they were trying and reflecting on new strategies they could try. The menu now also supported goal setting and small group instruction.

Over the years, the use of elaboration menus has continued to evolve, not just in Leigh-ann's classroom, but across our school. We have created elaboration menus for various genres of writing across the grades. Instead of a tool that is used only for reflection at the end of a unit, these menus have become something that writers reference throughout the writing process. We have also found them helpful as teachers. Used vertically, they inform teachers of what strategies students have learned and can be reminded of, moving from one grade to another.

In that moment, all those years ago, we had a choice when that young writer asked, "what's a detail?" We could blame the curriculum or even the kid. But instead, we saw this moment as an opportunity to reflect on our instruction and the way kids accessed the strategies available to them. The problem became an opportunity that helped us all to grow...together.

References
Calkins, Lucy. 2018. Leading Well. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.
I'm a mom of three daughters and a literacy coach in CT. I love to learn and share with others. View all posts by Jessica Carey

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Teachers are excited to study a problem that occurs in the work of many of their students, and they welcome the idea that this problem is a reflection of their teaching. One senses that these teachers feel that pinpointing the problem is a big step toward not only helping their students but also improving their own teaching.

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Differentiated Instruction: What is the Difference Between Accommodations & Modifications?

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Differentiated Instruction: What is the Difference Between Accommodations & Modifications?

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Active Engagement Assessment - Make A Copy

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Formative assessment-discovering what students know while they're still in the process of learning it-can be tricky. Designing just the right assessment can feel high stakes-for teachers, not students-because we're using it to figure out what comes next. Are we ready to move on? Do our students need a different path into the concepts? Or, more likely, which students are ready to move on and which need a different path?

When it comes to figuring out what our students really know, we have to look at more than one kind of information. A single data point-no matter how well designed the quiz, presentation, or problem behind it-isn't enough information to help us plan the next step in our instruction.

Add to that the fact that different learning tasks are best measured in different ways, and we can see why we need a variety of formative assessment tools we can deploy quickly, seamlessly, and in a low-stakes way-all while not creating an unmanageable workload. That's why it's important to keep it simple: Formative assessments generally just need to be checked, not graded, as the point is to get a basic read on the progress of individuals, or the class as a whole.

7 Approaches to Formative Assessment

1. Entry and exit slips: Those marginal minutes at the beginning and end of class can provide some great opportunities to find out what kids remember. Start the class off with a quick question about the previous day's work while students are getting settled-you can ask differentiated questions written out on chart paper or projected on the board, for example.

A quick way to see the big picture if you use paper exit tickets is to sort the papers into three piles: Students got the point; they sort of got it; and they didn't get it. The size of the stacks is your clue about what to do next.

No matter the tool, the key to keeping students engaged in the process of just-walked-in or almost-out-the-door formative assessment is the questions. Ask students to write for one minute on the most meaningful thing they learned. You can try prompts like:

What are three things you learned, two things you're still curious about, and one thing you don't understand?

How would you have done things differently today, if you had the choice?

What I found interesting about this work was...

Right now I'm feeling...

Today was hard because...

Or skip the words completely and have students draw or circle emojis to represent their assessment of their understanding.

2. Low-stakes quizzes and polls: If you want to find out whether your students really know as much as you think they know, polls and quizzes created with Socrative or Quizlet or in-class games and tools like Quizalize, Kahoot, FlipQuiz, Gimkit, Plickers, and Flippity can help you get a better sense of how much they really understand. (Grading quizzes but assigning low point values is a great way to make sure students really try: The quizzes matter, but an individual low score can't kill a student's grade.) Kids in many classes are always logged in to these tools, so formative assessments can be done very quickly. Teachers can see each kid's response, and determine both individually and in aggregate how students are doing.

Because you can design the questions yourself, you determine the level of complexity. Ask questions at the bottom of Bloom's taxonomy and you'll get insight into what facts, vocabulary terms, or processes kids remember. Ask more complicated questions ("What advice do you think Katniss Everdeen would offer Scout Finch if the two of them were talking at the end of chapter 3?"), and you'll get more sophisticated insights.

3. Dipsticks: So-called alternative formative assessments are meant to be as easy and quick as checking the oil in your car, so they're sometimes referred to as dipsticks. These can be things like asking students to:

write a letter explaining a key idea to a friend,

draw a sketch to visually represent new knowledge, or

do a think, pair, share exercise with a partner.

Your own observations of students at work in class can provide valuable data as well, but they can be tricky to keep track of. Taking quick notes on a tablet or smartphone, or using a copy of your roster, is one approach. A focused observation form is more formal and can help you narrow your note-taking focus as you watch students work.

4. Interview assessments: If you want to dig a little deeper into students' understanding of content, try discussion-based assessment methods. Casual chats with students in the classroom can help them feel at ease even as you get a sense of what they know, and you may find that five-minute interview assessments work really well. Five minutes per student would take quite a bit of time, but you don't have to talk to every student about every project or lesson.

