Teacher as Effective Classroom Assessor

Educators were encouraged to “begin with the end in mind” at Teacher as Effective Classroom Assessor, a Measured Progress workshop held in Providence October 19 and 20. The two-day workshop, which attracted attendees from throughout New England, focused on various classroom assessment tools and strategies teachers can use to diagnose learning problems and monitor student progress. 

By beginning with the end in mind, teachers identify what they need to assess, why they need to do so, and which kinds of assessment tools yield the type of learning data they seek. 

Measured Progress professional development specialist Catherine Garrison led attendees through a combination of tutorials and practical exercises, all designed to illuminate characteristics of effective classroom assessment. 

Attendees arrived armed with their respective states’ standards, designing items aligned to a given standard, as well as to scoring rubrics. Working individually and collaboratively, attendees designed multiple-choice, short-answer, and constructed-response assessment items, as well as scoring guides. Garrison also led the group through discussions about using performance events, portfolios, and other measures of student learning. 

Participants found that attending the workshop was an effective use of their time. “I like the idea of discussing a process and then having to do the process in order to grasp the idea,” said a participant from Warwick, Rhode Island. “When this happens, I feel I could share it with my colleagues,” she said. 

Teacher as Assessor is one of several professional development offerings available from Measured Progress. Other upcoming workshops include Examining Student Work To Improve Achievement, Start with the Standards: Planning, Assessing, and Instructing for Student Achievement, and Everyday Data: Using Multiple Data Sources to Plan for Improvement, as well as future sessions of Teacher as Effective Classroom Assessor.  We also offer workshops on classroom assessment, including Classroom Assessment FOR Learning—Leading Professional Develop.

Measured Progress has been involved with professional development for nearly twenty years. The new offerings are designed by teachers and for teachers, to help educators effectively integrate state standards with curriculum and instruction. The Measured Progress professional development model’s effectiveness is borne out by the comment of a participant from Glocester, Rhode Island, who said “I can’t remember the last workshop that was this friendly, informative, and professional.”