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Waterford PD Day: Learner Driven Goal Setting

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Waterford PD Day: Learner Driven Goal Setting

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Waterford PD Day: Learner Driven Goal Setting

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Here is a link to an elementary using the 4DX.

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Goal setting for kids | Small Talk | CBC Kids

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The 4 Disciplines of Execution Summary & Review (Chris McChesney) - ANIMATED 2021

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Author: Betsy Wierda
August 13, 2015

Using student data as a tool in self-directed learning is important to teach students; it teaches students to not only set goals but also teaches students how to manage their goals and lead measures. Many classrooms are starting to utilize data as our world fills with data-driven performance and decisions. But how does one start teaching students to capture, record, and analyze data for their own use?

Using Student Data

Many teachers use some type of student data notebook to keep track of where their students are in achieving learning objectives and where they need to be. These notebooks are more than a collection of charts and grades. It captures data and progress on academic and personal goals and is used as a vehicle for students to truly own their learning.

Dr. Robyn R. Jackson comments on this classroom tool in her book Never Work Harder Than Your Students and Other Principles of Great Teaching:

"Another strategy for helping students collect and analyze their own data is to use a strategy adapted from Malcolm Baldrige called data notebooks. Data notebooks provide a powerful way of getting students involved in collecting their own feedback about their learning and have been used with children as young as kindergarteners all the way up through seniors in high school."

Students benefit from data notebooks because they have a voice in their learning and can understand and work toward success in a systemic way. Students are then able to articulate their learning at Student-Led Conferences because they record and understand their own data.

Parents benefit from the use of this tool as well and become more engaged in their children's education as they hear their children share their goals and academic progress at Student-Led Conferences.

Make the Data Meaningful

Philosophically, it is easy to see that when children lead their own learning, they can become more responsible, motivated, and involved in their education.

John Hattie, the author of Visible Learning Plus, identified the major factors and practices that influence student achievement-from family background to teacher training, to specific instructional practices. Through his research, Hattie has found the importance of giving students a voice in their learning.

Hattie states that "Visible Learning is when teachers see learning through the eyes of the students and students see themselves as their own teachers."

Could a data notebook actually give children a "voice" in their own learning? Absolutely!

Through listening to their students, educators discover what learning is like for their students, and become more capable of engaging and learning from students what they need most to achieve their next goals.

With a growing focus in education on a holistic approach to learning, a data notebook could be a great place to start tracking nonacademic goals that are relevant and important to students such as career goals, hobby goals, service goals, or relationship goals.

Make the Data Manageable

As I have worked with teachers at Leader in Me Schools who use Leadership Notebooks, they sometimes struggle with how to manage the process. Some teachers use physical binders and notebooks. Others have experimented with digital versions of data notebooks as a way to integrate technology into the process and leave shelf and desk space open.

The key is having a system in place so instruction time is not interrupted too often and the time spent looking at and recording data is meaningful. You need to figure out what works best in your classroom structure.

Here are a few suggestions:

Combine Data With Effective Teacher Feedback

As a former teacher, I know that meeting with children happens daily in most classrooms. I also know that there are coaching dialogues and crucial academic conversations happening consistently in effective classrooms. The same should hold true when it comes to holding students accountable for their goals.

Let's face it; great teachers don't just say, "Work harder," or "Better luck next time." Great teachers are great coaches, and they provide specific strategies for individual success as they serve as the champion for each and every child.

The most impactful time students spend tracking data is the time they spend with the most important tool for success in the classroom-you! As the teacher, you have a greater understanding of what needs to be achieved, and you can guide each child to an understanding of the next steps for his or her achievement.

Within these coaching conversations, the data notebook becomes the vehicle for capturing feedback and monitoring each child's progress individually. This process can lead to increased student achievement in a natural and an authentic way.

Use a Leadership Paradigm

You may wish to consider looking at your system for tracking student data from a paradigm of leadership. When data tracking involves students, as Leadership Notebooks do, it provides ownership, student voice, visible learning, and student empowerment.

