Learning Celebration Reflections

By Dan Saken

Learning Celebrations

Two summers ago, I read an article by a Baylor Sociology professor that claimed students in his class performed better on assessments when the teacher reframed "Test Days" by instead referring to them as "Learning Celebrations."  So, always looking for ways put a positive spin on things, I decided to make the change myself starting last school year.  I told students that instead of taking "tests" where students are worried about what they didn't learn, we would instead focus on celebrating what they did learn. 

While I definitely received numerous odd looks and eye rolls from students when I first introduced the idea, "Learning Celebrations" have become an important part of the class vernacular for both myself and my students.  We even blast "Celebration" by Kool & The Gang as students arrive to class (in addition to some really bad dancing by myself) to give them an extra boost of positive vibes before we start the Learning Celebration.  And though the simple name change hasn't done away with all anxiety students may feel when taking a unit assessment or magically led to all students earning A's, I did see an increase in class averages from previous years on a majority of my assessments.

Taking Time to Reflect on Learning Celebrations

A vital part of Learning Celebrations is actually getting to celebrate how well students performed the day after.  My classes set aside the day after a Learning Celebration to give students time to reflect on how they did and give them opportunities to see what they knew and what they didn't.  Student are always anxious/excited to see the grade they received, but it is even more important (especially in a class that is cumulative like AP Psychology) that students get a chance to fill in any gaps of knowledge that may exist.

A student who scores an 85% on an assessment is seemingly in a pretty good place grade-wise, but that still means that the student did not know 15% of the content.  If students don't reflect and learn the right answer to a question they missed, that 15% could continue to get wider and wider.  This would then form a considerable gap in their knowledge, leading to them making the same mistake when faced with a similar problem later on.  I have a poster in my room that states, "An error doesn't become a mistake until you refuse to correct it."  That kind of thinking guides our Learning Celebration Reflection.

Team Retake of the Learning Celebration

I have various activities I use on reflection days throughout the year, but the one I like to do with the first unit is a team retake.  Students are placed in homogeneous groups of 3-4 based on their individual scores (but they don't know how they scored until after the team retake).  I also try to group students that don't normally sit by each other or work together as much as possible to get them interacting with more of their classmates and possibly reduce distractions.  They are tasked with retaking the entire multiple choice section of the Learning Celebration, with the promise of earning some extra points if they do even better on the team retake than they did individually.

The conversations, debates, and friendly disagreements are incredibly rewarding to listen to, especially when they have "Aha!" moments related to questions or answer choices they may have read or interpreted wrong the first time through.  Their ability to arrive at those moments through self-realization or guidance from classmates is a lot more meaningful with a longer-lasting impact than if I simply told them the right answers myself.  When groups finish the retake, everyone in the group gets their individual scores back, getting time to see what they got right and wrong themselves, helping peers with questions they answer incorrectly, and ensuring their errors do not become a mistakes.

Using Statistics and Modeling Content

Once all groups have finished the retake, I talk about the class average and single out the most-missed questions for further review.  Last year, I added one more thing to my reflection days as a way to further connect to the content we learn in Unit 1 of AP Psychology.  The first unit is on Research Methods, which includes a part on statistics and how data is used to interpret results of studies.  On an Excel spreadsheet, I calculated the Mean, Median, Mode, Skew and Standard Deviation of the data on an Excel spreadsheet, along with creating a Histogram (bar chart) to see if there was a Normal Curve....all terms we learned in the first unit.  I'm no Excel whiz, but YouTube is a magical place to learn how to do things!

I share all that data and the graph with the students so they can see the statistics at work, especially with a concept such as standard deviation, which can be confusing for students.  Statistics are not overly relevant in most of the other units over the rest of the course, but I continued inputting data from the Learning Celebrations to show students on reflection days and it has become a mainstay in the reflection process.

Correlation Does Not Prove Causation! (But it's still informative!)

