Shirley Clarke's "Formative Assessment in the Secondary Classroom" (2005)

Shirley Clarke's "Formative Assessment in the Secondary Classroom" (2005) 

Introduction

Formative Assessment consists of the following

• clarifying learning objectives and success criteria at the planning stage, as a framework for formative assessment processes (chapter 1);
• sharing learning objectives and success criteria with students, both long term and for individual lessons (chapter 2);
• appropriate and effective questioning which develops the learning rather than attempts to measure it (chapter 3);
• focusing oral and written feedback, whether from teachers or student, around the development of learning objectives and meeting of targets (chapter 5)
• organising targets so that students' achievement is based on previous achievement as well as aiming for the next step (ipsative referencing) (chapter 5)
• involving students in self- and peer evaluation (chapter 6)
• raising students' self-efficacy and holding a belief that all students have the potential to learn and to achieve

Black and Wiliam research (Assessment Reform Group, 1999)

"The research indicates that improving learning through assessment depends on five, deceptively simple, key factors:

• the provision of effective feedback to students;
• the active involvement of students in their own learning
• adjusting teaching to take account of the results of assessments
• a recognition of the profound influence assessment has on the motivation and self-esteem of students, both of which are crucial influences on learning
• the need for students to be able to assess themselves and understand how to improve.

This was further broken down to include

• sharing learning goals with students;
• involving students in self-assessment;
• providing feedback which leads to students recognising their next steps and how to take them;
• underpinned by confidence that every student can improve

The "inhibiting factors" identified include:

• a tendency for teachers to assess quantity of work and presentation rather than the quality of learning;
• greater attention given to marking and grading, much of it tending to lower the self-esteem of students, rather than to provide advice for improvement;
• a strong emphasis on comparing students with each other which demoralises the less successful learners
• teachers' feedback to students often serves managerial and social purposes rather than helping them to learn more effectively.

OFSTED publication Good Assessment in Secondary Schools (2003) includes a list of the features seen in classrooms where formative assessment was deemed successful:

• a welcome to the students, who were personally valued and knew that they would be expected and helped to do their best
• clarity of aims and expected outcomes, discussed at the outset
• a range of methods that give students some responsibility  for organising how they learn, and that involve them in a variety of ways -- through presentations, displays, using the whiteboard, simulations, role play, quizzes, modelling, the use of memory and recall techniques, and through reflecting on the value of what has been achieved.
• a collaborative approach to learning, with a strong emphasis on analysis and discussion
• opportunities for divergent thinking in an atmosphere that ensures students do not feel bad if they make a mistake.

Chapter 1: Creating a learning culture in which formative assessment can exist

In Formative Assessment in the Secondary Classroom, Shirley Clarke claims that "constructivist teaching" underlies true formative assessment.  Brooks and Brooks (1993), authors of In Search of Understanding: the case for constructivist classrooms,  list twelve descriptors of constructivist teaching behaviors.
1. Constructivist teachers encourage and accept student autonomy and initiative (students frame their own questions and find answers)
2. Constructivist teachers use raw data and primary sources, along with manipulative, interactive and physical materials (students look for evidence rather than receiving knowledge passively and link concepts to real life situations)
3. When framing tasks, constructivist teachers use terminology such as 'classify,' 'analyze,''predict,' and 'create'
4. Constructivist teachers allow student responses to drive lessons, shift instructional strategies and alter content
5. Constructivist teachers inquire about students' understandings of concepts before sharing their own understanding of these concepts (take account of current understandings and interests)
6. Constructivist teachers encourage students to engage in dialogue, both with the teacher and with one another (students are encouraged to present their own ideas as well as being permitted to hear and reflect on the ideas of others; paired two-minute discussions before general feedback leads to more powerful construction of new understandings or reflection of old ones.)
7. Constructivist teachers encourages student enquiry by asking thoughtful, open-ended questions and encouraging students to ask questions of each other
8. Constructivist teachers seek elaboration of students' initial responses
9. Constructivist teachers engage students in experiences that might engender contradictions to their initial hypotheses and then encourage discussion -- teachers ask questions which set up contradictions to encourage discussion
10. Constructivist teachers allow 'wait time' after posing questions.
11.  Constructivist teachers provide time for students to construct relationship and create metaphors
12. Constructivist teachers nurture students' natural curiosity through frequent use of the learning cycle model - (i) students interact with selected materials and generate questions and hypotheses, (ii) teacher focuses students questions as a way of introducing the concept, (iii) students work on new problems as a way of applying the concept.