You can also shift some of this work to students using a peer-feedback process called TAG feedback (Tell your peer something they did well, Ask a thoughtful question, Give a positive suggestion). When you have students share the feedback they have for a peer, you gain insight into both students' learning.

For more introverted students-or for more private assessments-use Flipgrid, Explain Everything, or Seesaw to have students record their answers to prompts and demonstrate what they can do.

5. Methods that incorporate art: Consider using visual art or photography or videography as an assessment tool. Whether students draw, create a collage, or sculpt, you may find that the assessment helps them synthesize their learning. Or think beyond the visual and have kids act out their understanding of the content. They can create a dance to model cell mitosis or act out stories like Ernest Hemingway's "Hills Like White Elephants" to explore the subtext.

6. Misconceptions and errors: Sometimes it's helpful to see if students understand why something is incorrect or why a concept is hard. Ask students to explain the " muddiest point" in the lesson-the place where things got confusing or particularly difficult or where they still lack clarity. Or do a misconception check: Present students with a common misunderstanding and ask them to apply previous knowledge to correct the mistake, or ask them to decide if a statement contains any mistakes at all, and then discuss their answers.

You can use sticky notes to get a quick insight into what areas your kids think they need to work on. Ask them to pick their own trouble spot from three or four areas where you think the class as a whole needs work, and write those areas in separate columns on a whiteboard. Have you students answer on a sticky note and then put the note in the correct column-you can see the results at a glance.

Several self-assessments let the teacher see what every kid thinks very quickly. For example, you can use colored stacking cups that allow kids to flag that they're all set (green cup), working through some confusion (yellow), or really confused and in need of help (red).

Similar strategies involve using participation cards for discussions (each student has three cards-"I agree," "I disagree," and "I don't know how to respond") and thumbs-up responses (instead of raising a hand, students hold a fist at their belly and put their thumb up when they're ready to contribute). Students can instead use six hand gestures to silently signal that they agree, disagree, have something to add, and more. All of these strategies give teachers an unobtrusive way to see what students are thinking.

No matter which tools you select, make time to do your own reflection to ensure that you're only assessing the content and not getting lost in the assessment fog. If a tool is too complicated, is not reliable or accessible, or takes up a disproportionate amount of time, it's OK to put it aside and try something different.

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7 Smart, Fast Ways to Do Formative Assessment

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Within these methods you'll find close to 40 tools and tricks for finding out what your students know while they're still learning.

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Introduce yourself

What feels tricky regarding assessment in workshop?

What do you wish you could trust yourself with in regard to assessment and personalized/differentiated instruction?

Record your thoughts right in the padlet by clicking the 'plus' button

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Assessment for learning in practice

AFL emphasises the creation of a learner-centred classroom with a supportive atmosphere, where students are not afraid to make mistakes and learn from them.
We are going to look at five approaches or strategies that you can use in a lesson or programme of study.

1. Questioning
Questions are a quick and important way of finding out what your learner understands about a subject. You can use this information to plan their teaching.

There are two main types of question: closed and open.

A closed question requires a short answer, such as remembering a fact. The answer is usually right or wrong.
For example, a Geography teacher might ask: 'What is the capital of Peru?'

On average, teachers only wait 0.9 seconds after asking a question before taking an answer from a learner. Mary Rowe suggests that increasing 'wait time' to three seconds improves the quality of answers.

One way to help increase 'wait time', and to ensure the whole class is actively engaged, is to ask your learners to write down the answer to a closed question on a piece of paper, mini whiteboard or tablet, and hold it up. This immediately gives you feedback about who understands, who does not, and therefore what the next steps in the learning might be.

A good strategy to use if a learner gets the answer wrong is to make this into a positive event. You could say: 'I'm glad you said that, as I'm sure lots of other students have the same misunderstanding.'

In an AFL classroom, finding out what learners do not know is as valuable as finding out what they do know. This knowledge will help you to see what material your learners need to spend extra time on to make sure that they all understand.

Open questions need longer answers, and often require the learner to provide an opinion.
E.g. A Physics teacher might ask: 'What will happen to the flow of water through a hose pipe if a smaller nozzle is fitted to it? Explain how this relates to the study of voltage, current and resistance in a simple electric circuit.'

Open questions like this allow all learners to try to answer the question and be part of a discussion. You can then facilitate this discussion, asking questions to develop the discussion such as 'Tell me more about that' and 'Why do you think that?'

'Dialogic teaching' is a term that describes on-going talk between teachers and learners, which leads to effective learning. If you discuss ideas with your learners, you can get a clearer view of what understanding your learners have about a topic, and put right any misunderstandings.

Reflection
Watch the video of a teacher talking about how he uses questioning. Do you use any of these techniques in your own classroom?
Transcript
Want to know more?
This video shows good use of closed questioning. How would you adapt this for your own classroom?

