Linda-Darling Hammond from Stanford's School Redesign Network, National Center for the Improvement of Educational Assessment NCIEA –Scott Marrian-out of NH, Margaret Heritage of the Crest Center at UCLA, Elliot Washor, Dennis’ colleague, for a network.
Here is my letter to Peter McWalters
Here is Peter McWalters writng a reply:
===================== In short, if you are a taxpayer and if you support a change in the environment, then learn more about School Redesign Network, Center for Assessment, the CRESST Center at UCLA and other advocates. Here's a quick gathering of information in one place to get you started. School Redesign Network   http://www.huffingtonpost.com/linda-darlinghammond/a-test-for-our-nation_b_328957.html (The grey boxes are extracts from her blog post)  ================  National Center for the Improvement of Educational Assessment NCIEA –Scott Marrian-out of NH The National Center for the Improvement of Educational Assessment, Inc (the Center) is a small non-profit organization that occupies a unique and influential niche at the intersection of psychometrics and educational assessment policy. The Center is pleased to offer summer internships for up to two advanced doctoral students in educational measurement and/or assessment/accountability policy who want the opportunity to work with the Center’s professionals on projects with direct implications for state and national educational policy. Scott Marion, Ph.D. Center for Assessment P.O. Box 351 Dover, NH 03821 smarion@nciea.org. =========================================  Margaret Heritage of the Cresst Center at UCLA,  Margaret Heritage is Assistant Director for Professional Development at the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing (CRESST) at UCLA. Her current work at CRESST focuses on data use for school improvement, including formative assessment, and on teacher evaluation. Her most recent publications include a co-authored paper, published in Education Measurement: Issues and Practice, on teachers use of formative assessment evidence (2009).  Margaret Heritage is Assistant Director for Professional Development, National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST), Graduate School of Education and Information Studies, University of California, Los Angeles, 300 Charles E. Young Drive North, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1522; mheritag@ucla.edu. Jinok Kim and Terry Vendlinski are Senior Researchers at CRESST, and Joan Herman is Director of CRESST. =================== Do we taxpayers need to start a group called "Taxpayers for Alternative Assessments"? If so, we will need to point to the work of people on this page. I hope pioneers like this get more attention in coming years. And, since Education is Everybody's Business, it's up to taxpayers to make sure that policy makers make time to consider these proposals. Here is a study about how Reading Apprenticeships (RA) can improve student performance. ...examination of the correlations between variables that are adjacent in the proposed mechanism and other exploratory analyses (e.g., how use of particular reading strategies relate to comprehension and writing scores) suggest that this mechanism is plausible. Specifically, it appears that the particular reading strategies emphasized by the RA program are positively related to subject-specific literacy. Moreover, the use of those strategies seems to be positively related to the sorts of instructional practices that RA teachers are trained to implement; what is more, those instructional practices appear to be related to participation in the RA professional development program. National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards, and Student Testing (CRESST) Center for the Study of Evaluation (CSE) Graduate School of Education & Information Studies University of California, Los Angeles 300 Charles E. Young Drive North GSE&IS Bldg., Box 951522 Los Angeles, CA 90095-1522 (310) 206-1532 ========================= As a taxpayer, I want people like Margaret Heritage and Scott Marion guiding school policy. I hope pioneers like this get more attention in coming years.  Elliot Washor, Dennis’ colleague, for a network. | Stanford Professor Linda Darling-Hammond's winter, 2008 presentation on international practices of performance-based assessment, and how these practices compare with American assessments. Rife with implications for NCLB reform (or better still, abolition). From the Forum for Education and Democracy's blurb: What we have thought of as fairly rare in this country [i.e., the USA] is quite common in most of the high-achieving countries internationally, Linda Darling-Hammond began. (See her presentation here.) Beginning with a list of 21st century skills, Darling-Hammond contrasted US tests - which require recall of a simple fact or ask students for a one-sentence explanation - with exams abroad that include designing science experiments, refining computer programs and explaining the reasoning behind solutions for complex problems. [In many nations,] theres a teaching and learning system, that operates to provide rich curriculum and strong outcomes, Darling-Hammond said. They are what assure that the higher-order skills are actually taught and practiced. Stanford University professor and noted researcher Linda Darling-Hammond discusses what the United States can learn from high-achieving countries on teaching, learning, and assessment -- from Finland to Singapore. For more information and resources, visit http://www.edutopia.org Jamie McKenzie has written widely about "The Guide on the Side." here is an excerpt from a presentation HOw do you define "formative assessment"? From Wikipedia: Formative assessment is typically contrasted with summative assessment. The former supports teachers and students in decision-making during educational and learning processes, while the latter occurs at the end of a learning unit and determines if the content being taught was retained Ainsworth p. 23 (2006)[7] On-going tests (tests while we're learning) versus Tests at the end of the course. Formative assessment is not distinguished by the format of assessment, but by how the information is used. The same test may act as either formative or summative. However, some methods of assessment are better suited to one or the other purpose.[8] EXAMPLE: ... a brainstorm activity: "Work in small groups -- write five things that you know about how hot-air balloons work" ...so that the teacher can discover what students already know about the area of science she is intending to teach http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formative_assessment |