Student Pre-Assessement and Post-Assessment Analysis
Individual Student Growth -The first chart examines the amount of growth that occurred, for individual students, between the pre and post assessment. Every student in the class improved from the time of the pre assessment, minus student #9 who neither increased or decreased. Some students, such as students #5, 7, 14, 16, and 17 had large growth between September 9th, when the pre assessment was issued, and December 9th, when the post assessment was issued.
Class Average - This chart shows a summative assessment of the entire class' growth throughout the semester. As a whole, the class improved. The average for the pre assessment was 5.66/12 and the average for the post assessment was 8.16/12 creating a 20% increase for the class average.
The assessment instrument, used for both the pre and post assessment, was issued by the Poudre School District Elementary art departments. It was last revised June of 2014. It is a standards based, four point rubric, and it covers three main areas that are overarching art principles. The first section is in regards to Planning and Ideation, the second: Creation and Exploration, and the third: Reflection and Connection. The three categories encompass the visual art standards which are: Comprehend, Create, Reflect, and Transfer.
The main strength of the assessment rubric is that it can evaluate big picture concepts spanning across various projects. Because of this, the pre assessment and post assessment could be performed on different projects, even using varying mediums. For example, some students missed the first day of class while others missed the last day of class, resulting in different projects being assessed for their pre and post assessment. Another strength of this rubric is that it is directly aligned with content standards.
The weakness of this rubric is that it does not define some of the expectations/vocabulary. For example, in the Reflection and Connection section it says for students to “Communicate personal connections with works of art and ideas using the language of art”. The rubric does not give an example of what “using the language of art” looks like for a second or third grader. Are the students expected to use words such as focal point, hue, and juxtaposition, or words like shape, color, and build? In order to make the rubric fully effective, these words/terms should be defined at the bottom.
Formative Assessments
During our lessons, we incorporated several different types of formative assessments. The first was a dialy check-in with the students at the beginning of class, while they were still cirlced up. We would begin by asking students a series of questions related to the previous class' instruction. What did we work on last semester? What materials did we use? What makes an object anthropomorphic? These short questioning sessions allowed us to quickly gauge whether the students had recieved the important information from the preivous class.
The next type of assessment was personal check-ins throughout the class period. Becasue there were three of us, it was easy for us to walk around and engage each student in a discussion on their project and the lesson objectives/learning targets. This allowed us to determine exactly which students may need additional instruction/clarification and whether the confusion was isolated to a certain student, or the whole class.
Another quick type of foramative assessment was check-ins like thumbs up or thumbs down. These quick assessments helped highlight whether the class was on track or needed further instruction.
Lastly, we tried to end each class with a sharing discussion when there was not a formal reflective activity. We asked the students to circle up and share discoveries they made that day, what they worked on, and why. Sometimes this came naturally to the students and sometimes they required further questioning or prompts in order to focus in on the objectives we were trying to achieve that lesson.
What did I learn about teaching...
Teaching at Polaris this semester provided an invaluable learning experience on my road to developing as a future art educator. Being able to assume the role as the main art teacher for a group of students fostered my growth in the classroom beyond what I expected and enlightened me to areas I still need to improve in.
When the semester began, I felt very overwhelmed with the task ahead of us and how we were going to get there. Being solely responsible for these students art education was an important position to be in. I was unsure of our lesson plans and whether or not they would be effective; constantly second guessing our instruction decisions. In addition to that, I was lacking confidence in the classroom. I wasn’t delivering my instruction clearly with purpose and I was struggling with class management when behavior issues arose or students were being disruptive. Reflecting on how I feel today, it’s hard to believe it’s only been several months since that first day we stepped into Polaris.
Discussed below are the biggest take-a-ways I’ve had this semester and the areas in which I still need to improve as an educator.
Aligned Lesson Planning: As the semester progressed and I gained more experience with instruction, it became obvious how important it was for our lesson plans to be aligned. Aligning our objectives and assessment was the first step, but integrating these into the overall instruction so it was a seamless lesson was the real challenge. For example, during our favorite place lesson, we introduced the students to the terms landscape, seascape, and cityscape using contemporary works of art. As our instruction continued and we moved to the ideation process, we again referenced these terms with questions like, “is your favorite place a landscape or seascape?” This helped our instruction carry purpose throughout the entire lesson. By ensuring that our lesson plans were fully aligned, they flowed smoothly through our instruction and felt whole rather than like a series of parts.
Classroom Management: One of my largest areas of growth this semester was in my classroom management abilities. The first time I took the lead teaching at Polaris, it was hard for me to address behavior issues or control disruptive situations because I felt overwhelmed. Thankfully, Julie was a great role model for dealing with these situations. Successful classroom management boiled down to three main aspects:
Speaking with confidence
Not giving students the option to continue misbehaving. For example, asking a student if they will be quite rather than telling them they need to be quiet.
Following through with my statements. For example, stating that we won’t move on until everyone is quite and then waiting till everyone is actually quite.
As my planning and instruction improved, so did my classroom management abilities. These three aspects of teaching are all closely tied together and help form an effective lesson plan.
Student Engagement: Whether it’s during instruction, the piece students are creating, or the reflective activity students complete, student engagement is one of the most important aspects of lesson planning. One of the simplest ways I found to engage students was to just ask questions rather than telling them the information. For example, rather than just telling them the different ways artists create a focal point, I showed them images and asked them to describe what they saw and why. I used follow-up questions to help them “discover” the information I wanted them to understand. This simple idea kept them engaged while also giving them the power to discover new information on their own. For the reflective process, I tried to develop activities that felt more like a game to the students. I found that if they thought it was fun, they remained more engaged and got more out of the activity. For example, to reflect on their favorite place paintings, the students created narratives from a chosen painting and then acted it out in a skit. The students were excited about the activity and remained engaged throughout the entire process.
Personal Significance: A large part of student engagement is whether the activity or project carries any personal significance with the student. Making our lessons significant/interesting to the students kept them fully engaged in the making process and motivated to create art.
Preparedness: Being completely prepared for class had a large impact on our teaching experiences this semester. Not only was it important to have all the materials on hand and ready for use, but also to be prepared for how the students would react to the lesson. Having thought about possible situations ahead of time allowed us to react when something came up and kept the lesson moving smoothly.
Documentation: Because it can be harder for students, parents, and administrators to decipher what students are learning from an art activity, I realized how important good documentation is to justify the arts in our schools. This was something I struggled with at first because I was more focused on what the students were doing rather than the process or what they were learning. By focusing our blog entries around what the students were saying and the discoveries they were making (“you can talk about how the art makes you feel”), I was able to better show what the students learned during our lessons.