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In the article Turning on the Lights: What Pre-Assessments Can Do, the author goes into detail about the importance of activating a student’s schema, or prior knowledge when beginning new material. It is essential to get students engaged and active in the lesson by allowing for them to fully understand what is being taught. By giving students pre-assessments, it also lets the teacher see how much a student knows about what will soon be discussed. In the text it also states that assessments “Are administrated before the lesson or unit will be taught so that they provide the most up to date information about student’s strengths and needs. How can we design assessments? It is needed to immediately declare the goals of the unit and learning objective. Without students being able to clearly see what is being asked of them, it leads to a ton of confusion. It is also important to go over any possible misconception with the class to correct their mistakes.
In the article A is for assessment, the author describes three different assessments and its benefits when used in the classroom. Pre-assessment is the first objective as it activates students’ prior knowledge and lets the teacher be aware of where students are at academically. Then there are formative assessments that can take place in the form of tests and quizzes. This is to check the see just how much the students understood when taught the material. Lastly, post assessments are used to end off a lesson or certain topic in the form of an exit ticket or final note. This is to be designed to leave students with a finishing thought or to let them to continue to think and wonder possible scenarios related to the lesson. For example, after a lesson about learning how humans can disrupt an ecosystem, an exit ticket may be given to them stating “What are some ways we can protect the environment to prevent disruption?” This will leave students continuing to think about the lesson and how they can make a real difference.
I will incorporate these different assessments in my classroom by giving my students engaging worksheets to activate their schema. It will also help me becuase then i can get a better understanding of what i need to go over or reteach. I also really like the idea of exit tickets. I remember all my time in elementary and even high school, we would be given exit tickets. It really makes the student think and again, allows me to see what the students took away from the lesson. I can distribute these by having students write their thoughts and ideas on a slip for me to collect at the end.
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