Jocelyn Zhang - Word Journal

Classroom Assessment Technique

-Word Journal

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

This study was conducted at HD Ningbo School, a private K-12 bilingual school in Zhejiang Province, China. The school is open to students from diverse backgrounds, but due to the high tuition fee, all the students come from upper-middle- class families. It offers students a world-class education, preparing them for university study throughout the world. The population of the primary division is about 400. Local Chinese students mainly make up the student body, while around 5% of the students hold overseas passports from USA, UK, Australia, New Zealand and Peru. Approximately one-quarter of the students can use English fluently in daily life and study.

Currently, I am the Head of Science for the primary division and the science specialist teacher for all the Year One and Two students. Our unique science curriculum combines the Chinese National Standard with Cambridge Primary Science Framework. I am also the member of School ICT Committee and provide training for teachers and parents on educational technology integration.

RESEARCH METHOD

The Word Journal was used for one of my Year Two classes during a science lesson last week. This CAT provides the opportunity for students to summarize information in a single word, then explain why they chose that particular word. It also supports several of my long-range teaching goals including developing their ability to synthesize information and think holistically. Having students practice higher-order thinking skills has always been a big concern for me. Through the Word Journal, I want students to know that they can formulate what they have learned into their own descriptions and see learning as a whole instead of isolated segments.

I have been teaching this class for one and a half years, so students are familiar with my teaching methods and philosophy. This class is made up of 10 girls and 11 boys with only one non-Chinese native speaker, who just joined the school three month ago. Eighteen out of the 21 students participated in the Word Journal. Three students were absent that day due to personal leave. It was the last week of school before Chinese New Year holiday. We finished all the units and assessments for semester one so reflection time was planned as part of the lesson. At the beginning of the class, I explained the purpose of doing the CAT and my MSSE program. Theoretically, students should read a short text before picking a single word. However, since my students are all aged from six to seven, reading was challenging for most of them. I modified the procedure so they could listen to the information instead of reading silently.

First, I gave a ten-minute presentation on what we have learned in semester one, including all the unit topics, learning objectives, main activities and experiments. During the presentation, the text was also shown on the screen, and students were allowed to ask questions for clarification. Second, I asked them to pick a single word representing our science learning for semester one. I emphasized that there was no correct nor incorrect word, and their answers would not affect their grade. Finally, instead of writing a paragraph to explain why he or she chose that word, the student talked about which word they chose and the reasons, while another student was recording a video using a class tablet.

Although most of the students mentioned the word they chose in both English and Chinese, all students except the one English native speaker explained the reasons exclusively in Chinese. My guess is they feel they can talk more in Chinese and it is easier for their classmates and parents to understand. All the videos were uploaded to their individual digital portfolios using the app called ClassDojo, so I can check and catalog them for my data analysis (Appendix A). I created an Excel file to record each student’s word and the reasons. After I approved publishing the videos, they were available for parents and students to watch on their own devices.

APPENDIX A

CLASSDOJO STUDENT PORTFOLIO

DATA ANALYSIS

The results of the Word Journal assessment indicated that the most popular word, wildlife was chosen by 22% of the students (N=18). These students gave reasons including wildlife is our friend, animals are beautiful, human beings should not be selfish and so on. In addition, two students thought environment should be the keyword while another three voted for natural. In the videos, many students also mentioned protecting the natural environment for animals was very important.

Eleven percent of the students answered rock as the word they wanted to choose plus 17% specifically said, crystal, because they really liked the experiment we did on growing crystals. Man-made was chosen by two students, and they talked about how we use products designed by human beings in daily life. Another student’s word was key, which is one thing we learned in the man-made world unit. In his video, he emphasized that he really enjoyed making his own lock and trying to open it with the key.

Surprisingly, one student said cell, which is not even in the text, as his keyword. Then he explained that, “cells are the basic unit of all life” and he was impressed by the lesson about DNA and how to use a microscope. This student was one of the high-achievement students in the class, and he has been showing great interest in microbiology (Figure 1).

Figure 1. Student answers for the Word Journal, (N=18).

CLOSING THE LOOP

Because it was the last week before the Spring Festival holiday, I didn’t have time to give them feedback directly in class after analyzing the data. I checked the video in each student’s ClassDojo portfolio and left individual comments that can be viewed by the student and his or her parent. For the students who gave very strong reasons supporting their choice of the word, I told them I appreciated their effort and they had shown good analyzing and synthesizing skills. For those whose reasons were not developed enough, I gave suggestions on how they could add other samples to enrich their explanations.

I published my data analysis chart on the class story through ClassDojo, which can be checked by all the parents and students in the class. I explained the reason for doing the CAT and my MSSE program, and made it clear to the parents that the results wouldn’t be used for grading. I received comments from the parents saying they would be happy to know what was learned in the science class and were willing to support class research projects in the future.

VALUES AND CLAIMS REFLECTION

I think this CAT went quite well, and both my students and I found the process easy to handle. All the students understood the requirement of the CAT and were able to finish the videos and uploaded them. Using ClassDojo as the platform for sharing the videos and comments was pleasing, since all my students and parents were familiar with the usage of the app. The next time I will encourage the students to explain in both English and Chinese. They can speak Chinese first and then translate it into English in order to practice expressing themselves bilingually. I know some of the students were able to do the video in English and the parents were proud to see this.

Previously I didn’t pay enough attention to cultivating young students’ ability to summarize and refine, but now I have realized the long-term benefits of doing it at an early age. Next semester, I will continue to run similar activities in the class which allow the students to keep developing their higher-order thinking skills. We may do this CAT at the end of a lesson or at the end of a unit. By doing this on a regular basis, students will feel confident in reconstructing what they have learned into their own words. Eventually, they will be able to write the summary down and this will prepare them for future science learning.

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