I also invite you to evaluate how students set goals and determine their part in reaching them assisted by teacher-led strategies.

I would be remiss to guarantee that a data notebook will lead to increased student achievement for all children. But I would like you to imagine the impact of a student-centered approach to data, paired with the constructs of authentic daily instructional frameworks (such as the guided reading or conferring time), and a focus on goal setting with individual strategies for each individual (think absolute differentiation).

Identify what small changes you could make to give your students more voice in the goal-setting and data-tracking process, and give them a try.

Empower your students in their learning, step back, and watch them thrive!

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Using Student Data as a Tool in Self-Directed Learning

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Author: Betsy Wierda August 13, 2015 Using student data as a tool in self-directed learning is important to teach students; it teaches students to not only set goals but also teaches students how to manage their goals and lead measures. Many classrooms are starting to utilize data as our world fills with data-driven performance and decisions.

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Phillip Schlechty's Levels of Engagement

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Phillip Schlechty's Levels of Engagement

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This fully editable student data binder will help you with progress monitoring and data tracking in your classroom.

This is another free resource for teachers from The Curriculum Corner.

This fully editable student data binder will help you create a system for data tracking and management in your classroom.

As showing student growth has become an important aspect of teaching, creating student data binders or folders is becoming more common.

We know there are many student data collection methods, we are sharing one we created.

We have updated our previous collection of forms and expanded their reach. You will also find that all of our forms are provided as a PDF and an editable PowerPoint file.

How to Set up your Student Data Binders

The wide variety of forms we have included should help you begin to pull together meaningful folders or binders for student data tracking.

Use our pages to set up your own simple data binders or adapt our materials to create a more complex data system that follows students through school.

As a teacher you might decide to have students be responsible for tracking their own data or you might be in charge of tracking data and share with your students when appropriate.

The decision is yours depending on the purpose of having data folders in your room.

Choosing Forms for your Student Data Binders

To decide on the forms that will fit your class best, begin by thinking about why you are creating these data folders. Make sure the pages choose fit your needs.

Thinking through the purpose before beginning will make sure the binders are meaningful. If helping children master sight words is not a goal in your classroom, skip these pages and find a different reading tool that works better for you.

Using Data Binders in your Classroom

These folders can be used as important pieces of a parent teacher conference. Compiling student work samples can help you share with parents how their child has grown or what struggles they are working on overcoming.

Data binders can be a meaningful tool during PLCs. Use your binders as a place to collect evidence that a new strategy is or is not working.

These can be an important part of helping students set and reach goals. Charting growth can give students the visual they need to see how they are progressing.

These data tracking sheets might also be useful for special education teachers looking to track IEP goals.

Notes about these student data tracking pages:

Student Mission Statements Have students begin the year by writing their own mission statements. Use the first form to help students make notes and form their ideas. They can then create a poem like mission statement by transferring their ideas to the outline form.

Long Term Goal Setting- Reading Use our graphs for student goal setting. Pick the system you use and copy one for each student. Students color in the bar graph to show their current level.

During a reading conference, set a goal with students for the following month. Mark the goal with a colored line. At the end of each month, have students update their goal sheet with the current level.

100s Chart: This form can be used for math facts or Fry words.

After taking a 100 problem timed test, students can color the number of problems they answered correctly. The following month they can choose a different color to color in their new total.

The same can be done with a list of 100 Fry Words.

RTI Forms: You will find forms that are designed to help you plan and track interventions in the classroom.

Reflection Forms: These include simple forms with faces to color in for younger students and more in depth forms that involve more writing for older students.

Ideas for Dividing up your Binders

Use dividers with tabs to create sections in your binder.

