Types of Assessments, Goal Writing, Accommodations
Types of Assessments
Formative Assessment: The goal of formative assessment is to monitor student learning and provide ongoing feedback that can be used to improve teaching and student learning. Formative assessments help students identify their strengths and weaknesses, allowing them to target areas that need improvement. They help teachers identify areas that need remediation and address them immediately.
Summative Assessment: Summative assessment aims to evaluate student work at the end of a unit by comparing it to some standard or benchmark. These are high-stakes or have a high point value. Many people feel authentic assessments ARE performance assessments using real-world or authentic tasks or contexts. These terms are used synonymously (Mueller).
Performance Assessment: A performance assessment occurs when students demonstrate that they have mastered specific skills by performing or producing a particular outcome.
Authentic Assessment: Authentic assessments have two characteristics. First, they may be embedded in classroom routines of instruction and learning and conducted during regular activities. Thus, they are related to the education and achievement of the goals, and the inferences we make from this information can be connected to student learning. Second, they may be focused on real-world reading. These tasks focus on the world outside of school (Afflerbach, p. 95).
The “Other” Assessment: Assessing essential factors such as motivation, engagement, self-concepts, agency, interest, and attitudes (Afflerbach, p. 171).
Teachers MUST assess “the other” essential aspects of reading, the critical factors contributing to and outcomes of reading success. These factors include (Afflerbach, p. 171):
- Readers’ motivation
- Readers’ engagement
- Self-concepts
- Agency (sense of control)
- Interests
- Attitudes
- Attributions that readers make for their performances in reading
Examine these factors from a formative perspective—how they develop and either support or impede reading development and from a summative perspective, as they represent a range of positive or negative outcomes of reading instruction (Afflerbach, p. 171).
Building a learning community is a vital part of a successful learning experience. Therefore, teachers should dedicate a significant amount of time to it at the beginning of the year.
View: Formative Assessments and the Common Core: Text Complexity to Task Complexity by Afflerbach.
When we read, we engage in a transactive experience where our personal knowledge, experiences, and emotions interact with the text. No reading experience is neutral, as the reader is an active participant in the meaning-making process. When we discuss what we have read with others, this experience becomes even more profound.
GOALS
Click on IEP Goal Bank for READING goals.
ACCOMMODATIONS
Common Accommodations
- Clear and concise directions, rules, and expectations
- Break down tasks into smaller chunks
- Gain eye contact with the challenging student before giving directions
- Repetition and restating directions
- Preferential seating
- Limiting distractions
- Use of visuals (schedules, rules, tasks)
- Frequent check-ins
- Modeling of language and classroom expectations
- Preview, clarify, and repeat new information
- Allow students extra time to process information and formulate a response.
- Have students repeat directions and instructions to make sure they understand what is being asked of them
- Connect new material to prior knowledge
- Use of graphic organizers
- A multi-modal approach to learning
- Positive reinforcement
- Opportunities for movement breaks
Teachers, you need to STRIVE to send this home with each child in your class!
Dear Parent,
_____ continues to develop as an enthusiastic reader. He chooses to read when given choices for independent work in the classroom. He identifies himself as a reader. He understands that he is in control of his reading, and his effort and persistence influence the outcomes of his work. Unlike at the beginning of this school year, he is now a motivated reader. I attribute this improvement to the fact that he now understands the value of reading, how it helps him achieve his learning goals, how it can enrich his life, and how it prepares him for the future. ___’s hard work at learning the necessary reading strategies is paying off.
At the beginning of the school year, he did not believe he was in control of his reading and had a poor attitude toward it. Through a series of lessons, hard work, and the development of a positive attitude and motivation, ______ has learned that understanding text is under his control. He demonstrates the sense of agency that is so important to successful readers. The ability to begin, work through, and complete reading on his own contributes valuable lessons about his hard work and his capacity to succeed and positively engage with the world.
In summary, ______ now sees himself as a reader who experiences success and values the outcome of his reading. (Afflerbach, p. 172)
Please check out my free Literacy Assessments page.
Copyright 10/25/2016
Edited on 07/09/2025
Reference
Afflerbach, Peter. Understanding and Using Reading Assessment, K-12. Newark, DE: International Reading Association, 2012. Print.
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