hollie_journal3

Journal #3 February 10, 2009

This assessment is another one that involves a written response from the students. However, rather than being a response based on a short story from their reading anthology, this one was a sample from a previous NECAP test. The teacher provided students with a photocopy of a sample reading (excerpt from //Snowflake Bently//) and response question from last years fourth grade NECAP test. (This is a third grade class) This assessment seemed more formal than the previous two, because students had to read the passage alone and answer the question without any assistance. It was almost as though they were actually taking the NECAP test.

Using a pencil, students had to answer the following question in the space provided on the sample sheet: “Explain how you know Willie Bently loved snow. Use details from the passage.” Before they began reading, the teacher instructed students to underline any important sentences and details as they read so that they would have details to support their response. Although the NECAP tests come with their own rubrics and grading systems, the teacher decided it would be best if she used her own writing rubric to be consistent. This way, the students would already be familiar with how they would be graded so they would know how they should set up their response. The teacher’s rubric for writing ranges from 0-4, 4 being the best. For students to receive a 4, they would need 3-4 details, a strong topic sentence, and a strong concluding sentence. Many students got between a 3 and a 4 on the rubric, but it seemed as though most of them were not performing to the best of their ability. The teacher informed me that lately, they have been lazy writers, and I noticed it myself after reading some of their responses.

Overall, I liked how the teacher mixed up the regular routine of giving a constructed response based on a short story by using this NECAP sample instead. It gave the students a change in pace, and it was something different. However, I did notice that the students definitely could have tried harder and done better; many of them were not doing as well as they are capable of. If I could change something about this assessment, I would probably change the format of the sample problem, because the students just took the NECAP test not too long ago. I feel that this may have been a reason as to why many of the students were being lazy with their writing. I know that they got a lot of practice with NECAP samples before the test, and they just took the test recently, so I think they may be pretty “NECAP-ped” out. Therefore, they were more careless with their responses, and they probably would have done better if this assessment had not been in NECAP form.

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