Some sections you might include could be:

Goal setting

Student work samples

Teacher observations

Progress monitoring

RTI documenation

Notes

For this collection, we are providing the PowerPoint and PDF versions so you may edit as needed. Download here:

We have a commercial use license for KG Fonts but you will need the following fonts downloaded on your computer if you plan on editing the PowerPoint version: Janda Closer to Free and KG Primary Penmanship.

Add colorful binder covers to your data binders with these: Editable Binder Covers.

You will find conferencing forms, running record forms and other reading workshop materials here: Editable Reading Management Binder.

You might choose to include calendar pages to document growth. Different versions are available here: Printable Calendar Pages.

You will find Fry Word checklists for monitoring student Fry Word progress here: Fry Word Checklists.

We have also created Fry Boxes for students to self assess their Fry Word knowledge. These can be found here: Fry Word Checks.

If your state still uses Common Core, you may also add our "I Can" Checkboxes to data folders: Everything "I Can" Common Core.

You will find our additional teacher binder materials here:

As with all of our resources, The Curriculum Corner creates these for free classroom use. Our products may not be sold. You may print and copy for your personal classroom use. These are also great for home school families!

You may not modify and resell in any form. Please let us know if you have any questions.

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Student data tracking is becoming a more important part of the classroom. Use this free collection of binder pages to make data easier to manage.

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The strategy of tracking student progress on specific learning goals is well supported. For example, Fuchs and Fuchs found that providing teachers with graphic displays of students' scores on formative assessments was associated with a 26 percentile point gain in achievement. Unfortunately, this strategy has not received the attention it deserves.

When students track their own progress on assessments using graphic displays, the gains are even higher. Over my many years of working with teachers, I have had the opportunity to examine the effects of such an approach. In 14 different studies, teachers had students in one class track their progress on assessments; in a second class, these teachers taught the same content for the same length of time without having students track their progress (see www.marzanoresearch.com/research/strategy20_trackingprogress.aspx ). On average, the practice of having students track their own progress was associated with a 32 percentile point gain in their achievement.

In the studies, students recorded their scores on a chart after taking each assessment. Figure 1 shows how a student tracked her progress on the topic of habitats using her scores on four different assessments. Using a rubric with a rating scale of 0 to 4 to score the assessments, this student began with a score of 1.5 on the first assessment and ended with a score of 3.5 on the fourth assessment.

Figure 1. Student Progress Chart

This approach provides two kinds of information for students and teachers. First, the rubric provides a description of the levels of performance that the teacher expects of the students. Second, the graph provides a representation of each student's progression of learning. The combination of these two types of information produces the powerful effect.

What Produces the Best Results?

Address a single goal in all the assessments. To track student progress in the manner depicted in Figure 1, all assessments must address the same learning goal. For example, assume that a teacher has two learning goals that relate to the topic of habitats. One learning goal might be, "The student will understand that habitats provide plants and animals with the things they need to survive." A second learning goal for this same topic might be, "The student will understand how a local habitat of his or her choice supports specific local animals." The assessments should clearly differentiate between these two goals. One assessment can address both goals, but only if the teacher assigns two scores to the assessment-one for each learning goal.

Use rubrics instead of points.Across the 14 studies, teachers obtained the best results when they scored assessments using a rubric instead of points. Teachers typically assign a certain number of points to each answer on a test and then convert the total points to a percentage score. When teachers use this approach, they tend to change the type and difficulty of items from test to test, even when those tests measure the same topic. The first test might include all easy items, but the second test might include all difficult items. Consequently, a student might receive fewer points on the second test even though he now knows more than he did when he took the first test. A graph of his test scores would make it look as though he had decreased in knowledge when he had actually gained in knowledge. In fact, in the two studies that did not show positive effects for students tracking their own progress, the teachers used points instead of rubric scores.A rubric I have found useful involves five values, 0 through 4, with the score of 3 meaning the learner has mastered the content that is the target of instruction-the specific learning goal that the teacher wishes to assess and track. The teacher would state the learning goal in a form that describes what he or she expects students to do to demonstrate their understanding: "Students will explain and illustrate how habitats provide plants and animals with the things they need to survive."A score of 4 indicates that students have mastered score 3 content and can also use that content to make inferences. For example, to earn a score of 4 on the habitat learning goal, students might be required to explain what would happen if the number of animals that the habitat typically supported increased dramatically over a short period of time. A score of 2 indicates that students know simple details and processes that relate to the learning goal (score 3 content) but not the more complex information and processes that the learning goal involves. In this case, a score of 2 might indicate that students recognize some basic facts and terminology associated with habitats even though they cannot explain and illustrate how habitats provide plants and animals with the things they need to survive. A score of 1 indicates that students cannot produce any of the content on their own but can do so with some help from the teacher. Finally, a score of 0 indicates that even with help, students cannot produce any of the content.