One last way I tried to connect the content with our reflection was through a demonstration of correlation.  In the Research Methods unit, one of the most important concepts is that "Correlation does not prove causation!"  However, identifying correlations can give us valuable information on how two variables might be related.  One required assignment I have for each unit is completing a Unit Review Quiz on Schoology that takes 20 random questions from a question bank.  Students can take the Review Quiz as many times as they like, getting a different set of questions each time, and I take their highest score as their grade.  Since there is no way to reasonably gather data on the amount of reading, studying, note-taking, etc. each student does to prepare, the best accessible and objective data point I have to see if there is a correlation with success on the Learning Celebration is if students had actually taken the Review Quiz.

I calculated the average score of students who completed the Unit Review Quiz at least once vs. the average score of students who did not do the quiz at all.

• Period 1: 78% (took quiz) vs. 67% (no quiz)
• Period 2: 74% (took quiz) vs. 70% (no quiz)
• Period 3: 80% (took quiz) vs. 74% (no quiz)

I stressed the idea that "correlation does not prove causation," so I wasn't claiming that taking the Schoology Review Quiz automatically led to higher scores.  But the data did show that those that took the quiz were at least more likely to score higher than those who did not.  Not only was I able to again connect to the content we learned in the unit, I'm hoping it will inspire more students to take advantage of the review tool in preparation of future celebrations.  After all, reflecting on Learning Celebrations is a lot more enjoyable when the scores show there's something to celebrate!

Growth Mindset with Assessments

By Mark Heintz

The AP World exam just transpired and I am in full reflection mode.  I asked my students a few questions about things they felt they needed based on the test they just took.  The students felt they needed more writing practice throughout the year.  They felt they needed more individual practice with feedback on their ability to perform on the spot.  To give some context on the test, the exam has four components. Part one is fifty-five stimulus multiple choice questions. Part two is four short responses.  Part three is one document based question (DBQ). Part four is one long essay exam.  While AP does give a course framework, the students do not know the prompts or documents ahead of time.

To adequeately gather enough assessment data for each component, it takes a lot of class time.  To prepare the students for each component and give feedback along the way so students feel success, it takes a lot of class time.  Despite the enormous use of classtime, I feel they are one of the best elements of the class because they require the students to think. Since they take a lot of class time, I have often taught small elements of the essays in the first few units, but never had hard checkpoints or summative assessments for each writing component in each unit.

Based off the student feedback and my feelings on the year, I created an assessment chart to ensure a linear progression of the skills required for each component of the exam.  I wanted to hold myself accountable to formally assessing each part in each unit with the exception of the first unit which is a very short unit.  I did not want to assess the entire essay in the beginning because it would be too difficult and too time consuming.



To give an example of the progression, in the second unit, I will give the students a two document DBQ.  The students will only be required to write a thesis, give contextualization, and connect the two documents to their argument.  This will not require fifty-five minutes like it will at the end of the year.  It only assess three skills, which I can easily provide feedback to the students to help them grow by the next assessment. Each unit I add a skill or documents to progress them towards the final product of seven documents. Unit three adds the synthesis skill.  Unit four moves to four documents.  Unit five adds source component and five documents.  Furthermore, it gives me data on what my students have mastered and need help on at a very early stage in the year.  They do not need to be able to write a DBQ until the middle of May.

I have selected the DBQ's for each unit already and tailored the documents to get at the skills being assessed.  I am hoping that this holds me accountable to ensuring that students are progressing in the skills to be successful.   Furthermore, my hope is that the students will master the skill in smaller doses so I can make them feel comfortable with the exam, hold them to a higher writing standard in the end, and not spend as much class time in the last few weeks leading up the examination.

Sharing Rubric Design

Written by Kim Miklusak and Quinn Loch

Sometimes in the CollabLab we hang unit plans, lesson plans, or assignments up on the dry erase wall to request interdisciplinary feedback from our peers.  It's a great opportunity to provide a consistent message to our students and reflect on our own instruction.

We did this for our writing rubric in regular & honors biology and AP English.  At first glance, you might not think there’s a large overlap between the subjects; however, we realized quickly that the writing skills in one class can inform those in the other.

