Standards-Based Reporting in a Flipped Mastery Classroom

(How does your student learn and get assessed?)

Learning is a process that takes time.  It does not happen overnight, and for some, may take several weeks.  All students are different and learn at different paces, and because of this, we have chosen to use standards-based reporting in a flipped mastery model.  This is done so that we can most effectively maximize our time at school helping students gain higher-level understanding of the content.  

We are assessing students on their knowledge of the required standards (or learning targets), and are therefore standards-based reporting.  However, we are required to use a percentage system in our current grading program in order to report/communicate final “grades” for each student.  In addition, we find the need to continue to educate our community on standards-based reporting (and grading).

What is a “Flipped Classroom”?

 A Flipped Classroom is basically one in which the traditional method of teaching (i.e. lecture in school and have “homework” to do at home) is “flipped” around.  In this model, students watch short lectures (class notes) at home as the homework, and do the traditional “homework” in class where the teacher is there to help and guide.  This allows the teacher to be available to students for one-to-one communication each day as they form their understanding of content.  This in turn, allows the teacher to learn more about their students' understanding, which gives us better insights as to how to plan quality learning opportunities for them.  

What is a “Flipped Mastery Classroom”?

Simply put, this is a flipped model in which students MUST show proficiency on a given learning target, before they move forward.  There is never a one-and-done.  Never will students be introduced to content, be tested, and then move on regardless of their level of understanding.  Only when a student can show proficiency (80% in our classroom), can they move on to the next concept.

Why Standards-Based Reporting?

The practice of standards-based assessment and reporting brings meaning to “grades” (if we have to use them).  It is essentially a tool for diagnosis instead of just point-collecting.  It allows the teacher, the student, and parents to see exactly where a student is in their understanding of the content.  If a student is struggling on a particular Learning Target (i.e. standard or LT), it will be very evident because that particular standard will not be designated as collected, and show that there are misconceptions in that specific area.  Learning is a process that will span the entire grading period (ideally the entire school year, but the middle school is also on 12  week marking periods).  Therefore, we will monitor growth (by individual LT) for each student from one summative assessment to the next.  This means that multiple opportunities to demonstrate understanding are given for each LT.  Students will continue to make additional attempts on each LT until they have mastered that content.  PowerSchool is set up by standard, rather than specific assignments, and there are only two categories in the grade book, formative and summative.

• Formative Assessment:  These are assessments for learning, where feedback is provided to help a student realize where they are in their learning process, and to then help it move forward.  These are NOT part of the student grade.    

• Summative Assessment:  These are assessments of learning, where students

demonstrate their level of understanding.  ONLY THESE ARE ASSESSED!

Standards-based reporting cannot be done without clear standards.  These are the specific things that the state has decided we need to teach for our particular subject.  These standards are provided by the State of Michigan Department of Education in the High School Content Expectations for Earth Science. (Please visit the class website for this document).  

A final grade must represent what a student “knows”.  Therefore only the most recent and accurate data is used to determine the final grade for a student because this represents the best picture of what that student currently “knows” (at the time the “grade” is reported).

Proficiency is the Price of Freedom!

Quality matters, and as we prepare students to be lifelong learners we need to teach them to be able to measure the quality of their own work.  This is a learned skill, and the way to teach quality is to demand it.  We must create an environment where standards can and must be met, and where students are not permitted to submit substandard work without being asked to revise it.

Our students must demonstrate understanding at or above the 80% mark to be considered “proficient” on a given LT (We realize that not ALL students may attain this 80% mark.  That is okay, but we still need a goal that can help define “mastery learning”, which is why we have this mark set at 80%).  If they are below 80%, they MUST continue to work towards this goal.  However, if they are above 80%, they can choose to either be done with the LT, or to attempt to show an even greater understanding by trying to score higher.  Either way, students learn that they are accountable for mastering the standards, and that the only way to improve in the class is to master the material.  This system makes if very difficult for the “Intentional Non-Learner” (i.e. the student who chooses to do very little in regards to their education) to skate by.

As parents, we simply want opportunities for our children to succeed.  In this model, students have a larger degree of control over their grades, and therefore greater satisfaction.  They know exactly where they stand on each LT, and which ones they need to focus on in order to improve their grade.  Students learn to compare themselves to the standard/goal, and NOT to other students.

How We Monitor Learning Targets, Assess Students, and Record Grades:

1.  Students receive the “Learning Target Summary Sheet” (i.e. The Roadmap) for the unit.  This explains each LT, what resources we are providing them with, what activities we need them to do to help form their understanding (and estimates of the time it will take to complete each activity), whether each activity is a formative or summative assessment, the date they finish, and a place for us to initial (or sign off).  In addition, this document provides a suggested Homework schedule and Class Work schedule.

2.  All assignments are labelled with the specific Learning Target code and description that the assignment is addressing.  This is done so that students are constantly being reminded of the goal they are being asked to meet.

3.  In preparation for a test, students have many resources to review.  We ask students to “practice like you play”.  This means that in order to prepare for an assessment, one should practice completing tasks that they may be asked to complete during an assessment.  We provide sample questions and tasks that students can do to further prepare (these both cover specific LTs, and an array of possible ways for us to ask a question about that LT).

4.  When we administer an assessment, all multiple choice questions are on the web at a site called ProProfs.  At this website, we have a private account where we can house all of our Learning Target specific multiple choice assessments.  Students login to each assessment with their first and last name, answer the questions, submit it, and immediately get to see their results.  Once they have submitted it, we have record of their score, the amount of time it took them to complete it, the date and time it was completed, as well as the IP address at which it was taken.  Each LT is a small separate assessment, so if we have 4 LTs that a given test is over, then there will be 4 short MC assessments (3-7 ques. each).  