Use different types of assessments. The paper-and-pencil test is only one of many options that teachers can use with rubrics. Other types of assessments include demonstrations, probing discussions, unobtrusive observations, and student-generated assessments.A well-constructed rubric allows for a relatively accurate measure of a student's level of understanding through both a demonstration, in which students demonstrate their skill at a procedure or their understanding of information, and a probing discussion, in which the teacher asks individual students to explain their understanding.Unobtrusive observations involve a teacher observing a student demonstrating a procedure without the student being aware of the observation. For example, a physical education teacher might observe a student demonstrating the overhand throw on the playground. If the teacher has designed an appropriate rubric for this process, he or she can assign a score to the student without interrupting the student's play.Finally, student-generated assessments are those that students have designed to demonstrate that they have met the requirements of a specific score on a rubric. For example, to show that she has attained score 3 status, a mathematics student might decide to explain how to solve a specific type of problem and demonstrate her explanation using selected problems from the end of a chapter in the textbook.

Benefits for All

When it comes to using classroom assessment to enhance student achievement, having students track their progress using rubrics is a hidden gem. This strategy involves multiple types of assessments, increases interactions between teachers and students, and provides students with clear guidance on how to enhance their learning.

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The Art and Science of Teaching / When Students Track Their Progress

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The strategy of tracking student progress on specific learning goals is well supported. For example, Fuchs and Fuchs found that providing teachers with graphic displays of students' scores on formative assessments was associated with a 26 percentile point gain in achievement. Unfortunately, this strategy has not received the attention it deserves.

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Encouraging students to set goals for themselves-the first phase of self-regulated learning-helps them develop a growth mindset.

"Setting goals is the first step in turning the invisible into the visible." -Tony Robbins

Many students may not necessarily have the tools to set academic goals and lack strategies to enact change and work toward those goals. Teachers can provide structure to help students set academic goals that are realistic and appropriate as well as achievable. It is important to note that goal setting is not just an activity for the beginning of the school year, but an ongoing process.

It personalizes the learning process based on their needs.

It creates intention and motivation that empowers students.

It establishes accountability to shift responsibility to students.

It provides a foundation for students to advocate for their needs.

Setting academic goals is the first phase of self-regulated learning. Irrespective of the model proposed by leading researchers such as Barry Zimmerman, self-regulated learning always begins with a goal-planning phase. Goal setting is an essential component for growth and development in our students for several reasons:

Goal setting can be done at any age-as long as it is age appropriate. Teaching the skill of goal setting coupled with reflecting and revising goals can give students the self-regulated learning tools for a growth mindset toward academic development.

With students as young as kindergarten, more scaffolding is needed. At the beginning of each day, students can select an emoji or picture that represents some action from a predetermined list of possible options. If teaching virtually, students can do this at the beginning of the session. If teaching in person, students can perhaps tape their goal to their desk or table area or perhaps a chart displayed in the classroom. The class can spend a few moments discussing goals and what actions they can do to achieve those goals. Teachers can invite other students to make suggestions for their peers. At the end of the day, allow students to rate themselves with stars and to think about how they could do things differently for the next day.

