Analyzing Assessment Data

The Why & The How

Sycamore District #427, January 18th, 2013

So, how’s it been going?

• Questions or concerns about:
• Creating student learning targets
• Aligning summative assessments to standards
• Creating formative assessments from summative assessments
• Anything else assessment-related

What are your current data analysis practices?

• Discuss:
• What type of data do you get from your assessments? (Formative or summative)
• How do you use the data that you currently get from assessments?
• Who uses the data you currently get from assessments?
• Why do you need to analyze data?

Analyzing Assessment Data

Why?

To determine "needs improvements" in instruction, curriculum, and assessment design

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To improve

student learning

and

teacher instruction

To make data useful…

• It must be collected and organized in a way that’s useful for your team
• By question/target/standard/skill
• It must be analyzed without turning it into a blame game.
• Teachers and students must use the data
• The focus must be on the students
• Not what’s easiest for us

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Steps for Data Analysis

The How

Before we begin..

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These steps are just suggestions.

Tailor this process to suit the needs of your team.

Step 1:

• Get the data broken down by question.
• Or any other format that is useful to you: By learning target, skill, etc.

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Step 2:

• Determine cutoff percentages/numbers for mastery and below mastery
• Can have two or three groups
• EXAMPLE:
• Mastery = 80% and above
• Below mastery = 70% - 79%
• Far below mastery = 0 – 69%

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Step 3

• Look for questions where large numbers of students are in the below mastery range.

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• Then, look at three things:
• The question
• The instruction
• The curriculum

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Looking at the question:

• Examine the question stem
• Wording/phrasing clarity
• Alignment with curriculum

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• Examine the distractors
• Wording/phrasing clarity
• Similar distractors
• Alignment with curriculum—is this what mastery was determined to look like?

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• Fix the question, replace with a new one, or throw it out.

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Looking at the instruction:

• Discuss: What did all teachers do to teach the concept or skill?

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• Look at individual teacher data if available

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• Determine how instruction should change for the next unit or next year as a group
• Discussions need to be open and honest
• Data should not be used for evaluative purposes

Looking at the curriculum:

• Discuss: Does the question match what mastery was determined to look like when the assessment was created?

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• Is it hard to for you or students to see what mastery is for the learning target? If so, modify the learning target or analyze its importance.

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• If it does not match your learning target at all, modify the question or get rid of it.
• Don’t assess around the target

Never let a question lead you to change your instruction or curriculum.

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Resist the urge to blame the students, previous teachers, or other schools.

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Avoid hair-splitting.

Record-keeping

• Record discussion and decisions made in a common spot
• Folder everyone to which all can access
• Google Doc in a shared folder
• Dropbox

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• Put it somewhere where it can be reviewed before you start the unit next year!

Let's analyze some data!

You come across this data for a question:

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You look at the question.....

Which of the following is the most accurate analogy for the connection between organisms, populations, communities, ecosystems, biome, and biosphere?

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a) A toy train going up a mountain

b) A bullseye

c) A birthday cake

d) A pair of shoes

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What discussion would you have if you were analyzing this with your team?

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Practice the steps.

Your Turn

Get out the data you brought with you

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Analyze it according to the steps (see handout)

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Contact Info

Email: mrsebiology@gmail.com

Twitter: @mrsebiology

Blog: www.crazyteacherlady.com