Tracking Children’s Learning Progress in School

“I am talking about a culture of schooling in which more importance is placed on exploration than on discovery, more value is assigned to surprise than to control, more attention is devoted to what is distinctive than to what is standard, more interest is related to what is metaphorical than to what is literal. It is an educational culture that has a greater focus on becoming than on being, places more value on the imaginative than on the factual, assigns greater priority to valuing than to measuring, and regards the quality of the journey as more educationally significant than the speed at which the destination is reached.”

Elliot Eisner, 2002

Sometimes, understanding how our children are doing in school seems like a daunting process. Report cards are not as specific as we seem to remember them being when we were young - and no one counts the ‘As’ and ‘Bs’ anymore! Comments don’t always make sense and seem so full of ‘teacher words’ that sometimes we wonder if the teacher is even talking about our child! We yearn for simpler strategies for reporting – clear, short, concise reports that identify targets and results, or checklists - and tests with percentages, the answers clearly indicated in familiar red pen…

That was our world and it probably didn’t seem as simple to our parents, just like reporting on student progress for today’s students seems so confusing to us as parents!

To begin with, it is critical to understand there are two basic kinds of assessment and tracking teachers use to assess and record student learning (there are actually more than two – but these are the most commonly used by teachers) – FORMATIVE and SUMMATIVE assessment.

Summative assessment is the kind most adults are familiar with – tests, essays, reports, etc. all assessed based on a quantitative scale such as percentages, rubric assessment or values assigned to specific criteria. Summative assessment clearly indicates the quantity of retained knowledge students have following a period of deliberate instruction (for example, a math strand, science or social studies unit of study, etc).

Formative assessment is something quite different and yields much different information. Perhaps the best definition is something like ‘watching, observing, noticing on the fly, giving feedback and using what’s been noted immediately to inform the next step in learning’. Teachers use formative assessment strategies pretty much all day long in a wide variety of ways – to see, for example, how students are progressing in learning to read complex words, understand non-fiction text, write a sentence that expresses their own ideas, make a math pattern, cooperate as a successful member of a learning group, handle a challenging social situation, pay attention to multiple instructions, etc, etc. as a school day full of learning interactions unfolds. Some of these observations might be recorded in some way for future reference, while others are more fleeting and require less vested teacher direction in the moment. Formative assessment is the most useful for teachers and students on a daily because it provides continuous new information about each particular child and lends itself beautifully to the next best step in learning for any give discipline area.These two main types of assessment yield a fuller perspective of student success and achievement – one that balances active, curious learning in the moment with pause, reflect and acknowledge content and strategy in a formal, recordable way.

At Eric Harvie School, we utilize several strategies for communicating student progress with parents throughout a school year – some are familiar like the report card and student-led conferences, while others likely appear to be confusing – such as the blog or Student Led Learning Walks.  Hopefully, this chart will help parents better understand the many ways they are able to access the learning journey and achievements of each student.

Student Progress Tracking Strategy	What Does This Look Like for Parents?	Approximate date/ timeline in school year	Tracking Student Learning
1.  Teacher Blog (on the website)	Daily sharing online of classroom learning activities, questions, possibilities; messages for parents related to homework or field trips, etc. May include photos, map, etc.	Daily - during regular instructional hours	- what learning events/instruction are happening each day; questions for home thinking; home reading/other assignments; purposes and goals of daily learning
2. Classroom Web Pages	Will be established in the new year – a cumulative ‘year in review’ of photos, student work, etc	Periodic collecting of evidence of student learning through visuals (photos/videos/etc) and student work samples	- learning events and experiences; classroom and school culture; student wonders and investigations
3. Student Led Learning Walks	Held in November and April; evening walk about in the gym to view student work	Twice a year - Display of student work across the grade levels on a similar process/theme/idea from the curricula (Speaking, Listening, Viewing, Reading, Writing, Representing)	- student achievement in the context of the whole school; student planning/completion of a particular task or process; oral explanations of the work across the grade levels
4. Interviews	Student sharing of accomplishments in the company of parents and teacher(s)	December & March	Review of student achievement within the context of grade curricula; strengths, challenges & next steps
5. Report Cards	Written comments and indicators related to curricular achievement at specific grade levels	January and June	Identification of student achievement within the context of grade curricula based on a 4-point indicator scale and teacher observations
6. IRIS	Student portfolio sharing of personalized student work self-selected and posted by the student	Ongoing at student’s discretion beginning November, 2016	Student self-assessment, willingness to share and reflect on quality of work, examples of creativity
7. Individual Program Plan	Students with identified learning challenges are tracked using an IPP.  Notes priority learning cycles, strategies, goals, targets, progress and adjustments as needed.	Formal IPP meetings in October/November, January, April and June	- addresses learning needs through strategy development, small group support, individual support, technology – as appropriate and provides support to improve student achievement of curricular goals

Assessment is ongoing – sometimes it is immediate (formative) to inform the next best steps for each learner, and sometimes summative to pause and compare student achievement to specific curricular objectives. Student progress is shared in several different ways to help parents and students understand how students learn best, which learning processes and/or strategies are most effective and how each student is managing/integrating new skills, strategies and knowledge within the context of the Alberta Education Programs of Study.

Frequent, consistent communication between students, teachers and parents ensures progress in student learning is tracked effectively and everyone understands the learning story JJ

Lorraine Kinsman, Principal

Eric Harvie School