Assessment is a necessary part of the educational process, but grading has its problems. I believe in assessment as a tool to help teachers adjust instruction and help keep students on the right track. In addition, many of my students will take high stakes exams in the future, whether it's standardized exams for high school students or the MCAT for premed college students. However, I also know that high-stakes exams can be anxiety-inducing, demotivating, and unfairly privilege some students over others. Therefore, I incorporate ungrading in a limited way - for example, I let students retake quizzes until they get the grade they want.
Let's use a physical science lesson as an example. Here, I want students to understand and apply position, velocity, and acceleration graphs. I'll start with very easy questions and work my way up. I want some multiple-choice and essay questions that might reflect what they'll see on a standardized exam, but I also want to ensure that students genuinely understand the topic - all that without the assignments being too boring. Let's start with an easy, formative quiz. I like to include a short , easy quiz every class when possible. This keeps quizzes/exams from being too high-stakes for students, and allows students plenty of practice. By using Canvas, Google Forms, or a similar learning management platform, I streamline the process for myself and allow students to easily monitor their grades.
When I write multiple choice questions, I am careful to reduce the cognitive load of my questions as much as possible. Particularly in my work with ESL students, I want to ensure that I'm only testing the concept I'm interested in, not complex linguistic ability. That means that I write questions simply, avoid putting blanks in the middle of a question, and avoid "except" questions whenever possible. For example, this question might appear on a physical science exam.
If a runner increases her velocity from 0 m/s to 10 m/s in 2 seconds, what is her acceleration?
Use: acceleration = (final velocity – initial velocity) ÷ time
2 m/s²
5 m/s²
10 m/s²
20 m/s²
That's a good start that can give students some early successes, but later on I'll want to increase the rigor. When I design essay questions for exams, I incorporate PISA-style thinking by writing questions that have real-world applications along multiple axes. I might continue the kinematics lesson with a PISA-aligned question like this:
A ride-sharing company is testing how smoothly its drivers accelerate and brake to improve passenger comfort.
One test trip produced the following driving pattern:
The car starts from rest and speeds up steadily for 5 seconds
It then travels at a constant speed for 10 seconds
Finally, it slows down steadily to a stop over 5 seconds
The company wants to represent this motion using a velocity–time graph.
Draw a velocity–time graph to represent the motion of the car.
Label the axes clearly
Indicate key points (start, transitions, stop)
Show the shape of the graph for each phase
Question 2: Interpreting Motion
During which part of the journey is the acceleration:
a) Positive
b) Zero
c) Negative
Explain how you can tell from your graph.
The company wants to ensure a “smooth ride.”
Which part of the journey is most likely to feel least comfortable for passengers?
A. The acceleration phase
B. The constant velocity phase
C. The deceleration phase
Explain your answer using ideas about motion.
During the first phase, the car accelerates at 2 m/s².
Use this information to:
Determine the velocity at the end of the acceleration phase
Show how this value appears on your graph
When possible, I like to include conceptual assessment activities. For example, this activity was designed for 12th grade physics students to help them internalize how acceleration graphs work. Students practice making acceleration graphs on the PhyPhox app in different shapes through physical motion. This assignment is useful for students because acceleration graphs can be counterintuitive. It is also useful for me as an instructor because it helps me identify difficulties; for example, I tried this assessment on 8th graders during their kinematics lesson but found that they needed more guidance to make the graphs.
PhyPhox Assignment
I believe in the power of gamification as a way to keep learning engaging. It's not just about being fun - it's a much better way to absorb and retain information than a traditional lecture.
Games don't have to be brilliantly designed to be effective. Something as simple as "whichever team solves the most math problems wins!" is enough to get students going.
But if you want to add a little spice, then it can be fun to invent a game.
Often, the games I make up are as simple as taking an existing mathematical model, assigning students different roles to play within that model, and then maybe rolling some dice to add the element of randomization. Here's an example of a gamified version of the Lotka-Volterra competition model that I made for my ecology class.
If that doesn't fit your situation and you're not sure where to start, AI models help me brainstorm. Sometimes an AI will spit out a fully-formed idea that's ready to go. Sometimes it'll be something that has potential, but needs a little work. Sometimes I won't like the idea and I have to reiterate a few times. But in any case, AI has definitely helped me work through some ideas of how to model complex concepts.
Here's a template for a prompt I would use for AI:
Can you please design a fun demonstration or game for a college freshman class for biology majors to illustrate the concept of convergent evolution? Use only commonly available materials and make it last about 20 minutes.
Professors aren't taught to write lesson plans (unless they're in the education department, I imagine, but that's not my experience.) I taught for nearly a decade when I finally took a continuing education class that taught me exactly what a lesson plan was and how to use them. Lesson planning is such an easy skill to learn, and I wasted a ton of time and effort trying to make do without it!
I'm including a template for my current lesson plan here. I've gone through several iterations and I like this one because it's thorough and easy to read.
I won't wax poetic about the theory behind lesson plans because that's outside of my lane. But I think you can learn most of what you need to know about lesson planning just by filling in the blanks. I often use AI to help me fill it out, although you'll notice that AI doesn't always know what you need and sometimes gets things wrong, so please double-check everything and plan on writing some parts yourself.
Why should you write a lesson plan?
Makes it easy to keep things organized (both in terms of concepts taught, and in terms of actual materials needed)
Helps you learn from your mistakes and your successes
Reduces prep time
Gives you a cheat sheet to refer to if you need it
Makes things easy for substitutes - or for your replacement if you decide to climb that ladder
Provides a paper trail for all the hard work you're doing