NinaWitJournal5

Nina Witel EDC 452: Dr. Pete Adamy Assessment Journal #5 03/10/09

In my first grade classroom, the cooperating teacher uses pre-assessment in many ways. This week I observed her assessing her students with the word-wall words. She gave them a list of five words that they all have to write down, sound out, and spell together. After going through each word, the students then turned over their papers and wrote a sentence that included many of those five word-wall words. The teacher does this every day with the students so they are able to understand and learn the spelling and meaning of each word. At the end of each day the students are able to bring home their work to practice at home with their parents. At the end of the week the teacher gives the students a test on each of the five words. The pre-assessment that this teacher is doing with her students is she is preparing them for their word-wall test. She is assessing their work before they are actually taking a test, by quizzing them as a group or individually or practicing the spellings and meanings of each word. This type of assessment is very helpful in many ways and can be used in any subject area in the classroom. I feel that by having pre-assessment it will help the student prepare as well as the teacher having an awareness of where each student stands in that subject area. The students are aware that they are not given a grade when doing practice work, but fully understand that they have to work their hardest with spelling, handwriting and using the word in sentences. Also by using pre-assessment the teacher is able to understand if certain students are able to work in a whole group activity, and understand her instructions. If students are having trouble, she is then able to work with them individually or with a small group. I feel that pre-assessment benefits both the teacher and the students.

Section 3