What if teachers had time set aside early in the year to truly analyze their pre-assessments?
The first week of school is invigorating or exhausting, depending on how you look at it. There is so much to take care of: establishing routines, procedures and expectations; learning names and developing relationships; assigning things meant to pre-assess specific skills or knowledge; gathering student info. sheets with information about who these kids are. At the high school level, we are talking about approximately 150 students to wrangle AND pre-assess at the same time. Not to mention getting a jump on instruction. There are a lot of standards to cover, after all, and only 36 weeks of school.
Every year I collect several things the first week: a student information sheet that lists activities, interests and prior educational experiences; a writing sample; some kind of reading activity that can serve as a pre-assessment; in some years, a grammar pre-assessment test; perhaps some vocabulary work. Every year, I take the stacks of papers back and forth between home and work for way too long trying to find the time to really get to know my students’ work.
I would like to read their essays mindfully: this first assignment always feels like an offering to me. They test the waters, seeing if they will get a personal response, a flicker of humanity, from me. The stories they tell me the first week often surprise me with their candor and trust. How can I whip through them quickly simply to note who uses paragraphs, who can spell, how complex their sentences are, and whether they use concrete verbs? I need to linger, but there is no time.
Often, I find myself two weeks into the year with the same stack of papers and folder of information sheets still unread. And then the weeks continue. Everyone has gotten their points, but they haven’t gotten validation for their work, and I have not gotten to know them as students. Every year I fight this battle. Some years I manage to get through the writing samples. My attention to the other pre-assessments often suffers.
What if we had a day off after the first week of school? A day to sort through everything and to really use all of that information to plan our instruction, which is the whole purpose of assessment, after all. Instead, we are launched headfirst into the year. But we do run into those unknowns eventually, no matter what.
Amethyst Hinton Sainz
Amethyst Hinton Sainz is National Board Certified Teacher in Adolescent and Young Adult English Language Arts, and is constantly trying to live up to that standard! This year she will begin teaching at Westwood High School in Mesa, Arizona as an interventionist. She has taught junior high ELD and high school English in Arizona for 25 years. She has been a Stories from School blogger since 2012. Amethyst’s alma maters are Blue Ridge High School, the University of Arizona and the Bread Loaf School of English at Middlebury College. Her bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing and Philosophy led her toward the College of Education, and she soon realized that the creative challenges of teaching would fuel her throughout her career. Her love of language, literature, and culture led her to Bread Loaf for her master's in English Literature. She is a fellow with the Southern Arizona Writing Project, and that professional development along with, later, the National Board process, has been the most influential and transformative learning for her. As a board member of the Mesa NBCT Network, she works with other NBCT’s to promote this powerful process throughout the district. She supports candidates for National Board Certification, and loves seeing teachers realize and articulate their teaching and leadership power! She enjoys teaching students across the spectrum of academic abilities, and keeping up with new possibilities for technology in education. Last year she had the privilege of running our school garden, and will really miss that this year. She is currently learning more about social and racial justice and is striving to be an antiracist educator. She lives in Mesa, Arizona with her family. She enjoys time with them, as well as with her vegetable garden, backyard chickens, and the two dogs. She also enjoys reading, writing, cooking (but not doing dishes), kayaking, camping, and travel, among other things.
Comments 3
That’s a battle for me, too, and I don’t have essays to grade, just some work through which students showed their thinking skills. But you’re right about them wanting to know if we’ll make comments or just whip through something. You’ve motivated me to do a better job than I was planning to on the stack of papers sitting on my desk.
I think about all the time before kids start and how the days were filled with meaningless things that had nothing to do with the 30 faces that would be facing me in a few days. It would be great if time were set aside to learn more. But then, I wonder…if time were given to me do so such a thing…would I use it or find something else that was more important in the moment. These are things that make me wonder!
Great post, Amethyst!
I like how you try to combine learning about them/strengthening relationships with them writing. Maybe a shorter writing sample so you can get through them? Maybe the top two or three things they want you to know about them? With all those students, it’s tough regardless of how it’s done.
I have the same issue in my situation with having around 400 students. Mine is a bit easier though since I won’t have to assess their writing.
Here are my 3 questions I had them answer prior to starting the year for K-5:
1. What would you like to learn more about this year in PE?
2. What makes you AWESOME? (kind, funny, helpful)
3. What are you looking forward to this school year?