Standard8

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** Standard 8 ** The teacher understands and uses formal and informal assessment strategies to evaluate and ensure the continuous intellectual, social, and physical development of the pupil.
 * Teachers know how to test for student progress. **

Evidence 1: Using Technology to Increase Student Learning and Student Motivation

Rationale 1: My action research project looked at how using technology increases student learning and student motivation in a sixth grade social studies class. One class used technology to research a country in Europe and then created a PowerPoint presentation to teach the information to the rest of the class. The other class used books and some technology to research a country in Europe and taught their information via a booklet format. Students took a pre- and post-test to show learning about their country, and they all completed a survey to give me information regarding their feelings toward the process. KSD 8.K.2 The teacher knows how to select, construct, and use assessment strategies and instruments appropriate to the learning outcomes being evaluated and to other diagnostic purposes.

For this situation, I wanted to see what students knew about their countries before they began and what they could remember after their research. My goal was to see if students who used technology learned and remembered more than those who did not. The assessment was basic, but it gave me the information I needed. I was able to determine what students learned about their countries and if they could match that information with the five themes of geography, of which our curriculum is based.  8.S.4 The teacher evaluates the effect of class strategies on both individuals and the class as a whole, collecting information through observation of classroom interactions, questioning, analysis of student work. Throughout the action research process, I was keeping formal observations and comparing the two classes. It was clear to me that the technology class was on task more often and rarely needed prompts to stay on task. The other class was noisier and often needed prompting to stay on task. This group was also sharing materials, so they had that struggle to deal with as well. Questions from the technology group were usually related to understanding specific content whereas questions from the other group were typically related to finding specific content. Time was definitely better spent in the technology group.  8.D.2 The teacher is committed to using assessment to identify student strengths and promote student growth rather than to deny students access to learning opportunities. Assessment tools have many roles in schools. I am constantly reminding my students that the assessment tools I use are for the purpose of seeing what they understand and what I need to continue to help them understand. I talk with my students about how they can use assessment results to continue to learn. When given the opportunity to retest or correct errors, I encourage them to do so to increase their own understanding of the topic. In the case of my action research, I used the assessment tools to determine whether using technology is useful in motivating students to learn. My research shows that it does.