Embedded Files
Formative Assessment
Introduction
Introduction
One program that I use to track student progress in a formative way is ESGI. This is a computer based system developed for early childhood teachers to quickly track student data and effectively use data to drive instruction (https://www.esgisoftware.com). The program also creates individual and class based graphs of student data, which is useful as a teacher for me to analyze my students results as a whole.
This form of assessment is useful because it is easy to communicate student growth with concrete skills such as letter names and sounds to students and parents in a way that keeps they very invested in student learning. ESGI allows me to print out individualized practice flashcards which are sent home bi-monthly for students to practice with their families. We also use a class anchor chart (explained at the bottom of this page) that we call the "Top Banana" tree to encourage students to learn all of their letter names and sounds. Students are engaged in their own growth in this skill because there is a clear and finite goal for it which is visually communicated in a way they can understand. This skill also related directly to our whole group phonics instruction where we practice these skills daily. Students who particularly struggle with this skill also receive remedial practice individually and during guided reading small group instruction.
These graphs provide two examples of data supporting the objective RF.K.1d , which states that students will be able to name all lower and uppercase letters (National Governors Association Center for Best Practices [NGACBP], 2010).
Graph A:
Graph A:
(Note: The y axis denotes the number of students out of 25 with the correct answer and the x axis is what uppercase letter they were trying to name.)
Graph B:
Graph B:
(Note: The y axis denotes the number of students out of 25 with the correct answer and the x axis is what lowercase letter they were trying to name.)
While looking at an overview of my class data through Graphs A and B, I find that students tend to remember lowercase letters that look similar to their uppercase component. For example: O/o, K/k, X/x, S/s, W/w. Conversely, they struggled with letters which look significantly different from each other, such as Q/q, E/e, and H/h. In order to combat this confusion, I will discuss more letter names in connection with upper and lowercase letters together. For example, framing the idea as “Each letter has a mama capital and a baby lowercase. They like to stay together so they don’t get lost. Can you help me match the mama capitals and the baby lowercase letters?”.
This can be a full group activity like a worksheet, or a small group or individual game in the form of a matching puzzle at a literacy center. I believe that being able to associate the two different types of letters together will increase student ability to remember lower and uppercase letter names in conjunction with each other.
Graph C:
Graph C:
Looking at overall trends of class progress on this class report, I can see that as of the week of September 17th, 11 out of 25 students know all of their capital letters, and 7 out of 25 know all of their capital and lowercase letters. This is excellent progress over the past few weeks towards total class mastery of this standard. Because this is a cumulative skill which will be necessary for future reading and writing progress, I will retest the students who received 100% in three weeks to make sure that they are retaining the information.
Graph D:
Graph D:
The above graph is an example of individual data tracking. Here you can see a data chart for my student M learning his lowercase letters. When first tested on September 10th, M knew 18 out of 28 lowercase letters (this test includes "a" and "g" in their typed format as well as written format). When tested again on September 18th, M knew 24 out of 28 lowercase letters. This shows significant improvement over the past week. Next week I can use this data to retest him on all letters to see if he has reached 100% mastery. If his week by week progress ever becomes stagnant or regresses, I can print him support flashcards of the letters he doesn’t know to take home and give him a copy to use at centers time. In this way I can respond to the data promptly to help him reach his learning goal. My current class wide learning goal is for all students to reach full letter mastery by late November.
Graph E:
Graph E:
My student E, whose uppercase letter identification scores have only increase from 2 out of 26 to 5 out of 26 in the time between September 7th and September 21st is an example of a student who will require extra remediation. I can pay attention to her responses during our whole group review, work with her on letters during small group guided reading, and reach out to her parents to encourage extra practice at home to help get her caught up with her peers.
When students master their upper and lowercase letter names as well as all letter sounds, they will be able to choose a "banana" on our Top Banana tree to write their name on. This is one way to publicly motivate all students and to highlight those who are making significant progress towards our whole class goals. Once all students' names are on the tree, we will have a class a party to celebrate. Our goal is to have the tree filled by the end of December, ensuring all students will be ready to move on from letter practice in isolation to blending, sight words, and more.
Conclusion
Conclusion
This assessment is clear and concise, and it relates directly to content covered in our phonics direct instruction. Since the whole class and personalized tracking systems through ESGI are easy to navigate and communicate, students are well aware of their individual progress and we celebrate each students success communally.
Resources:
National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Council of Chief State School Officers. (2010). Common Core State Standards Kindergarten. Retrieved from http://www.corestandards.org.
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