In English, I have recently moved to a 3-degree rubric: mastery, proficiency, and “not yet.”  The way I think about it, a 4-degree rubric still accepts borderline unsatisfactory work.  Instead, proficient shows that the student technically understands the skill and has demonstrated it in their work.  Mastery, however, moves to a more successful, argumentative, or stylistic demonstration of the skills.  I’ve also taken up the language I’ve seen online; instead of having a “revision” or “unsatisfactory” category, I’ve labeled it “Not Yet,” indicating that students can progress to the next level.  Yet I wasn’t sure of a straight 3-degree rubric because even AP considers “rising” and “falling” scores,” so I added two categories in each area, which also satisfies a points-driven report card.  Ideally those point values would go away and students would be able to focus on honing skills-driven writing.  

The feedback from the team involved wording and whether students were familiar with the language on the rubric and how well this aligned to the College Board's actual holistic scoring guide. 

In Biology, skills related to experimental design, execution, analysis, and reflection are a continued focus for the freshman biology team. Last summer the team designed a rubric to help provide feedback on lab assessments. Here is our original rubric. The goals of our rubric included the following...

1. Allow for focused student revision
2. Make grading easier, less subjective, and more consistent
3. Clearly communicate expectations to the student

Based on discussion and feedback with colleagues, I made some changes to condense the original rubric with aim to make it clearer. This involved having fewer descriptors and including "rising" and "falling" scores to provide some wiggle room when grading, making the score translate better into the grade book. Here is the second revision.

In biology, next steps within the process of skills assessment will be to gather student samples that can be used as models in the development of skills. These models can be used as guides or as a way to train students to further understand the expectations within the rubric.

More on common rubrics soon! Big conversations are happening!

Too many questions...

By Mark Heintz

I have been asking a few questions lately.  Do we believe all students can learn the course objectives? Many people and myself included respond to that question, if the students are placed correctly.  So my next question is, if all students are placed correctly shouldn't they all get an A's? If we want all students to know our content and master our skills, then shouldn't all students get A's? Can a student pass my class if they don't know ALL the content and master ALL the skills?

Do students only not get A's because they are lazy or improperly placed?  Is it a problem if all students get an A? Have I set up my course so only hard workers or the incredibly bright get A's?

How does a student progress at a normal rate? What is a normal rate?  If you don’t know the normal pacing at a standard, then if you inflate grades to move along a student, then is it a disservice to the students? Does the grade become what I do or what the student can do?  Then, what does a grade represent? Should grades exist? Or should we just report on the standard?

If you feel like you just want to back out of these line of questioning, here is an entertaining video for you.

EG Lead Learners Team Meeting #3

Today was our third meeting of the Elk Grove Lead Learners Team. First, here is a brief overview of the EGLLT:

At Elk Grove High School, our Lead Learners Team is an interdisciplinary team of staff that comes together monthly to collaborate and learn, with our ultimate goal to improve learning for our students.  We are a team of staff that in many schools, and formerly at Elk Grove High School, would be called the "staff development team." Our EGLLT is a group of 30 staff members and it includes our principals, division chairs, counselors, teachers from all departments, and teachers from the feeder schools; it is truly a collaborative venture.

Our objectives for today's meeting were:

-Participants will be able to recognize and explain the difference between Clear Purpose and Clear Targets

-Participants will be able to recognize and explain the difference between Formative and Summative Assessment

-Participants will be able to use Formative Assessment every day to check for understanding and maximize student learning

The hope for the first two objectives was to get the entire school to use the words the same.  

Establishing Clear Purpose & Clear Targets

The EGLLT discussed the difference between a purpose and a target.  The purpose in the teacher actions, approach, logistics, etc. while the target is the content, skills, etc.  

Formative & Summative Assessment
One of the activities used to differentiate between formative and summative assessment was this Google Form. After completing this form, we discussed the results in our groups. We also talked about the best uses of each type of assessment as well as how all of these can be used to inform students of their learning. In small groups, we created six-word statements to define formative assessment.

Seven Strategies of Assessment for Learning
In a jigsaw activity, we learned the background of the Seven Strategies of Assessment for Learning. Then, teachers presented examples of each strategies. Thank you to Kirsten Fletcher, Leslie Guimon, Rachel Barry, Tom Boczar, Matt Bohnenkamp, Kristen Guth, Paul Kelly, Quinn Loch, and Kerry Frazier for sharing your practices!