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Assessments

Throughout the school year, there are midterms and finals, but are these the only way to

check on a student’s knowledge? Of course there are different ways to check on a student’s

understanding of the material other than exams. The mentor with whom I’m completing my

internship tests his students' knowledge in many different ways. As I observed my mentor teach

his class I noticed that he uses some engaging and fun ways to check up on his students’

understanding of the subject.

First of all, when I interviewed my mentor he stated that he uses three types of

assessments in his class; summative assessment, data-driven assessment, and formative

assessment. After a whole week of teaching his class a new topic, he gives his students a Friday

Check-In. This Friday Check-In contains ten questions based on the things they learned

throughout the week. This would be considered a summative assessment because he checks for

their understanding at the end of the week, meaning at the end of teaching a new topic. Another

example of summative assessments that he uses is reviewing quizzes. As he reviews quizzes in

class with his students he is constantly asking questions. My mentor also believes that reviewing

quizzes is important so that the students learn from their mistakes and fix them. My mentor calls

this strategy higher-order thinking, where students find their mistakes and fix them.

The second type of assessment, data-driven assessment, is based on quizzes or homework

that he assigns his students. My mentor uses this strategy when they are reviewing a quiz. After

he graded the students’ quizzes he knows who has more problems solving certain questions, so

when they are reviewing he asks these students to focus on reviewing specific questions. Another

example of data-driven assessment is when he is cold calling during a lesson and he targets
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students who he knows usually have problems on quizzes, this keeps the students engaged in

class and they pay more attention.

The last assessment is called formative assessment which is a little more informal and

casual assessment. My mentor uses this strategy all the time in class. Before, I mentioned the

words “cold calling”, now let me explain a little further what that means. When my mentor does

cold calling he calls students at random to answer questions whenever they are reviewing or

learning something new. He always asks the question first and then says the student’s name. He

stated that doing it in this order keeps every student alert because they don’t know who he’s

going to call on. Also, whenever a student doesn’t know the answer to a question, they say

“Help” and then he asks another student to answer the question. After they answer correctly he

goes back to the first student and asks them to repeat what the second student said. This strategy

is called “No Opt-Out”, and he uses it so that no student gets left behind. Another example of

formative assessment is worksheets. Sometimes, my mentor gives his students worksheets that

contain ten questions about what they learned in class, and the students take this worksheet home

as homework.

Additionally, my mentor does informal assessments all the time throughout the class. One

example is asking the students to answer questions as he is teaching something new. He also asks

his students to respond to their peer’s answers by showing thumbs up if they agree, thumbs down

if they disagree, and thumbs in the middle if they are not sure. He stated that thumbs in the

middle are important because this way everyone can participate. This strategy also helps him

check if everyone understands what he's teaching, and it also lets him know whether he can

move on to the next topic or if he needs to reteach something.

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Another informal assessment he uses is group discussions. He asks a question or gives his

students a problem, then he puts them into groups, asks them to discuss it and solve it together,

and then share it with the rest of the class. He said that this is something that he’s been practicing

throughout all his years of teaching; staying quiet and just letting them share their answers. He

said that when he started teaching he would say “that is correct” or “that is not quite right”

during group discussions. Now, he stays quiet and lets the students do the talking.

The following informal assessment is Do Nows. The Do Nows that he gives his students

are usually questions from the Friday Check-In or that are related to the Friday Check-In. From

time to time he also does an Exit Ticket at the end of class where he asks one question about

what they learned that day. The final informal assessment is a really fun activity that his students

love which is multiplication competitions. Since the students are seated in groups he goes to each

group and asks them to solve a multiplication problem, the first one to solve it has to compete

with the winners of the other groups, and they keep competing until there is only one winner.

In conclusion, I think that assessments don’t always have to be just tests or exams, there

are fun ways to check on a student’s understanding, like multiplication competitions. I have

learned a lot of strategies for teaching just from watching my mentor in class. I hope to be able to

use these strategies in the future when I have my own classroom and students.