Not one day, not one classroom
Using evidence from student work in technology to inform overall teacher judgments for National Standards.
BRENDA WEAL and SELENA HINCHCO show the trail
his school year saw the introduction of National Standards for reading, writing and mathematics.
All schools with students in Years 1–8 now report on students’ progress and achievement against these standards, and in 2010 The New Zealand Curriculum is expected to be fully implemented in schools.
Evidence of how a student meets a standard is collected across a range of contexts and learning areas. Just as it is not enough to use only one assessment tool, it is also not enough to just look for evidence within only the specific teaching sessions of reading, writing, and mathematics. How students use reading, writing and mathematics in other learning areas provides evidence towards making an overall teacher judgment.
Below we use the example of Jack, a Year 6 student, to describe examples of how he uses reading, writing and mathematics within the learning area of technology. We will outline how evidence of his learning can be used by his teacher when making an overall teacher judgment [OTJ] against the reading, writing and mathematics standards.
During an integrated unit on sound, Jack’s class identified the opportunity to create wind chimes for their school environment. Jack examined the range of wind chimes his teacher brought to class and researched wind chimes using the internet and non-fiction books. He learnt the names of the parts of a wind chime, how they were constructed and decorated, and what materials they were made from.
This research helped him decide and record the attributes for his wind chime. He decided the chime needed to be waterproof, made from metal to get a better sound, have strong string to hang from, needed colour, a theme and detail to ensure it had good aesthetics.
Because Jack had not worked with metal before, he looked into the properties of three materials: aluminium, brass and copper to decide which materials would be best.
He did sketches of several ideas and modelled his two initial ideas through 2D drawings. Through evaluating these ideas Jack decided on his final design. He chose a space themed wind chime, which he demonstrated through a detailed 3D annotated drawing, with measurements of the components he needed to construct. He planned the key stages of his work using a flowchart.
Over several sessions he created his space themed wind chime. Firstly he tested aluminium chimes of different lengths to find the best sound and then drilled holes to enhance their sound. The star and planet were created by cutting and filing plastic into shape. Jack built a ‘UFO’ shape by using a steel base and shaping, gluing and painting foam.
Jack kept a daily diary of manufacture, recording his achievements, problems and next steps. He evaluated his final outcome against his attributes and described possible modifications for the future.
Judgment time
NEW ZEALAND'S NATIONAL STANDARDS differ from many overseas versions in that no single source of assessment information is being used to decide where a student is at in relation to the standards.
Instead, the existing formative assessment practices of New Zealand teachers are supported by the need to reach an OTJ (overall teacher judgment). An OTJ involves teachers making use of a range of assessment evidence to support a judgment about students’ progress and achievement in relation to the standards. The OTJ is made using the triangulation of:
- Observing students, i.e. their workbooks, observations, approaches to tasks.
- Learning conversations with students, i.e. conferencing, interviews, self-assessments.
- Formal assessments, i.e. standardised tests (e.g. PAT, e-asTTle, Gloss, STAR).
Teachers have always made judgments about their students’ progress and achievement in reading, writing and mathematics. National Standards now call for teachers to make judgments about how students can demonstrate these skills not only in dedicated reading, writing and mathematics teaching sessions but also as they work, mainly independently, across the curriculum.
Students connect what they have learnt in reading, writing and mathematics sessions into other curriculum areas. In the story of Jack’s technological practice we can see examples of his use of reading, writing and mathematics in a variety of ways.
We have identified three stages teachers may progress through as they come to terms with understanding how to make defensible OTJs for National Standards.
Initially, teachers will most likely consider making OTJs based solely on how students perform during their dedicated reading, writing and mathematics teaching sessions. The second stage of development could involve teachers identifying some evidence from other curriculum learning areas when seeking evidence to support their OTJ.
As teacher understanding grows we can expect a more cohesive approach to making OTJs as teachers plan across the curriculum to utilise authentic situations for students to use reading, writing and mathematics knowledge and skills providing evidentially proven OTJs.
Only then can we say that the judgment is genuinely an overall one.
STANDARDS REQUIREMENTS do not replace Jack’s teacher’s assessment of his achievement in technology where learning area achievement objectives still drive the teaching and learning. Technology education in New Zealand has a strong research base and this research has led to the development of the Indicators of Progression.
The Indicators of Progression provide support for teachers to interpret the achievement objectives for each strand of the technology curriculum within the NZC. They describe what student achievement at each particular level might look like, across all three technology strands and across all eight levels of the NZC.