Upper Elementary and Middle School

For students who are slightly older and able to write, an excellent way to develop the habit of creating, planning, and reflecting on goals can be done through the use of short-term daily goals using sticky notes. At the beginning of the day, students take a few minutes to imagine some task, behavior, or skill they want to focus their intentions on for that specific day. Let the students keep the notes somewhere visible, so they can refer back to the goal throughout the day. Include class conversations with either a partner, a small group, or the whole class at the beginning and end of the day. Focus on the achievement of the goal, but suggest growth mindset strategies to focus on the wins as well as necessary changes for further improvement.

What do you think about the choices in goals for the week? (Were they realistic and appropriate? Were they the most needed for growth at this time?)

How did you progress toward your goals? (Did you have clear, actionable steps?)

What were some of the wins for the week?

What are some ways you can continue to improve on your development of these goals?

Once students have more advanced writing skills, it may be useful for them to keep a chart or table of their goals in a logbook. Students record in the morning, not only the goals but an action plan, and then reflect on strategies for improvement at the end of the day. At the end of each week, allow students time to reflect on their goals for the next week with structured prompts such as the following:

While a logbook is functional, it can be a more motivating experience to allow students to engage in creativity and personalization. Allow them to have fun with the process and create a goal journey map. They identify a goal, which is the end of the map. They also identify different benchmarks or steps to complete along the path or journey toward that goal. Students then have a visual representation of the progress of their journey.

High School

For high school students, l use a reflection sheet after each unit or chapter to create a regular habit of revisiting goals. Ask students the following questions:

What are some areas that you can improve upon? What are some areas that need more attention or focus? What could you do differently?

What specific and concrete actions can you do?

How can you advocate for yourself? In other words, how can your teacher, your peers, or others guide you toward your goal?

What were the wins for this chapter or unit? In other words, what things did you do well or what areas did you improve?

I always begin new units with an independent work day or two. During this time, the students are working on their reading skills, while I conference with their classmates independently.

Goal setting can help with classroom management and academic performance. It allows students to become more aware of expectations and concrete methods to achieve an outcome. It scaffolds the process, making it more manageable. With goal setting that is reflective and iterative, students establish a growth mindset as they engage in monitoring of their progress and reflecting on it as outlined by Zimmerman and Dale Schunk.

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Encouraging students to set goals for themselves-the first phase of self-regulated learning-helps them develop a growth mindset.

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On one "Data Friday," Ms. Mendoza tries to encourage healthy competition by displaying her 7th period's performance on the most recent interim assessment compared with that of her other classes. Down the hall, Mr. Williams passes out individual results on the assessment and asks students to take out their data binders to graph their own progress, reflect on their data, and determine action steps.

Like Ms. Mendoza and Mr. Williams, practitioners and policymakers around the country have expressed considerable enthusiasm for engaging students with data. Some see it as a way to encourage students to exert extra effort; others believe that students who look at their own data gain a better understanding of their strengths, their weaknesses, and how to improve.

How do teachers commonly examine data with their students? And what does research tell us about how these practices are likely to affect student motivation?

Motivating or Demotivating?

Motivation research identifies classroom practices and activities that shape students' orientation toward goals (Dweck, 2010; Pintrich, 2003).

A performance orientation directs students' attention to grades and achievement and encourages them to compare themselves with others (Ames, 1992; Pope, 2010). Performance-oriented goals are generally associated with negative student outcomes (Meece, Anderman, &amp; Anderman, 2006). Although some students may be motivated by a performance orientation, others may balk at difficult tasks and give up when faced with difficulty (Pintrich, 2003).

Teachers promote a performance orientation when they make most decisions for students, reward achievement relative to others, use rewards to control behavior, provide boring or repetitive tasks, and divert attention from tasks and learning to achievement (Ames, 1992; Epstein, 1988).

