Standard 6:
The teacher of PK-12 music can assess musical knowledge and skills.
Reflective Essay:
Assessment of student learning is more than just exams. Educators need to know various assessment strategies to properly gauge the learning of their students. In my elementary music class as well as my early music education classes, we learned many different forms of formal and informal assessment. We went over exams, observations, projects, and ways that students can assess themselves. Along with these lessons, we wrote lessons of our own which were to include specific ways of assessment. I used strategies such as having students work in groups while I walk around to see if they are successfully completing what I have asked them to. Another strategy that I used was having students perform what they learned and created. Sometimes these were individual performances, and other times they were in groups. I personally like having students demonstrate their learning in groups. This makes assessment less daunting, especially in younger grades, and it turns into more of a game so that students do not even realize that they are being assessed.
In my classroom, I would like to take what I have learned and put it into practice. I think that switching up my assessment strategies will be the key to successfully gauging my students’ learning. Using only tests is not ideal, but neither is only having group projects. While some students will thrive in group settings, some will be too shy to work well with others. I will use group projects, exams, and performances interchangeably for formal assessments in my classroom. As for informal assessment, I will use whatever strategy the situation calls for. If my students are working in small groups, then I will be walking around and spending a little bit of time with each group. I can listen to what students are talking about, watch what they are creating, and help to guide them in a different direction if it looks like they are headed down the wrong path. I will explain my different assessment strategies to students so that they can understand why I chose a certain strategy. By using all of these different assessment strategies, I will show that I can fulfill this standard.
Artifacts & Rationales
This portfolio show many different ways that I would assess a music classroom. For each example, I have added a description of the assessment, and example of how to execute each one in a classroom. I have also added any rubrics or worksheets that I would use in any of the instances. This shows that I am able to assess the musical knowledge and skills of my students in many different ways.
At the end of my year-long curriculum, I have listed out and explained each of my assessment strategies. They are also throughout the document in order to show how I would use each one for each performance. This shows that I understand different ways of assessment, as well as how to use them in actual circumstances, with specific music and performances.
Elementary Unit Pre- & Post- Assessments
Though I talk about the assessments that I will use for each lesson, in the outline of the unit, I explain the pre- and post- assessments that I will use. The pre-assessment that I outline is a way for me to make sure that my students are where they should be before adding more information. The post-assessment is similar to the pre-assessment, but it is assessing what the students learned from the beginning to the end of my unit.
My secondary unit ends with examples of the assessments that I would use throughout the teaching process. I assign a different assessment strategy for each activity that I use in my unit. This shows that I am able to know exactly what assessment strategy is appropriate for a given lesson.