2. Feedback
Feedback is the process in which learners come together with their teachers to discuss where they are in their learning, where they want to be in their learning, and how they are going to get there. It usually involves looking at a particular piece of work done by the learner. Feedback can be described as the 'bridge' between teaching and learning.

The aims and objectives of any assignment must be clearly understood by both the teacher and the learner. You can help by providing 'success criteria' before your learners start work.

Feedback might involve marking. However, a learner may only remember the mark/grade and not act on any comments to improve their work. In an AFL classroom, a teacher will give 'comment only' feedback on their learners' work. If you do want to add a grade, give this later on, so that the learners read the comments before they receive the grade. Effective feedback depends on task-focused comments, rather than ego-focused comments.

Here is an example of ego-focused feedback: 'Great work Melanie, the best in the class.' This kind of feedback can make strong learners complacent, thinking that they do not have anything to do to improve. They might also be scared of trying something they find difficult in case they lose their high place. Weak learners can feel as if there is nothing they can do to get better.

You should aim to provide feedback to each learner that praises task-focused aspects of their work, but also contains targets about how to improve their learning.
E.g. 'Ali, you have written a good introduction to your story. Now, can you think how you can make the description of the main character more striking?'

Reflection
Think about a time when you gave feedback to a learner that could be described as more ego-specific than task specific. What might you have done differently?

Want to know more?
In this video, Dylan Wiliam explains why task-focused feedback is more effective than ego-focused feedback.

There are some good examples of how to give effective feedback in different subject areas on http://www.teachthought.com.

In this handout, by the RAPPS project, you will find lots of suggestions for different ways of giving classroom feedback.

3. Peer assessment or peer feedback
Peer feedback, or peer assessment, is the process by which learners assess each other's work and give each other feedback. This feedback is based on an understanding of what makes a successful piece of work. The teacher is vital to this process, as teachers know their learners and can help them to develop their critical and reflective thinking skills.

Giving learners independence is a great way for them to take responsibility for their own learning. Peer feedback also helps learners to develop their social skills and to use higher-level skills such as thinking critically and analytically.

A successful peer feedback session requires learners to 'think like a teacher' for each other. Each learner will apply the success criteria to another learner's work, and make value judgements based on these. The learner then has to give their partner ideas for how to improve the work. In doing this, they will both be increasing their own understanding of what makes a successful piece of work.

At primary school level, the theory behind AFL is the same, but the tasks might be different, to reflect the different stages of the pupils' cognitive development. For example, learners could use pictures to describe positive and negative aspects of the work.

Reflection
Watch the video of learners taking part in a peer feedback session. Notice how independently they are working. Would this be effective for your learner?
Transcript
Want to know more?
In this video, learners explain what they like about peer feedback.
Transcript
4. Self-assessment
'Students need to learn for themselves how they move up to the next level ... they need to internalise the process. Learning cannot be done for them by the teachers.' (Mary James, 1998)

In self-assessment a learner evaluates their own work, and thinks about their own learning. This helps them to make sense of what the teacher says, relate it to previous learning and use this for new learning. Ultimately, self-assessment enables learners to set their own learning goals and be responsible for their own learning. However, be aware that learners cannot become reflective learners overnight. It takes time and practice to develop these skills, and the role of the teacher is crucial in encouraging this.

"Students need to learn for themselves how they move up to the next level."

Introducing learners to self-assessment
When you introduce self-assessment to your learners, carefully guide the process. To start with, give learners a list of questions to ask themselves, and write down the answers. Starting a 'learning log' or 'reflective journal' is good practice. This is a notebook in which the learner documents their recent experiences, asking themselves questions such as:
'What made sense and what didn't?'
'How does this subject fit in with what I already know?'
'What did I do well and what could I have improved?'

Ideally, you will talk to each of your learners individually to guide their thinking until they feel comfortable with the process. Self-assessment is an activity which requires one-to-one tutorials to be fully successful. In these short sessions, you can ask questions to help your learners to reflect on their studies.

Having thought about how their work could be improved, your learners can then set themselves targets to make their work better. These targets can cover any aspect of learning, from time management to asking more questions in class if they do not understand something.

5. The formative use of school tests and exams
This 'Getting started' guide has focused mainly on formative assessment strategies and checking learning in the classroom. However, learners often have to take summative school tests such as end-of-year exams or final exams.

Return marked test or exam papers to learners, so that they can spend time understanding where they earned most marks and where they had misunderstandings.

After the exam or test, find out which questions were answered less well by most learners. This will give you important information about what subjects, ideas and skills your learners need to work on. You can then focus on explaining the areas of the syllabus that gave problems to most learners. Your learners could also re-work exam questions in class in pairs or groups as a peer-learning activity.

www.headguruteacher.com explains in more depth how internal school tests and exams can be used to maximise learning.

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Getting started with Assessment for Learning

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AFL emphasises the creation of a learner-centred classroom with a supportive atmosphere, where students are not afraid to make mistakes and learn from them. We are going to look at five approaches or strategies that you can use in a lesson or programme of study. 1.

