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Are you picking up all your students' work is trying to tell you? In this book, assessment expert Susan M. Brookhart and instructional coach Alice Oakley walk teachers through a better and more illuminating way to approach student work across grade levels and content areas. You'll learn to view students' assignments not as a verdict on right or wrong but as a window into what students got and how they are thinking about it. The insight you'll gain will help you * Infer what students are thinking, * Provide effective feedback, * Decide on next instructional moves, and * Grow as a professional. Brookhart and Oakley then guide teachers through the next steps: clarify learning goals, increase the quality of classroom assessments, deepen your content and pedagogical knowledge, study student work with colleagues, and involve students in the formative learning cycle. The book's many authentic examples of student work and teacher insights, coaching tips, and reflection questions will help readers move from looking at student work for correctness to looking at student work as evidence of student thinking.

Assessment literacy leads to improved outcomes for all Do you know how to ensure teachers have the knowledge and skill to use assessment data to improve student learning? Do you know the influence that student involvement in assessments has on motivation and learning? This book guides you and your leadership team through 10 assessment literacy goals with practical content, how-to’s, success indicators, and activities to extend and process learning. You will come away understanding the attributes of comprehensive and balanced assessment systems, the necessity for clear academic achievement targets, and why assessment quality is essential. In addition to providing rubrics, processes, and practical tools that work across all grade levels and subject areas, this book shows you how to: Work with staff to integrate formative assessment and sound grading practices Communicate with all members of the school community about student learning Protect students and teachers by avoiding unethical and inappropriate assessment use Use student assessment information to improve and inform instruction Develop assessment policies that support quality assessment practice Advance your understanding of assessment so your teachers can accurately measure learning, practice effective formative assessment strategies, and ensure and maintain a comprehensive and balanced assessment system in your school or district.

In this guide from Susan M. Brookhart, you'll learn about Achievement-focused grading Strategies for grading individual assessments Strategies for assigning report card grades How to involve students in the grading process Ways to communicate clearly about grades and grading Packed with examples for elementary and secondary levels, this guide offers grading and reporting strategies that motivate student learning and accurately reflect student achievement. 8.5" x 11" 3-panel foldout guide (6 pages), laminated for extra durability and 3-hole-punched for binder storage.

"[Authors provide teachers with numerous examples and guides to improve teaching and student learning.]"--

Discover how using student-centered learning targets enables schools to raise student achievement and create a culture of evidence-based, results-oriented practice (includes reproducible planning forms).

For a wide variety of courses in classroom assessment. This highly respected text offers the most comprehensive discussion of traditional and alternative assessments of any classroom assessment text explaining, giving examples, discussing pros and cons, and showing how to construct virtually all of the traditional and alternative assessments teachers use in the classroom. The author explores assessment theories and research findings as they affect teaching and learning, and examines why, when, and how teachers should use assessment in the classroom. To the text's hundreds of practical examples are added checklists to aid in evaluating assessment vehicles and scores of strategies for assessing higher-order thinking, critical-thinking, and problem-solving skills. NEW TO THIS EDITION: NEW - Coverage of current topics in assessment including: formative assessment, differentiated instruction, response to intervention, universal design, and using technology for accommodations. NEW - Two new appendices: Implementing the Principles of Universal Design via Technology-Based Testing and Answers to Even-numbered Exercises NEW - Additional practical examples of classroom assessment "as it happens"-Throughout the text. Show students the exceptional range of assessment tools available-provide models for developing assessments, aligning assessments with lesson plans and standards, and creating both traditional and alternative assessments. NEW - Coverage of ways to assess students' writing skills. Teaches students how to write prompts that effectively assess different writing genres-explains the development and use of rubrics to evaluate writing. NEW - An introductory overview in every chapter-Poses the key questions that each chapter addresses and describes how each chapter is organized. Engages students' interest in chapter content-readies them for what's important in each chapter and helps them gauge their understanding. NEW - A glossary. Provides for easy look-up of important terms and concepts.

