Chapter 5: Tiering Assessments

Chapter 5 of Fair Isn’t Always Equal was all about tiering, which is the technique of building platforms around the on-grade level to accommodate early readiness students and advanced readiness students. I feel like this is one of the parts of education that was either overlooked as a student, or went unused in my schools. I wouldn’t be surprised if most of the students in our class said that they were bored in classes in high school to the point of hurting our learning.
I really appreciate the Tic-Tac-Toe boards, partially because of novelty (this is my first introduction to this assessment style), and partially because I love how much choice it endows students with. Students get to choose 3 ways to best express their knowledge and understanding, rather than force themselves into a hole through which they won’t fit.
The taxonomy of creativity also really connected with me – I can’t wait to incorporate those elements into my lessons. Like the chapter concluded, it seems like tiering needs practice, but I can’t wait until I am an expert at it.

Chapter 4: Three Important Types of Assessment

Chapter four of Fair Isn’t Always Equal looked at three assessment types. I’ve been in classrooms that used all of these types. My high school English classes in particular used all three types of assessment at the same time. Portfolios are a good type of assessment to look at the span of an entire year – I remember choosing documents in different learning areas of my English class and explaining why I chose those items for my portfolio. I remember picking out well-done items for my portfolio and feeling really proud of myself when I was finished – that is a feeling I’d like to be present in my classroom.
Rubrics were the most common assessment style used in my schooling. They’re good for traditional school products like essays or projects because they lay out the guidelines clearly, and the student can see exactly what needs to be done to demonstrate knowledge, skill, and understanding. I liked examples 4.2 and 4.3 because they spent the most time discussing what the standard of excellence looks like, making it easier to aim for excellence instead of shooting for mediocrity.
I really like the student self-assessment type. It’s good to get students thinking about their own work. All of the techniques the book proposed sound good to use in my own classroom.

Chapter 10: MI and Assessment

The chapter on Multiple Intelligences and Assessment had a great many suggestions for assessing students. The chapter started off with a good laundry list of observational assessment that we can use. Observational assessment is good because it’s almost always authentic. Observation forces the assessor to look at students’ abilities and works, strengthening impressions of multiple intelligences. One idea that I was somewhat surprised with but really liked was informally administering a standardized test. In addition to relaxing students and keeping them from freaking out (which is a normal response to standardized tests), the test would give students the chance to see what standardized tests look like. Familiarity with standardized tests could help prepare them for taking high-risk tests like the SAT (assuming, probably rightfully, that College Board doesn’t make sweeping changes recognizing the validity of Multiple Intelligence Theory). On that note, the large tables comparing Standardized Testing to Authentic Assessment made the distinction even clearer than it has ever been.
The section on assessing in eight ways, suggesting for each intelligence various ways to let students show their knowledge about specific topics. I really liked the large eight-by-eight grid showing assessment contexts for assessment by activity. If I can overlap certain activities, it will certainly help my own classroom. The MI Portfolio will also be really useful, providing I can use it correctly. I think I should be able to.

Chapter 3: Principles of Successful Assessment in the Differentiated Classroom

This chapter repeated a lot of what we’ve already read in other books. I take this as emphasis of the chapter’s importance rather than needless repetition. Everything from avoiding fluff to furthering differentiated instruction to keeping one’s eye on the essential goals was reiterated in my mind as I read this chapter. The bulk of material in this chapter, which for the most part was reiterating differently things we’ve already read about, was summed up excellently toward the end. The “good assessment” bullet list would be a great thing to scan down when testing out an assessment strategy for the first time in a classroom, especially if I’m nervous about it.

Chapter 2: Mastery

Chapter Two and its focus on mastery of subject was immensely helpful to me. I have always thought about the ambiguity of exactly where a student was supposed to be in understanding of subjects by the time a unit was over. The definitions that the chapter compiled were helpful, but I can see this as something I need to define for myself in my school. My high school always had some infatuation with students reaching mastery, but I’m not certain the teachers ever discussed the definition of mastery in the teachers’ lounge. Again, the table on page 13 was invaluable for me to see examples of mastery.

Chapter 1: The Differentiated Instruction Mind-set: Rationale and Definition

Chapter one explained the differentiated instruction mindset, which focuses on fairness in instruction and assessment for students. The example of the two kids sitting at the back of a class, one with glasses and one without, was very well-crafted. I hadn’t heard it before. I like how the book, which I assume will focus on assessment, referred to Differentiated Instruction as a mindset, implying its value could exceed instruction. As we’ve pointed out in other readings, the Differentiated Instruction mindset is one that I wholeheartedly agree with and plan on using in my own classroom eventually.

Chapter 5: Considering Evidence of Learning in Diverse Classrooms

This chapter was packed with great things to keep in mind. The one that really popped out at me was GRASPS, mostly because I’ve heard the term before but never had it explained to me. All of these mnemonic devices in our books are going to be very helpful. Also very helpful to me were all the tables, like the one comparing authentic and inauthentic work. The 3 assessment principles will be used in my classroom – they make sense, but I hadn’t exactly thought of them or put them into words yet.