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What are you already doing or trying to do around assessment as and for learning? How unobtrusive is it?

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How does analysis paralysis impact assessment, teaching and learning? How can we overcome it, get unstuck and dive in?  Share below.

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Table Conferences Rooted in the Teaching Point - Make a Copy

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Zooming in on Writing in Active Engagement

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Zooming in on Writing in Active Engagement

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 Zooming in on Writing during Active Engagement - Make a Copy

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1. Look at the student work pictured in this document. 2. Sort into 3 groups using the organizer. 3. Decide what to compliment each group. 4. Decide what to teach each group. 4. How would you model and coach? Type write into the document.

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1. Look at the student work pictured in the document. You may need to zoom in on the document to read student writing. 2. Sort students into the 3 groups using the organizer provided (each piece of work is numbered). 3. Decide on a compliment and teaching point for each group. 4. How would you model and coach this?

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1. Familiarize yourselves with the rubric section being 'zoomed' in on. 2. Read the student writing for each table group. 3. Decide on what each table group has in common to compliment and to teach. 4. Decide how you would model and coach this work. Perhaps one of the students at the table can serve as the model?

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Zooming in on Writing in Active Engagement

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Zooming in on Writing in Active Engagement

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Zooming in on Writing during Active Engagement

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If you tried informal running records, post your student recording, the text and what you complimented, decided to teach and give a brief description or photo of what you coached or modeled for the student(s).  This could be a picture of a post it note, a personalized anchor chart, etc.

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1. Share and post the assessment strategy you used, the feedback you gave, and what you did with the data (taught a small group, revised a mini lesson, etc).
2. Look at what others have posted. What else do you notice could have been complimented and taught?  How would you model this?  Comment on one another's homework!

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If you tried assessing reading during the active engagement part of your lesson, post your sorted data. Include a description and/or image of your groups. Tell us what you complimented and decided to teach each group.

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This is part of the monthly "Ask the Expert" series in which NC State College of Education faculty answer some of the most commonly asked questions about education.
When students feel a sense of belonging in the classroom, it can increase their educational success and motivational outcomes in multiple ways, and teachers can help create this feeling of belonging by building connections between classroom and community, according to DeLeon Gray, Ph.D.

Gray, an associate professor of educational psychology and equity in the NC State College of Education, studies how to help students, parents, teachers and community stakeholders unpack belonging and motivation to support students' engagement, learning and productivity.

"A sense of belonging at school means feeling a sense of acceptance, respect, inclusion and support in a learning environment," Gray said.

Gray said students who feel a sense of belonging at school are typically more energized, more likely to spend time on-task and return to activities, and more likely to choose to be in the school environment.

Students who don't feel a sense of belonging, however, often struggle to devote their full cognitive resources to tasks and experience issues with emotional wellness. These feelings could manifest in frequent visits to the nurse's office or even truancy, as students look for a way to avoid environments where they feel as though they don't belong.

"The negative impacts of not belonging can be cyclical in the sense that you can have a negative or disconfirming experience about your identity or your place within the school and that might lead you to try to make up for that in some way, which could also lead you to do things you wouldn't otherwise do if your belonging needs were met within that educational context," Gray said.

How Educators Can Help Foster Feelings of Belonging

One way teachers can help prevent students from mentally or physically checking out of the educational environment, Gray said, is to create instructional opportunity structures that help students feel a sense of continuity between home and school. This is especially important for historically underrepresented students, who benefit from seeing their ancestral heritage and community represented in the classroom.

To help build these connections between community and content, Gray recommends teachers bring in community members, artifacts or even local news stories to reinforce concepts that are covered in the curriculum. Teachers can also give students opportunities to discuss the ways in which the content connects with their outside lives, allowing them to drive connections themselves.

"This gives more meaning and life to the activities that students do and makes those activities more valuable for students to engage in," Gray said.

Gray, who works with students in Durham, North Carolina through iScholar -an ongoing, community-engaged partnership between NC State students and faculty and Durham teachers, educators, leaders and students- said he has found success incorporating things students are passionate about into lessons.

For example, sneaker culture is very important to the students iScholar serves, so they brought that into a lesson on space exploration, asking students to design shoes that would be both aesthetically appealing and protective for a mission to Mars.

"We talk about cultural relevance at a very broad level, but when we break that down to bringing culture and belonging inside of a school, it means recognizing where students are," Gray said. "Students got to express their creativity and ultimately design a shoe that honored their culture. For them, the take-home point was that going into outer space doesn't have to come at the expense of leaving your culture behind."

To understand what matters to their students, teachers need to build interpersonal relationships with youth of all backgrounds through authentic compliments, authentic praise and authentic connections, Gray said.

Teachers can self-disclose information about their own lives to build relationships with students as well as create time and space in the classroom for students to share about their lives outside of the school environment. One activity that works well, Gray said, is to pass a ball around at the beginning of class and, as each student holds the ball, they are given an opportunity to share one good thing that has happened to them that day.