Formative assessment is one of the best ways to increase student learning and enhance teacher quality. But effective formative assessment is not part of most classrooms, largely because teachers misunderstand what it is and don't have the necessary skills to implement it. In the updated 2nd edition of this practical guide for school leaders, authors Connie M. Moss and Susan M. Brookhart define formative assessment as an active, continual process in which teachers and students work together—every day, every minute—to gather evidence of learning, always keeping in mind three guiding questions: Where am I going? Where am I now? What strategy or strategies can help me get to where I need to go? Chapters focus on the six interrelated elements of formative assessment: (1) shared learning targets and criteria for success, (2) feedback that feeds learning forward, (3) student self-assessment and peer assessment, (4) student goal setting, (5) strategic teacher questioning, and (6) student engagement in asking effective questions. Using specific examples based on their extensive work with teachers, the authors provide - Strategic talking points and conversation starters to address common misconceptions about formative assessment; - Practical classroom strategies to share with teachers that cultivate students as self-regulated, assessment-capable learners; - Ways to model the elements of formative assessment in conversations with teachers about their professional learning; - "What if" scenarios and advice for how to deal with them; and - Questions for reflection to gauge understanding and progress. As Moss and Brookhart emphasize, the goal is not to "do" formative assessment, but to embrace a major cultural change that moves away from teacher-led instruction to a partnership of intentional inquiry between student and teacher, with better teaching and learning as the outcome.

"[Authors provide teachers with numerous examples and guides to improve teaching and student learning.]"--

In Learning Targets, Connie M. Moss and Susan M. Brookhart contend that improving student learning and achievement happens in the immediacy of an individual lesson--what they call "today's lesson"--or it doesn't happen at all. The key to making today's lesson meaningful? Learning targets. Written from students' point of view, a learning target describes a lesson-sized chunk of information and skills that students will come to know deeply. Each lesson's learning target connects to the next lesson's target, enabling students to master a coherent series of challenges that ultimately lead to important curricular standards. Drawing from the authors' extensive research and professional learning partnerships with classrooms, schools, and school districts, this practical book * Situates learning targets in a theory of action that students, teachers, principals, and central-office administrators can use to unify their efforts to raise student achievement and create a culture of evidence-based, results-oriented practice. * Provides strategies for designing learning targets that promote higher-order thinking and foster student goal setting, self-assessment, and self-regulation. * Explains how to design a strong performance of understanding, an activity that produces evidence of students' progress toward the learning target. * Shows how to use learning targets to guide summative assessment and grading. Learning Targets also includes reproducible planning forms, a classroom walk-through guide, a lesson-planning process guide, and guides to teacher and student self-assessment. What students are actually doing during today's lesson is both the source of and the yardstick for school improvement efforts. By applying the insights in this book to your own work, you can improve your teaching expertise and dramatically empower all students as stakeholders in their own learning.

"Of all school-related factors that influence student learning, only classroom instruction has greater impact than leadership. And leaders have the greatest impact when they set direction, citing that the goals and purpose they provide serves to strengthen and solidify the faculty. The ten competencies for school leaders described in this book are based on a few factors. First, standards-driven reform has created new knowledge requirements and responsibilities for school leaders. In today's systems, sorting students along a bell curve and artificially creating winners and losers has been replaced by a mission that all students must learn well. Instead of a curriculum focused on what a teacher should teach, the curriculum identifies what students must know and be able to do. These standards are public, and communicate what a state or district values when it comes to student learning. Assessing the standards day to day, not through large-scale accountability tests or even local short-cycle or common assessments, is a requirement for effective standards-based reform. Second is the reward of improved student learning brought about by the use of classroom assessment for learning. Assessment for learning has implications not just for school leaders but also for broader educational practice: The research is conclusive, and improved learning lies within the grasp of anyone wishing to apply it. What does it look like when school leaders demonstrate mastery of the Ten Assessment Competencies? Included in the book are examples, learning activities, and opportunities for practice as well as success indicators for each competency as leaders work toward mastery"--