Assess, Analyze, Act

The project leaders; Pam, Dennis, Myra, Jim, Doug, and Jane; are coming into Des Moines for our monthly meeting on Wednesday. We do have a good time together, and they work hard to help schools implement Skills Iowa well. Al has retired and he and his wife Patricia plan to spend serious time traveling. You can see the project leader pics at http://www.ia-sb.org/skillsiowa/staff.aspx

Do you think the way you use Skills Iowa makes a difference for kids? Do you use the Assess, Analyze, Act sequence to support the learning of your students? Let us know how that works for you.

The National Middle School Association provides an interesting article on formative assessment. “Formative assessment is a tool teachers can use to probe student understanding, inform instructional decisions, and develop relationships. Bell and Cowie (2001) defined formative assessment as ‘the process used by teachers and students to recognize and respond to student learning in order to enhance that learning, during the learning.’ This rich description explicitly states the process and the players, but not the difficulty of its implementation when district calendars are promoting coverage of material.”
http://www.nmsa.org/Publications/MiddleSchoolJournal/Articles/March2006/Article7/tabid/722/Default.aspx