"That provides so much ammo for the teacher to then weave these connections for students in and out of their lessons," he said.

Educators can also help foster a sense of belonging in their classrooms by having high standards combined with rigorous support, adopting a communal orientation and letting students know they have the safety to be wrong, because mistakes mean that they are being ambitious.

"These strategies all hinge on students understanding that they have a place inside the classroom, they have rights and the classroom is centered around their experience," Gray said.

Creating a Physical Space that Reflects Your Students

In addition to individual classrooms, Gray said that the overall school environment can also be leveraged to increase a sense of belonging among students.

In 2019, students who participated in iScholar won a national design competition by designing a school that honored students' cultures, drawing inspiration from ethnic and indigenous patterns to design the architecture of the proposed building.

Although redesigning a school building is likely not an option in most cases, Gray said educators can still give students a sense of ownership over their schools by giving them a say in the way things are done.
Video by Ryan Clancy
For example, students can be made members of an advisory board to help make decisions or can be given a budget and time to collaborate in order to lead new initiatives inside the school.

"Students choose to be in environments that make them feel a sense of fit. This is especially important during adolescence and emerging adulthood, where questions of identity are prevalent," Gray said. "If these questions are answered within a certain space that students are in, they will choose to be there mentally and physically."

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Why is it Important for Students to Feel a Sense of Belonging at School? 'Students Choose to be in Environments That Make Them Feel a Sense of Fit,' Says Associate Professor DeLeon Gray

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When students feel a sense of belonging in the classroom, it can increase their educational success and motivational outcomes in multiple ways, and teachers can help create this feeling of belonging by building connections between classroom and community, according to Associate Professor DeLeon Gray, Ph.D.

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School Belonging: The Importance of Student and Teacher Relationships

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School belonging is associated with a range of positive educational and developmental outcomes, including psychosocial health and wellbeing, prosocial behaviour and academic achievement, and transition into adulthood. However, an increasing number of students…

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How Belonging and a Culture of Care Impact Learning and Tips to Nurture Belonging

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How Belonging and a Culture of Care Impact Learning and Tips to Nurture Belonging

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Do I belong at this school? How students respond to this question is closely linked to whether they succeed and thrive.

According to our research, students who feel a strong sense of belonging are more engaged and more likely to join school organizations, take on research opportunities, and make connections with peers, faculty, and staff. Not only that, students who feel like they belong in school earn higher grades and opt into and succeed in more difficult courses.

When students don't feel like they belong, the opposite is true, and they can become disengaged and disconnected. Feeling a sense of belonging in school is especially important for students from marginalized and stigmatized groups, such as Black, Latino, Native, first-generation, and financially stressed students. Because of the long history of exclusion and discriminatory treatment that their groups and families have experienced in the American education system, students from disadvantaged backgrounds have reasons to question whether instructors and peers value, respect, and welcome them.

Belonging can be even harder to foster during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the need for social distancing and remote learning. Indeed, it takes more focused intention and new strategies to support students' sense of belonging given these pandemic challenges. So how can instructors, administrators, and staff cultivate a sense of belonging and connection when so many are teaching online and stretched thin by the pandemic?

Our latest project, called the Student Experience Project, has been helping instructors, administrators, and staff understand the importance of students' feelings of belonging in class-and how to cultivate them, despite social distance. This past fall, over 100 faculty across six U.S. universities experimented with some of the most impactful, research-based teaching practices that help students feel a sense of belonging in class.

Some instructors were teaching online and others in person-yet all found ways to enact these practices that were authentic to their teaching style and classes. We measured students' psychological experiences in class at various points throughout the term to see whether instructors' practices made a difference, and our results revealed that students' sense of belonging in class increased. Another one of our studies suggests that for marginalized students in particular, attending to students' sense of belonging in school can help them fit in socially and academically and avoid dropping out.

How can teachers and instructors use this knowledge as they plan for the new term? Here are four research-based practices that you can use (and share) to cultivate a strong sense of belonging in your classes in 2021.

1. Normalize challenges to belonging and provide strategies to overcome them

When you explicitly acknowledge the challenges and struggles that can interfere with your students' sense of belonging and normalize their worries and experiences, students feel supported and are more likely to stay engaged and feel that they belong in class.

In the Student Experience Project's focus groups, marginalized students described the stress and isolation of feeling like they did not belong in certain courses. But they also reported how much it meant to them when instructors showed that they cared about their students and built in opportunities for connection.

At the beginning of the term, you can acknowledge to your students that this academic year has been a challenge for everyone-including for you-and that you understand the greater work and home responsibilities students may be juggling as they continue their studies. You can also note that you know that social distancing has made it more difficult to connect with and get to know each other.

However, you can assure students that you value connection and belonging-and that you know it is important for their success; therefore, you have built in ways throughout the term to help them build those connections, both with each other and with you. This might include group work (online or socially distanced in-person), drop-in or office hours, and supports that are available outside the course.

