What is Formative Assessment?
You hear formative assessment in meetings or when a colleague mentions it in conversation. You know you should be using formative assessment more often, but maybe it’s also a bit overwhelming or you don’t have to time to create extra assessments and analyze them. Let’s make it simple. Formative assessment is learning about students by checking on understanding to inFORM instruction. This doesn’t have to be one more thing to add to your busy teacher plate. If you pivot, it can become part of your teaching style.
Before learning more about pivoting your teacher style, grab this quick guide to getting yourself organized for formative assessment. This is the FIRST step in making formative assessment feel like a part of your practice. Use these steps to set up an assessment system so formative assessment will be a breeze!
Formative Assessment Analysis: Instructional Paths
All of the natural assessing such as listening, questioning and analyzing student work is the first step. While working with students, ask yourself, how do I know students are getting it? Much of this becomes a natural part of teaching, but as you learn and begin to assess in new ways, it will require a bit of data analysis. Formative assessment can lead to several instructional paths. Those might include:
- In the moment– This type of formative assessment happens during instruction. It is adjustment to instruction. These are quick decisions that a teacher makes during your teaching block.
- Short-term– This type of formative assessment often happens after instruction. Analysis and reflection may lead to conferring or a short-term group for students to learn missed skills. Reteaching in these groups may be as few as 2-3 sessions.
- Long-term– This type of formative assessment gives data to support assumptions that students are having larger misunderstandings of concepts. These groups can align with the MTSS intervention process that many schools around the country use. Students may need more explicit teaching of skills or concepts. These groups tend to be longer, around 6-8 weeks. Read more about how to do this more specifically with reading and math.
Examples of Adapted Instruction
These specific examples will paint a clearer picture of how instruction may be adapted from assessment in the classroom.
In the Moment
- Pivoting instruction and breaking down concepts
- Providing support with an assignment
- Reteaching one on one or in a smaller group after a lesson
- Explicit teaching of vocabulary
It can even be stopping a lesson and backtracking when you notice students are confused and have stopped tracking along with instruction. Pay attention to students as you are teaching and begin to pick up on their cues.
Short-term
- Reflection after a lesson or review student work that leads to teaching a strategy or skill
- Conferring with a student on a specific skill for multiple sessions
- Student self-assessment
For me, this tends to be the type of assessment that is most utilized. While all are important, this type of assessment drives my weekly reading, writing, and math groups. Read about more formative assessments for reading.
Long-term
- Diagnostic information
- Post-assessment intervention
- Pre-assessment groupings
- Student self-assessment for goal setting purposes
This type of assessment is done in the beginning of the year, quarterly, and possibly even after a unit. This type of analysis will take more time to reflect on data and to create or adjust small groups. Read more on grouping students.
Formative Assessment vs Summative
Anytime you assess student understanding and make an informed decision, you are using formative assessment. Summative assessment comes at the end of a unit or a cumulative measure of learning. The purpose of formative assessment is to guide and target instruction before you get to the summative assessment, thereby enhancing student engagement, comprehension, and retention throughout the unit.
Grab any assignment, assessment, or notes from a lesson, reflect on it and then make an informed decision for instruction. As you begin to use data to drive instruction, it will change the way you teach and eventually become a part of your regular teaching practice. Check out these 2 FREEBIES below to help get you started.
Need a quick anecdotal notes form to help you get started? Try these FREE quick checklists. Edit with student names and quickly give a check or minus during a lesson based on understanding. You instantly have a short-term group through formative assessment.
Download these FREE reading engagement activities below to get to know your readers better. Use their work as formative assessment to inform instruction for short-term groups.
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