In contrast, a mastery orientation, in which students focus on developing new skills and improving their competence, is associated with self-regulation, increased effort, autonomy, and the belief that effort will lead to academic success (Ames, 1992; Pintrich, 2003; Seifert, 2004). Teachers foster a mastery orientation when they focus on individual improvement, recognize and reward effort, evaluate students privately, involve students in decision making, foster students' sense of responsibility and independence, provide meaningful and interesting learning activities, and encourage students to set short-term, self-referenced goals (Ames, 1992; Epstein, 1988).

A Study of Teacher Practices

To understand how teachers use data with their students, we conducted in-depth fieldwork in six middle schools in four districts in 2011-12, including interviews, focus groups, and observations with teachers, coaches, and school and district administrators (Marsh, Farrell, &amp; Bertrand, 2014).

The teachers in our study, like most educators in the United States, faced increasing demands from school and district administrators to engage in data-driven practices. Their schools had data walls and regularly scheduled data chats focused on standardized test results. They received new technology to obtain quick results from assessments, generate color-coded displays, and assist with analyses. Teachers also had data coaches, instructional coaches, and professional learning communities to support this work. It was only a matter of time before the demand for data use extended to students.

We met many teachers who believed that having students analyze data would motivate them to learn, and we identified 50 instances where teachers engaged students with their data. Overall, we found that many teachers set up performance-oriented classrooms that may actually have been de motivating for students.

Data-Use Practices Supporting a Performance Orientation

Mrs. Landen, a 7th grade language arts teacher, frequently posted graphs of test results on her data wall following each common grade assessment or district benchmark assessment. These bar graphs compared the results across her classes, which were homogeneously leveled by students' performance on the prior year's state test. Mrs. Landen felt that students were motivated by competition:

Yes, it's to motivate, to encourage my "basic" kids that they're "this close" to honors, and then it's to motivate my honors kids. I even lie to my honors kids and tell them, "You know, on this test our neighbor teacher's honors class scored a certain percentage."

The graphs themselves emphasized not only the state's performance levels (with an emphasis on a proficiency goal), but also the direct comparison to others. Students were not involved in analyzing their data, and there was very little guidance on how they could improve or reengage with material to fill in gaps in their knowledge.

Mrs. Landen's data use typified the performance orientation we saw in one-third of all instances in our study. These teachers

Believed that if students saw their data, they would work harder and take assessments more seriously.

Presented data as status-based information. For instance, one teacher posted the names of all students scoring proficient or advanced on district assessments on the classroom wall and had those students sign the list.

Publicly shared group-level data or even individual results in the belief that social comparison motivated students.

Used extrinsic rewards like prizes and parties when students had moved to a certain proficiency status to ensure student investment in assessment results.

Provided limited opportunity for student involvement, instead showing prepared data displays and telling students how to interpret the information. Teachers provided little guidance about what students should study or revisit.

Data-Use Practices Supporting a Mastery Orientation

Ms. Santos, a veteran 8th grade language arts teacher, began the school year worried about the low performance of one of her classes. She worked closely with the school's literacy coach to design routines to engage students in analyzing assessment data and setting goals. She provided students with copies of their multiple-choice answer sheets, and together they corrected the results. Students then privately analyzed how well they had mastered each standard, and they chose how they could close their own gaps in learning.

In one instance, Ms. Santos designed state standardized test "clinics" where student choice was central:

I have five different groups by strand, and I have a different activity for them to do. They chose which strand was their weakest and which one they wanted to work on for six weeks. ... They bought into that since they were able to see their own strengths and weaknesses.

In small-group settings, Ms. Santos provided students with specific feedback based on each student's needs. She repeated the cycle at each benchmark assessment, emphasizing students' individual growth and effort as the key to improvement.

Ms. Santos's practices, which were likely to promote a mastery orientation, were typical of one-third of the observations in the study. Teachers who used these practices

Embraced a learning perspective -a belief that examining and reflecting on the data would help students identify weaknesses, what contributes to them, and how they could address gaps.

