Technology+Facilitator+Standard+IV

= Assessment and Evaluation =

__Reflection__
In relation to assessments, technology has influenced this area more than many others, partially because teachers are often more comfortable with teaching than with the process and paperwork that assessments often brings. I would often talk with peer teachers about topics from my courses at Lamar, however they were not interested until I began to talk about no paperwork assessments that they did not have to had grade and pull out the old EZGrader for. This grabbed their attention. During the school year, I trained fellow teachers on inputting and publishing their assessments using ExamView, purchased by the district, in lieu of Microsoft Word which is the standard tool. (TF-IV.A.1) ExamView allowed teachers to scramble test, publish multiple version of the same test, publish the content to a html file for upload on the internet. The wow factor for me is that html assessments are graded automatically by the system, and the final grade, the ones the students scored incorrectly on are generated and emailed to the teacher. Even the most technology resistant teachers saw the benefits of posting a test, and just looking at the results fill her inbox. During the summer session, I experimented with the assessment tool build into Schoology.com. I like the way that once an assessment is generated and as students take the assessment it automatically fills that spot in the grade book. There are wonderful settings like setting the number of times a student can take an assessment, whether you average the grades or take the highest. In the grade book, there are awesome data analysis tools that show the median score across a class, highs lows, averages with graphic views that make the data easy to evaluate. (TF.IV.B) I did not like the format for inputting questions, because it is really tedious, and it does not allow you to copy and paste multiple questions. Having tried this tool out this summer, I will be ready to train my peer teachers on it this upcoming fall. During the summer session students had to demonstrate not only mastery of the content, but mastery of the technology. I have always preferred to assess with a mixture of questions and application demonstration. In that way I know that students know what they are doing and how to do it. The Schoology.com framework allows for students to submit assignments into a drop box, which allows me to assess the final product of an application assessment.(TF.IV.C.2) I am really thankful to have gotten the opportunity to apply what I have learned during my summer teaching session, I was basically given free reign to structure and assess the content in any format I wanted. I must say that my evaluation of the Schoology website is that it is a wonderful tool, that allows a great deal of flexibility and is very structured organized and was very easy for the students to acclimate to. I know that it will change the way I approach teaching from now on. Someone once told me to work smarter not harder. I believe this generation of students already understands this concept; it is time for teachers to learn from them.