It's particularly helpful to share times when you questioned your own belonging-whether it was something that happened during the pandemic, or something from the more distant past, perhaps when you were a student yourself. Learning that successful adults, such as their instructors, have also questioned their sense of belonging is reassuring to students and helps them see that people succeed despite such challenges.

Normalizing these experiences and sharing some strategies that you have found useful for overcoming these challenges shore up students' sense of belonging. Give students time at the beginning of the term to identify their challenges to belonging and to brainstorm and share with each other the strategies they've used to address those challenges.

2. Make a plan to check in with students

Even during normal circumstances, simple check-in messages from their instructors communicate care and connection and mean a lot to students. This could be an email early on in the term asking students how they are feeling about the course and reiterating resources like office hours that are available to them, or using online polling sites during class to invite students to respond anonymously and then discuss what they show. In this time of greater uncertainty and challenge, these check-in messages are even more important because they make students feel seen and valued despite being socially distanced.

Throughout the term, you can plan for and schedule simple messages that check in with students, remind them that you care for their well-being and that you are there to support their learning and development, and encourage them to talk with you if they need support navigating challenges that are interfering with their learning.
Even if students do not respond directly to instructors' check-in messages, the vast majority interpret these messages as supportive (and may even share that with you later).

One instructor in the Student Experience Project posted an announcement inviting students to email her. She provided some starter questions: How was the term going? What shows were they watching? What activities were keeping them busy outside of class? Approximately 25% of students actually sent emails, and she responded to each one with brief encouragement. But just knowing they were invited to send emails appeared to benefit students-students specifically mentioned it in course evaluations at the end of the term and felt it made an impact.

3. Make a plan to give wise feedback when returning each assessment

Many students begin to question their belonging in class (and in school) when they receive critical feedback on tests or assignments. In remote learning, students may not have ever met you in person and, therefore, they might not fully trust your feedback or interpret it in the most constructive light. So it's especially important to make sure your feedback doesn't undermine their sense of belonging and self-efficacy.

How can you do that, while still giving actionable, critical feedback? Research shows that when instructors explicitly communicate to students that they are giving critical feedback because (a) they have high standards and (b) they believe that students can meet those standards, it helps students understand the reason for the feedback and reassures them that their instructor believes in their abilities to rise to the occasion.

If you want to shore up students' sense of belonging, make a plan for how you will deliver wise feedback when you return the first big assessment of the term. And then consider how you will continue to do so throughout the term so that all students continue to feel that you are invested in their learning and that you believe in their ability to be successful.

For example, instructors in the Student Experience Project have implemented exam wrappers, wherein they provide wise feedback to students after the first big test or graded project and have students complete a reflection activity about how that assessment went and what they can improve for the next one. Before the next assessment, instructors remind students of their reflections, and some instructors even share themes that emerge across different reflections to highlight common points of difficulty and strategies students can use to improve.

4. Shout out your favorite mistake

When students feel uncertain about whether they belong in school and vulnerable to critical feedback, they are loath to make mistakes that might further undermine their belonging in the eyes of their instructors or their peers. To instructors, this can feel like students are disengaged and unwilling to take intellectual risks.

However, instructors know that making mistakes is key to students' growth and development. Making mistakes is how we grow. How can you create a culture that celebrates (rather than shames) mistakes?

My favorite mistake is a practice whereby you regularly review and publicly celebrate a mistake (or mistakes) from tests or assessments that are your "favorites" because they reveal something about students' development or thought processes, or because they are a common mistake that students can correct and learn from. During class, when instructors celebrate mistakes as opportunities to learn (rather than things to be avoided), students take more risks in the classroom.

In some of the classes that have made "favorite mistakes" a regular practice, we have seen students compete and get excited about being featured in "favorite mistakes" because the instructor has made mistake-making fun and rewarding. In these classrooms, mistake-making is welcomed and it shores up students' sense of belonging rather than undermining it.

In our experience, and from hearing from instructors who tried these strategies during the pandemic term of fall 2020, this approach not only improves the student experience and contributes to more equitable academic outcomes, but is also rewarding for instructors. Instructors told us they felt more connected to their students, found meaning in their contributions toward equity, and had more fun than they anticipated with pandemic teaching because they used their creativity. As such, fostering belonging in the classroom is a "win" for everyone-especially during a pandemic.

Greater Good wants to know: Do you think this article will influence your opinions or behavior?

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How to Help Students Feel a Sense of Belonging During the Pandemic

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Do I belong at this school? How students respond to this question is closely linked to whether they succeed and thrive. According to our research, students who feel a strong sense of belonging are more engaged and more likely to join school organizations, take on research opportunities, and make connections with peers, faculty, and staff.

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Formative Assessment & Standards Based Grading Marzano

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Formative Assessment & Standards Based Grading Marzano

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Refer to pages 24-26 for an explanation of the difference between obtrusive, unobtrusive and student generated assessments.

