Chapter 7: Thinking like an Assessor

In chapter seven we go in depth into stage 2 of UbD Template. Once we have specified the objective, something natural for most teachers involves designing the learning activities. However, first we must establish what we can consider as valid and reliable evidence and how we are going to assess that evidence. Stage 2 will provide us all the elements that we need to take into consideration when gathering our students’ evidence for assessment.

According to the book, in stage 2 of UbD Template we must ask ourselves three main questions in order to think like an assessor. I summarized those questions in statements: what types of performances we must consider as evidence, by which criteria and rubrics we will assess our students and finally we must verify if the evidence matches our established goals. Chapter seven reviews only the first statement.

This chapter invites us to gather several pieces of evidence through the unit using different formats or methods instead of applying just one test to assess our students. This evidence could include oral questions, observations, dialogues; traditional quizzes, tests, and open ended prompts; and performance tasks and projects. Besides, evidence must be authentic and contextualized. Students must have the opportunity to apply their knowledge, to connect with their own experiences in real-life problems in order to acquire enduring understanding. This chapter also provides us the GRASPS design tool. This acronym has been created to help teachers in their task design. The letters mean Goal, Role, Audience, Situation, Performance, Standard. This useful design tool will help teacher ensure the authenticity of tasks.

Something that caught my attention and I agree with is the fact that we can improve assessment through the use of self-assessment and peer review. Besides assessing, we will be developing other social skills like work group and self-reflection.

I must admit that once I have established the learning goal I make the common mistake related to engagement. I start immediately to create the learning activities without paying attention to think what kind of evidence would be most suitable for the goal. This will require a real change of mind.