Saturday, November 19, 2011
Blog Topic #14
Summarize findings of Pre and Post VTS Tests
As I read through the Post-VTS assessments, I still felt that the students found it harder to write down their thoughts. A few of them made remarkable (in my opinion) improvement and I will share those at our meeting on Saturday. Most of the students used more words and evidence with their assertions. We still need to work on conditional language which a few have picked up. I now understand why Mary said this is not a process that is completed in a semester. I did see some improvement but maybe not so 'remarkable' as I said earlier. I'm just proud that I did see some improvement. I was a little worried as the papers were turned in and I just glanced at them. A couple may have elaborated a little bit more on their narratives but nothing compared to class discussions. I don't believe any one gave various possibilities in their writing.
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You have every reason to be proud of your students! Improvement is improvement! I agree that writing samples as an indicator of growth may be flawed. I have been wondering if student interviews or small group pre & post VTS discussions would be a more valid assessment method. It would require more videos and would be more cumbersome during the normal teaching day, but with the right approach, administrators might allow release time for teachers to conduct these. Something to think about.
ReplyDeleteMore than half of your student increased their word count and of those that did, the increases were impressive. The assertions with evidence were notable as well. I hope you will continue VTS regularly with this group and retest them again at the end of the year. I'll bet they continue to improve!
I'm seeing the same thing in my post assessments. The word count is overall down from the pre assessment and I think it is related to not practicing the writing component throughout. More on that will be posted on my blog in my assessment.
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