For class next Wednesday please have your two high inquiry tasks fully flushed out including at least four Assessment criteria for each. The full specifics of what is required in this assignment is outlined in this blog post. Try to be as specific as possible. For example, if it involves a script how many words do you want. If it is a digital narrative or mini-documentary how long will it be? When looking for Assessment Criteria for each inquiry task draw from research on the internet, assessment criteria you have seen in other projects, and the particulars of what you think constitutes powerful work in relation to this task. I have provided a fully articulated example in this Google doc.
Remember we only have four more classes and next Friday class is cancelled. However, I will be in class and I encourage you to come and use this time as a work period where I will be available to help you and answer questions as they arise. In asking you to create an assessment plan for a unit is perhaps one of the more important competencies you can have as a teacher. It is what separates you from someone who walks off the street. It is quite challenging though, so working on this in stages is helpful.
Assessment taks:
Once you have done identified your two big inquiry tasks, you now want to work backwards to create an assessment plan that will help students create a powerful response to this task. These would be mini-activities you would take in a long the way that will prepare students for the final task. As part of this process, include two assessment criteria. See the ones I generated for my assessment tasks as an example.
Research:
Some examples of assessment tasks for research would include creating a critical question requiring a reasoned judgment among options. For example: What were the three most important elements of traditional Inuit life? What are three most significant elements that need to be present for a country to be considered democratic? For assessment you could included identifies three areas, explains why these are important, and provides a specific supporting detail for each.
Connecting with experts:
An assessment task could involve developing questions to ask an expert coming in to visit or to interview a specialist classroom group. Here the assessment criteria would be open-ended, gets us information we need to know, unexpected. See my example.
Evaluating good and bad examples:
So that students understand the main assessment criteria for the inquiry task, you could create an assessment task asking them to evaluate a bad exemplar based on the criteria you will be using to assess their final work. Again, the criteria would be related to identifying areas of weakness in relation to particular criteria and advice for improvement.
Formative Feedback:
As you need to build in formative feedback loops within any inquiry project, you could give students a rubric and do the same as above but with their work. Alternatively, you could get them to show you four changes they made to their script based on the formative feedback you gave them.
Remember that you need to include the following for your final unit plan:
- Two big inquiry tasks that will guide this unit along with accompanying assessment criteria for each (min. 4) that you will use to evaluate your students.
- A series of at least five or six assessment tasks that will prepare students to powerfully respond to each inquiry task. Include how many one-hour classes you think each stage will take at the top.
- For each assessment task include 2-3 assessment criteria that you will use to evaluate student work. Make these tasks specific. See examples.
- For each assessment task and inquiry task include specific resources you would use to achieve these tasks including videos, articles, critical challenges from Learn Alberta, the Historical Thinking Website, or other sources, that you will closely follow or draw upon.
- Include the specific learning outcomes and competencies that you hope to address in this unit. Including a 200-250 words response to how this unit is an attempt to live out key elements articulated in the front matter of the Alberta Social Studies Program.
- Develop one lesson plan that could be used at one point in the inquiry. This assessment for this will follow the criteria used for your earlier lesson plan. This lesson plan should include a fully developed rubric of three criteria you will use to assess student work. However, you only need to include the upper end- well developed (4) and the lower end still developing (2).
- Choosing two of the following areas to concentrate on in particular: Aboriginal and/or Francophone perspectives, infusion of technology, learner differentiation, and inter-disciplinary, write a short 300 word explanation as to how and when you would incorporate these elements.
- Include an APA reference list of all resources you draw on and plan to use. For example, if you borrow from a rubric or another lesson, please reference this.
This post first appeared on I Can't Believe A Kid Did That: Powerful Examples Of Student Inquiry Work, please read the originial post: here