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Formative Assessment & Standards Based Grading

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If you tried using an exit pass at the end of workshop, post your student work here! Include images to show how you sorted your students' work.  Include a description of what you complimented and taught each group.

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If you tried table conferences using one section of the writing rubric as your lens, post your work here. Please include a description of what you complimented and taught each group.

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Zooming in on Writing in Active Engagement

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Zooming in on Writing in Active Engagement

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Did you zoom in on student writing using one section of the rubric during active engagement?  Post images of student work from your "not yet" group. Include a description of what you complimented and then taught them right after the mini lesson. Bonus if you include a picture of your anchor chart!

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Building Positive Relationships With Students: What Brain Science Says - Child Mind Institute

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When students feel supported, they’re more likely to engage in learning and have better academic outcomes.

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Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain

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Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain

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Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain

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Book - Culturally Responsive Teaching & the Brain

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Helping Students be the Leaders of their Learning

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Unconditional positive regard is a stance I take in relationship to my students. The message of unconditional positive regard is, "I care about you. You have value. You don't have to do anything to prove it to me, and nothing's going to change my mind." I sometimes try to imagine myself radiating unconditional positive regard like a glow around me when I walk into a classroom. But I also actually say those words to my students in ways that fit our relationship. I make sure to tell them I care about them, regardless of what they accomplish or achieve in our academic work together. This care infuses all of my teaching choices, from personal interactions to learning design. Importantly, unconditional positive regard stands in opposition to savior mentality and deficit thinking.

Building Unconditional Relationships

A philosophy is important, but only as much as we put that philosophy into action. Unconditional positive regard is an equity approach when we actively put it into practice in our everyday interactions with students.

Sometimes unconditional positive regard is just as simple as how we greet our students when they are late to class: how I greet them can communicate either my unconditional care or my lack of regard. If I don't have unconditional positive regard, I might say, "You're late, sit down," and roll my eyes, or I might sarcastically say, "Nice of you to show up." These responses tell students that I care about them only as long as they follow my expectations-they are an inconvenience. Even if I don't mean to communicate this, small moments add up. If students comes to my class and I roll my eyes, if they go into the hallway and are told to take off their hat, if they sit down at lunch and are warned to speak more quietly, then the cumulative message of school is that orderliness is the most important thing.

Instead, I can greet my student with "Hey! It's great to see you today. Settle in a minute and then I'll catch you up." When we work from unconditional positive regard, the message is that I value you for who you are, not what you do or how you do it. This doesn't mean that I won't address attendance issues later, but my priority when my students arrive isn't to scold them about compliance. My priority is to greet them in a way that says they matter and that their presence is more important than how fast they got here.

In general, slowing down most conversations with students to simply ask, "How's it going?" changes the tone of my whole day. When visiting schools as part of my consulting work, it's always surprising to me how infrequently I see teachers stopping to just check in with students throughout the day, or even saying students' names. Creating an environment of care means going back to the basics and not skipping the human connection of just asking one another how we're doing. This may seem like an obvious point to make, but the basis of unconditional positive regard is the phrase "I care about you." To care about someone else means that we see the sum of all of their strengths and challenges and choose to care for them.

Our schools need to be places where we care for our students, not just care about them. Education philosopher Nel Noddings calls this an "ethic of care," in which learning how to be cared for and learning how to care for others are central tasks of education. Caring for students means being in relationship with them, whereas caring about students allows us to keep our distance. If we commit to an ethic of care, building relationships and caring for our students aren't strategies in the name of increasing academic achievement but the actual goal itself.

One of the foundations of caring is seeing and truly getting to know our students. Too often our approaches to relationship building in school can feel transactional. I remember that, as a new teacher, my strategy for relationship building was to give students a long survey to complete, telling me about their interests, learning styles, and favorite colors. These types of "getting to know you" surveys are only surface level and don't do much to create a caring relationship. Now I try to get to know students the same way I would get to know a new friend: spending time together, asking questions about their lives and what they feel passionate about, and talking about what matters to us both. Real relationship building isn't flashy and can't be condensed to "fifteen tricks and tips." Sometimes building relationships means sitting together in silence and simply getting used to being around one another. Often, relationship building happens in the small moments, not during the canned activities: I get to know my students through quick check-ins before class, through reading their papers and witnessing how their minds work, through noticing the ways they communicate with their peers. Relationship building is slow and deliberate and can't be rushed.
Alex Shevrin Venet is the author "Equity-Centered Trauma-Informed Education." She is an educator, professional development facilitator and writer. She teaches in-service teachers at Antioch University and Castleton University, and undergraduate students at the Community College of Vermont. She is a former teacher/leader at an alternative therapeutic school.

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How Unconditional Positive Regard Can Help Students Feel Cared For - MindShift

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Alex Shevrin's newest book Equity-Centered Trauma-Informed Education gives teachers practical ways to develop caring relationships with students.

