Week5, Reflections

At this week I have a chance to learn more about alternative assessment, autonomous learning, and project-based learning process. If teacher wants to work creatively and provide new ways of teaching in the classroom, he/she has to think about cooperation with students on the problem-based methods. At my school, we have the grading system from 5 to 1 that is not flexible and do not provide any feedback to students. I pointed out in discussion that in case of using rubrics I have to modify scores to our system and for that goal I have to reconsider the syllabus for grading. However, assessment has to be an active part of learning process that encourages students in their educational process for class and out-of class activities. Teacher has to give to student a freedom in discussing the process of learning. Teacher and students have to collaborate in all activities and all steps in class activities and out.
Through readings we considered different tools of alternative assessment such as checklist and rubrics, their structure and functions in learning process. They are the tools that help motivate students to study, because they exactly know the requirements for accomplishing tasks. They are useful to assess any task: presentation, essay, test with multiple-choice questions, and so on. We discussed and analyzed the differences and similarities between different types of rubrics, such as holistic and analytical, primary trait and multi trait rubrics. From my experience, I can tell that I used rubric for evaluation of student progress, but it was not systematically. After reading articles on the value of them, I would like to work on redesigning lesson plans with rubrics for evaluation. They are productive tool that show to the students the strength of their work and help to analyze weaknesses. Teachers provide feedback to their students by rubric during the process and at the end. Jo-Ellen Tannenbaum in the article “Practical Ideas On Alternative Assessment For ESL Students” writes that “In contrast to traditional testing, "students are evaluated on what they integrate and produce rather than on what they are able to recall and reproduce" (Huerta- Macias, 1995, p. 9).”It improves the objectivity of assessment. Teacher cannot pay attention only to the best students and tell them the result of their best work, but will make individual approach to each student in the class. Jo-Ellen Tannenbaum mentions that “Focus is on documenting individual student growth over time, rather than comparing students with one another.”
Students have to be involved in the process of creating rubric for special task, for agreement on each point of the task and escaping the conflict situation on assessing student work. Students can evaluate themselves and learn how to evaluate their peers. Jo-Ellen Tannenbaum points out that “Whatever methods teachers choose, they should reflect with students on their work, to develop students' ability to critique their own progress.”This is also the part of learning process, because they have to explain the strength and weaknesses of students work and it can be if they fully understand the content of the topic and can identify other aspects according to criteria of the task. Rubric can be created by different sites that provide templates with criteria for task or made by teacher. In order to make a rubric, I used sites http://www.rubrics4teachers.com/ and Rubi Star, and found that there are many templates to create rubrics for all disciplines. When the teacher use rubric in the classroom, it will not require more time for assessing students result. In the article “Alternative Assessment” on the site http://www.nclrc.org/essentials/assessing/alternative.htm, authors write that “In classrooms where traditional forms of assessment are required, this gives the instructor multiple ways of measuring progress without increasing the time students spend taking traditional tests.” It makes clear the process of assessment for teacher and for students.
We read and discussed issues about Problem-based learning method and projects that can be created on the basis of this method. I made a conclusion that Problem-based learning process is integral part of academic process. Students have to learn to work in teams, find solutions, and solve problems. Students with different learning styles will be involved in the process. Students who like read, write, speak, calculate, move, touch, see, observe, and so on, will find interesting activity to do in a group by PBL process. We discussed with my classmate Celeste influence of PBL method on “shy” students in her class and we concluded that this method will encourage this group of students in order to be active in any approaches for solving problems and working collaboratively with students in the group on preparing the task in the project. Project has to be interesting to students and to be valuable for community ( Susan Gaer ). In this case, students will love to work under PBL method. Teacher’s role is very important in this process, because he/she has to think over the steps of PBL method realization, to create the plan and help students to design their project, to show the steps in realization of it, to teach how to monitor and evaluate the project. In addition teacher has to monitor and evaluate the result of student work. Checklist and rubrics can be useful for this goal. Through the PBL, students will learn to write projects, brainstorm ideas, research information on the problem and find solutions. These skills would be useful for educational process and for real-life situations, because it improves critical thinking skills, problem solving skills, creativity, and cooperative work.
Many examples of PBL method were provided through the course. They demonstrate the role of PBL method for students’ individuality. For instance, Yan Guo in the article “Project-based ESL Education: Promoting Language and Content Learning” writes that the project was organized in China and “Professors believed that project- based learning may “enhance students’ motivation” and “develop students’ ability to learn more independently and autonomously.” It tells that because of participating in PBL project, student will be more independent and learn to work individually without “requirements” of the teacher, but with facilitation by cooperation.
At this week, I get to know about Web Quests. Readings and Tutorials in Internet helped me to understand better that this is a part of PBL method that can be designed through zunal.com site and shown at Internet for learners and public. I was interested in creating the lesson on Web Quest that contains attached files, video on You Tube, and additional resources. I proposed lesson by different parts, such as Introduction, Task, Process, Evaluation, and a Conclusion. By following these steps I could consider all of the parts of the lesson and could include their new resources. It was difficult for the first time to design the lesson on Web Quest and publish it. I had several attempts, before I found information through Internet on publishing Web Quest and then completed the task.
I search and search again and learn so many new tools for teaching. It makes me feel more confident in my computer skills and so on… I added more useful URL from sites to my delicious page. Nonetheless, when I opened site http://www.educationworld.com/a_tech/archives/techlp.shtml , I understood that I still know nothing ( and I have to plan it for future studying!