In addition to the MC section, we always have a short answer portion as well.  Each short answer question is labelled with the LT code.  This is done so that each LT has a multiple choice section and a short answer section.  We then combine the two assessments together to come up with an accurate picture of a student’s knowledge of an individual LT (LT ex. = E4.p1.....students usually know even the alpha-numeric codes by the time they assess b/c they have so many things that are labeled with the LT code prior to the assessment).

5.  To record all this data in our grade book, we have 2 categories:  Formative and Summative.  Only summative items will ultimately be considered toward a final “grade”, and only the most recent summative items for each LT will be used for the final grade (i.e. this would be the most recent and therefore accurate data).  The grade book is organized by LT code and date (all LT codes are seen together because we give them the same date, the end of the grading period, - we then specify a more specific date of when it was actually completed in the comments section).  You will see four different letter codes in each LT, and they are as follows:

        NM = Standard Not Met        P = Progressing        SM = Standard Met                M = Mastery

Only the “SM” and “M” mean that a student has shown proficiency.  When a final grade must be submitted at the end of the trimester, the grade will be a percentage reflection of:  Standards Met / Total Standards (within that grading period).

Why is 80% Proficient?

• We concluded that 80% or higher = proficient.  If a student scores over 80%, they can choose to continue to work on this LT until a 100% is reached, but they are not required to by us.  If a student was lower than 80%, they MUST continue to work on the content (we will re-teach and re-learn with these students).
• 80% became the cutoff because if we had 5 points for a given LT, and a student got ⅘, they automatically were knocked down to 80%.  However, we felt that ⅘ showed that the student knew the content at an adequate level - well enough to then leave the decision up to the student and the parents as to whether or not they needed to continue to test on that LT.

NOTE:  This benchmark will only be used when scoring an assessment is absolutely necessary.  Otherwise, student achievement will be documented on the Earth Science HSCE Student Evaluation.

Retake vs. Reassessment

The question we receive more frequently from students is, “If I do not do very well on a test, can I retake it?”  Many times we hear students walking into our classrooms on the day of an assessment talking about the opportunity to “retake” an assessment before they even take it the first time!  The answer to the question is, “No, there are no retakes.”  Let me explain:

• A retake is providing an opportunity for a student to take the same test they took the first time and to show that they now know the information that was on the test the first time they took it!
• A retake is not a true test of what a student knows, it is a test that often simply asks a student to go home, look over the test (and the answers), and memorize the answers to the test.  In most cases (not all), this is exactly what takes place.  The student simply memorizes the test and then retakes the same test, with the same questions, in the same order, and turns it in and is graded on their ability to memorize the information and not spend time learning from their misconceptions to create new meanings of the concept(s).

When we respond to a student question about retakes we respond with, “No,” but there is more to our answer.  We then explain that we do not believe in re-takes (using the examples and reasoning above), but we believe in reassessing student abilities and understanding of content that they may have displayed misconceptions about on their test.

The reassessment technique(s) that we use are listed below, but this list is not the only available reassessment techniques that are available to our students (more to come below):

• We will sit down with each student, individually, to go over their test(s) with them.  During our time with the student we may ask them to look over their test(s) and then provide us feedback on things that they notice are incorrect and provide them an opportunity correct their misconceptions right there.  Some students are very particular in their methods of explaining/demonstrating their understanding of the content, so we provide ample opportunities for students to “show” us they know it:

• Verbally explain their understanding to the teacher
• Verbally explain their understanding using the Camera app on the iPad/iPod Touch
• Verbally explain their understanding using the Instacorder app on the iPad/iPod Touch
• Verbally and visually explain their understanding to the teacher using the Camera app
• Verbally and visually explain their understanding to the teacher using the ScreenChomp app on the iPad
• Use materials (manipulatives) to demonstrate and explain their understanding to the teacher
• Use materials (manipulatives) to demonstrate and explain their understanding using the Camera app on the iPad/iPod Touch
• Diagram and describe, through writing, their understanding on paper and submit it to their teacher
• Diagram and describe, verbally, their understanding to their teacher
• Other???

• If a student has a better why they would like to demonstrate their understanding of the concept(s), we are open to any/all suggestions and ideas!

• If a student is able to explain, demonstrate, etc. their understanding of the misconceptions they demonstrated on their test, we will credit the points that were lost when they took the test.
• If a student is not able to explain, demonstrate, etc. their understanding of the misconceptions they demonstrated on their test, we will then create an individual lesson plan (mini-lessons) for each student to help them clear up their misconception(s) over the content within a unit.

In the end, we would like for our students to understand the concepts before they move forward in the curriculum, which is the reason we are using the Flipped Mastery approach in our classrooms.  For many years, we simply provide a grade and regardless of how well (or not so well) a student understands the information, we move forward in the curriculum, regardless of how well (or not so well) the student understood the information.  We are not holding our students accountable and in most cases, our curriculum is set to build a foundation for the next unit we are going to cover.  So, if a student doesn’t have the information that is needed for the foundation is it understandable why a student may continue to struggle in a class where the foundation has not been built before moving forward in building the structure?  Math, along with Science, is a great example of how a continued push forward, before the information is understood, can lead to bigger issues later in the year, a few years down the road, and maybe later in life.  We need to make sure our students have a good, solid foundation before we ask them to move forward, otherwise our foundation is unstable and may lead to other problems down the road!