Forums

I went looking thorough my files for articles on formative assessment and I found an interesting article that I will attach. I am also going to attach a probe I created to use as part of a force & motion unit. I would love feedback on the probe itself. Am I asking the right questions to get at the students' thinking? Kathy

Attachments

WorkingInsidetheBlackBox.pdf (0.38 Mb)

Elementary_Balloon_Caper--Probe.doc (0.07 Mb)

Kathy, I like the assessment you wrote! My choice is C. Am I right? Now you need to write the correct answer and an explanation of why. Keep up the good work. Betty

Betty,

I am not going to give you the correct answer but I am going to share something that Arlene fund that might give you a bit of a hint.

http://www.thenakedscientists.com/HTML/content/kitchenscience/exp/balloons-in-cars/

Interesting. I will not post the answer. We let others discover for themselves.

Wow Kathy! Great job on the assessment! This is such an important concept for kids to understand. I'm sure many of your students will initially guess that the balloons will move forward when the brakes are applied. Have you though about giving them a balloon as they leave school so they can try the experiment on the way home? I'd be curious to see how many moms and dads would also be surprised by the results! Maureen

Wow Kathy! Great job on the assessment! This is such an important concept for kids to understand. I'm sure many of your students will initially guess that the balloons will move forward when the brakes are applied. Have you though about giving them a balloon as they leave school so they can try the experiment on the way home? I'd be curious to see how many moms and dads would also be surprised by the results! Maureen

So glad to find this link on formative assessing student learning! I am a 5th grade teacher in a middle school, these assessments help me deal with my time crunch as well!

Heather, I am wondering what concepts you might be working on. I am sure we could either share some resources or maybe some people might even be willing to create some formative assessments around concepts that are part of your curriculum.

Just wanted to thank you for posting the article. The article stated that assessment for learning is any assessment for which the first priority in its design and practice is to serve the purpose of promoting students’learning. I really like this article because our goal is to meet the learning needs of every student and this is how we do it by using any assessment that is used for promoting student's learning.

I just found this site where many different types of formative assessments are available. It is not discipline specific to science.

Formative Assessment Activities

Hi Kathy, I am in Ohio, we are in the process of instating our own standards in the upcoming school year. I have topics of: light and sound, ecosystems and interactions in ecosystems, inquiry (which is hard for me to assess because it IS part of everything, does that make sense??), and pretty much the whole darn solar system. I use some of the formative assessments found in the NSTA books by Keeley, but depending on what the kids need to know specifically they may or may not work all the time. Heather