One thing every teacher can agree on is that students in our classrooms have holes from the spring digital teaching. Just because we know that they have gaps in their learning doesn’t help us know exactly what those gaps are. Enter in pre-assessments. While pre-assessments aren’t new, how we create them will have to change in this new world order.
I love using pre-assessments in my class at the start of each unit to gage student prior knowledge. However, I don’t have time to take a day for a pretest. I see my kiddos twice a week in a hybrid model and we need to be learning new information during that time!
While seeing ever gap that a student has at the start of the unit is helpful, I’m rethinking this idea. By giving short, pin-pointed mini assessments to start I’m able to see what students can do. In 2-3 questions, you can really gage what a student remembers (and what they don’t!).
This is where the pre-assessments will have to change a bit. Instead of a full test, I’ve rounded up faster ways to assess students while in a digital environment. These ideas can also be used for general formative assessments!
Mini Assessment
A 2-3 question assessment over the main pieces of your unit might be the most similar to an actual pre-test. When I get to my decimal operation unit in 6th grade, I plan to give students a 4 question ‘mini assessment’ with 1 question for each operation. I’m going to know very quickly if students have prior learning on this set of standards. A mini-assessment could be done virtually through a Google Form or your LMS (learning management system). It could even paper pencil as a warm up on an in-class day.
Entrance/Exit Tickets
A quick check in with students via a Google Form (that automatically grades!) gives me the information I need without taking too much time. An exit ticket can be utilized to gage if students understood what you taught in class. Similarly, the first 5 minutes can be used to see if students followed along with a flipped classroom. If you are teaching 5th grade math and looking for a set of exit tickets, check out my TPT shop!
Self-Assess
I love to get kiddos thinking about their own learning. A quick thumbs up/down is easy for me to see how students feel about the content. Bonus points for being able to do this one through a computer screen.
Thinking Maps
Creating a whole class thinking map about a particular topic is an easy way to see what kiddos remember. Take fractions for example. I’d post an open-ended question of ‘what do you remember about fractions?’ to my class and record their ideas. If students don’t know to multiply fractions, I’ll know that I will need to address it in my lessons. This could be done virtually using Padlet or in class discussion.
Asking Last Year’s Teachers
Depending on the grade you teach, this might be a fast way to see what students learned remotely last year. Students will probably need a refresher from the spring. If students didn’t get to learn about long division then you can plan to incorporate some as a warm-up. You might have to spend time on it when you get to a lesson that relies on that background information.
Scope & Sequence
If your district has a scope and sequence, taking a peek from the grade behind will give insight to what a 4th quarter kiddo would have learned. Students that were supposed to learn division might not have grasped the concept virtually.
What ways do you quickly pre-assess your students?
[…] pretest for the unit, which keeps groups the same for a few weeks at a time. Another idea is to use daily exit tickets, which will keep your groups changing each day/week. Pick an option and try it! This was the part […]