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If it's tailored to the individual student and clear-cut, feedback can be a formidable learning tool.

Feedback can be a powerful process that greatly impacts student learning when it affirms students' identities as learners, is clear and direct, and considers the individual attributes of each student.

Strength: You clearly state your claim, The women's rights movement began with the suffrage movement but it's not over yet, and provided a list of recent events, such as the Women's March of 2017 and the U.S. Women's Soccer Team's court case, to support your thinking.

Need: Include the counterclaim and how you would respond. What would someone say if they disagreed with you? Where would they find fault with your supporting evidence? What can you include to address these arguments?

Next step: Work with your writing partner to talk through the Claim, Support, Question protocol. Do some more research to address the questions that you and your partner generate, and add this information to your essay.

Here's an example. A student receives the following feedback from her teacher:

This feedback moves beyond what students often receive in response to their work-statements such as "Great job!" "Shows improvement." "Add evidence." The more comprehensive feedback can empower students because it's individualized to the student; leverages students' assets, interests, and learning preferences; and builds students' confidence in themselves. Let's unpack the above example to see how to accomplish this.

Providing Meaningful Feedback

Strengths: Identify what students can do in relation to the learning target, regardless of whether they've achieved mastery. The feedback in our example is based on the following learning target and success criteria for the student:

Stating a claim

Providing supporting reasons and relevant evidence

Addressing counterclaims

I can write an argument by doing the following:

When a teacher identifies what students can do, it communicates the belief that all students are learners and can achieve high expectations. Students know what to repeat in future assignments and, most important, develop confidence in themselves. Often by middle and high school, students who have repeatedly been told what they cannot do have accepted failure as a norm and need support in redeveloping their identity as a learner. Identifying what students can do helps rebuild this identity characteristic necessary for learning.

Needs: Identify where a student is in relationship to the learning target. The language the teacher uses in identifying needs can affect how students receive the feedback. In our feedback example, the teacher states the need- Include the counterclaim and how you would respond-and then provides some questions to prompt student thinking. Zaretta Hammond writes in Culturally Responsive Teaching and the Brain that direct and honest feedback helps students understand that feedback is affirmation that the student can reach the goal. When feedback is cushioned or vague, a student may interpret it to mean that the teacher doesn't believe in the student's capability.

Next steps: These directly correlate with the identified needs and provide suggestions on how students can move forward. Too often, students are given feedback but don't know how to address it. The teacher supports student independence and self-regulation by describing actions that the student can take on their own to strengthen their work. In our example of feedback, the teacher reminds the student to use a thinking routine that has been repeatedly used in class-to identify possible counterclaims and provide stronger evidence to support their reasoning.

Next steps should also consider the individual attributes of the student. For example, if the teacher knows a student is an artist, suggesting that the student use sketchnoting before writing might be a good next step. Students who use oral language to process information might benefit from peer discussion, as mentioned in the example, before writing. A linguistically diverse student might write in the language they are most comfortable with to organize and elaborate on their ideas.

The amount, timing, and format: These can influence how a student receives the feedback and their willingness to act on it. Some students need less feedback more often, while other students prefer to have the time to process and apply the feedback. Feedback can be verbal or written and offered privately or in small groups. The same process for providing feedback will not work for everyone. If a teacher is unsure as to what strategy might work best for the student, the teacher can conference with the student and discuss different strategies. This builds the trust that underlies the successful feedback relationship.

The feedback that students receive from their teachers serves as models for students to engage in peer feedback and self-assessment. When students use the same process with their peers and then apply it to themselves, they're truly empowered. Students, like their teachers, must have clearly articulated learning targets and a protocol, such as the strengths, needs, and next steps. They must also reflect on the feedback process. Questions such as "How did feedback from your classmate help you revise your work?" "What did you learn from examining your classmate's work that will help you in revising your own?" and "How did you revise your work after completing your self-assessment?" all help students see the value of the feedback process.

Empowering students through feedback begins with teacher feedback that identifies what the student can do, clearly states areas of needs, and considers the individual attributes of each student in providing next steps. When students receive quality feedback from their teachers, they are primed to engage in peer feedback and self-assessment, and empowered to be self-regulated, independent learners.

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If it's tailored to the individual student and clear-cut, feedback can be a formidable learning tool.

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Feedback to Drive Self Directed Learners

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Feedback to Drive Self Directed Learners

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Promoting Self-Direction Through Better Feedback

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When students get the right feedback at the right time, they move closer to becoming independent learners.

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Go into different participants' homework from session 1. Add a comment to provide feedback on student work using the feedback framework.

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1. Share and post the new assessment strategy you used, the feedback you gave, and what you did with the data (taught a small group, revised a mini lesson, etc).

2.  Share and post the culture of care strategy you are choosing to try.  What was it?  How is it going?  What's next?

3. Comment and interact with other course participants by adding your thoughts to their homework!