Chapter 3: Questioning

How to increase 'wait time' in questioning

indicating the thinking time and asking for no hands up until the time is up

asking for talking partner* discussions for a given period of time before taking responses

asking students to jot their thoughts on paper for a given period of time before taking responses

what are the benefits of extending wait time?

answers are longer

failure to respond decreases

responses are more confident

more alternative explanations are offered

students challenge and/or improve the answers of other students

Of course, even better than longer wait time is a policy of "no hands up."  

* what's a talking partner?

Even if the question is a basic recall question, a more effective approach than rapid fire is to ask the question, then ask students to talk to the person next to them (their talking partner) for, say 30 seconds, to determine the answer.  Then answers are then gathered, with no hands up, from a number of pairs (with one student acting as spokesperson^ each time) until a full definition is compiled.  When asking open questions ("What might be the reasons for this?"), it is often useful to ask students to raise their hands if their partner had a good idea that they could tell the class.  This technique also has the benefit of students feeling authentically proud of what they've done in class.  Having 'talking partners' as a regular feature of lessons allows students to think, to articulate, and therefore to extend their learning.  

^who should be the spokesperson?  Kevin Feldman would say that the teacher should choose the weaker student when it's an important academic task.  Too often, the weaker student sits on the sideline while the stronger student practices thinking and speaking.  

(from Shirley Clark, Formative Assessment in the Secondary Classroom)

Chapter 5: Quality Feedback: practical implications

Shirley Clarke's "Formative Assessment in the Secondary Classroom" (2005) has been on my "to read" list for a couple years.  I've finally gotten around to reading it.  Not too long ago I read this section about "Comment Only Marking" that fits in very well with our departmental conversations about making feedback to students as good (and as efficient) as it can be.   I thought that it might be useful to share now that we're moving into 2nd quarter.

Here's how you do it:
Phase 1: At the very beginning of a new work/assignment/paper, explain to the class that you will be changing the way you will mark their written work in order to help them make more progress in the future.

Phase 2: Read all of a student's work through very carefully before making any mark on the paper.  Next, highlight three places in the writing where the student best met the learning intention(s) of the activity (where the student met with some success on the rubric or scoring guide).  Then indicate with a star where an improvement can be made to the original work.  Use your judgment about the one area on the rubric that would be best for this student.

Phase 3: Draw an arrow to a suitable space near the start and write a "close the gap" (yes, Shirley is British) prompt to support the student in making an improvement to their work.  This prompt can be provided in a number of ways:
          a) reminder prompt is simply a rather unhelpful reiteration of the learning objective, for example:  ("give more detail about the impact of Henry VIII's reign" or "write a more interesting ending to this story")
          b) scaffolded prompt involves the teacher giving examples and ideas as words or phrases.  For example: ("Give more detail.  For instance: what else did he change? what kinds of people were affected by this change? in what ways did the affect them? or could you make your story more interesting? what did the character learn from his experience? what advice might he give to future travellers?)
          c) the example prompt involves the teacher giving exact models of what the student might write.  The student is invited to choose one of these or to then write their own example.

Phase 4: Ensure that you provide time in class to enable students to read and respond to the 'close the gap' comment.  This could also provide a suitable time to follow up individual needs with specific students 'face to face.'  Finally, remember to comment on their improvement at the first available opportunity.

According to Clarke, you don't share a letter grade.  You don't give 1 good thing and 3 things to work on.  And, if at all possible, you provide the feedback verbally.   (She says that later, when students are nearer mastery, you might want to give kids more "negative" feedback, but start this way.)


I just collected papers on Friday and finished grading them Sunday.  I have been meeting with each student these past couple days and am doing this:  provide exactly 3 areas that the student has shown some success and 1 area for growth with a specific request for a change.   I have selected "good example paragraphs" from the papers that I've graded to share as "example prompts" that will provide examples for various KINDS of paragraphs (intro, summary, response/critique, synthesis, conclusion) that I'm sharing with students.  Everyone leaves with their paper, a “cover sheet” of the 3+1, and an example photocopied paragraph.  I look each student in the eye and say, “you’ve done some really good work here.  I think that reworking this section will make a real difference.  Work hard.”  I’m trying to make them blush and feel good about what their current efforts and that they can do even better with some specific hard work.