Focused on growth-related information, articulating a clear relationship between effort and outcomes and encouraging students to consider their progress.

Shared individual-level data privately with students in ways that focused student attention on how they were performing relative to their own past performance or how close they were to reaching standards.

Sometimes used intangible rewards like praise and discussion of positive results to emphasize key messages about progress.

Involved students in analysis, goal setting, and follow-up. For instance, students had opportunities to graph their own results and identify topics on which to focus their reflection.

Were highly involved in supporting students' next steps. In whole-group or individual interventions, teachers did not simply repeat the same content and approach but instead tried multiple ways to reteach the material.

Mixed Data-Use Practices

Finally, one-third of the instances of data-use practices we observed were mixed-that is, a hybrid of mastery and performance practices. For instance, in one school, classrooms were equipped with a "scan-cam," a tool students used to immediately learn their individual scores on multiple-choice questions. A 7th grade teacher, Mr. Wilson, implemented this tool in such a way that students were actively involved in analyzing and identifying gaps. However, identifying a response to the results was teacher-driven, and it rested largely on test-taking skills rather than on helping students reengage with the content.

Digging Deeper

The environments in which teachers worked-characterized by school-level polices, routines, type of leadership, district-level expectations, and the broader accountability context-greatly shaped how they used data with students. In some cases, these factors pressed teachers to focus on performance; in others, they created opportunities for teachers to focus on mastery.

First, school-level policies and routines like data talks and data walls appeared to define acceptable student data-use practice for teachers. In one school with a high proportion of teachers who had a performance-oriented approach, a schoolwide policy required teachers to post comparative class data with a focus on proficiency goals to encourage competition between teachers and classes. Classroom structures then tended to replicate the components of the data-wall policy, such as attention to status and class comparisons.

Messages from school leaders-administrators, coaches, and teacher leaders-also framed the discourse around data use. In one school with the highest proportion of mastery-oriented observations, the assistant principal communicated mastery-focused messages to teachers:

I've tried to be really consistent in my message about how important goal setting is for kids, to teach them how to set goals, how to monitor their goals, how to assess their goal achievement and then recalibrate their goals based on how they've accessed them.

Several teachers at this school mentioned how the assistant principal's vision helped them think about their own practices.

District policies and norms also shaped data-use practices. The literacy curriculum one district adopted fostered mastery-oriented practices with learning-focused, formative assessments, such as readers' notebooks and conference logs. In contrast, the culture and norms in another district promoted competition among schools. During monthly meetings with principals, district administrators regularly reported and compared schools' scores on the district benchmark assessments.

Finally, the broader national and state accountability environment in the United States promotes a performance-based orientation. Federal accountability policy (embodied in No Child Left Behind) has long emphasized status measures of student achievement and assumed that public reporting of information on performance, coupled with consequences, will motivate individuals to work harder to improve performance. It's not surprising that many educators replicate the orientations promoted by the broader structures within which they operate.

Questions to Guide Practice

Educators are unlikely to have control over the broader state and federal accountability messages that shape data-use practices. But with an eye for what's realistic and possible, we offer some questions that educators who want to engage students with data should ask themselves:

For teachers: What is your purpose in engaging your students with data, and how do you structure your classroom practices to meet these goals? What elements of your data-use practice are inadvertently emphasizing performance? How could you reorganize or refine your data-use practices to reflect a mastery orientation?

For school and district administrators: How are school or district policies and routines framing messages around data for your teachers that might translate to a mastery or performance orientation within classrooms? Do school or district policies and programs emphasize the values of performance, status, and extrinsic rewards; or do these policies recognize effort and growth?

As we work toward the laudable goal of involving students in data use, we want to make sure that our data-use practices support and motivate students, rather than deflate or demotivate them.

Authors' note: Teachers' names are pseudonyms.

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From "data chats" to "Data Fridays," teachers are involving their students in looking at data. Does your approach increase student motivation-or decrease it?