Top Tech Tools for Assessment and Evaluation

Elizabeth Beste

Aurora University EDU 6210

July 8, 2015

Gonzales, L., Vodicka, D., & Young, C. (2014). Top tech tools for assessment and evaluation. Leadership, 43(4), 22-25. Retrieved July 8, 2015.

Top Tech Tools for Assessment and Evaluation

Summary

In this article, three members of the Association of California School Administrators examine fourteen technology tools that can be used for evaluation and assessment. These tools were picked because they were free, easily accessible, and relatively easy to use. Since the implementation of the CCSS, the authors felt that they needed to address shifts in education. According to the authors, administrators are now taking on the role of instructional leader, while teachers are moving to facilitating and away from strictly delivering content. Students are becoming more responsible for their own learning. So, these tools have been picked for administrators to use to support classroom teachers. They especially wanted to use tools that didn’t need a lot of time investment from the teacher.

Main Points - Teacher Evaluation – Sites with Teacher resources.

The first tool introduced was teachingchannel.com. This was considered the favorite new website because it provides teachers with a wide variety of videos linked to discussion boards that are led by teachers. The videos demonstrate effective teaching in action on focused topics. Teachers can tag videos for sharing. This website is free, but requires teachers to set up accounts and there are additional paid services available.

Learnzillion.com is a website of instructional resources for teachers, parents, and students, created by teachers. Lessons, and lesson ideas, as well as resources are available online. A lesson might include the plan, standards, slides for training, a video of the lesson in action, materials or handouts, and assessments.

The next tool is Kathy Schrock’s Guide to Everything (http://www.schrockguide.net/assessment-and-rubrics.html).* As a top educational technologist, Kathy provides teachers with rubrics for assessment, as well as resources on a wide variety of technology or web tools, Common Core areas, and project based rubrics.  Additionally there are graphic organizers and report card comment suggestions. These are tools so teachers don’t need to invest their time creating these from scratch.

Technology Integration Matrix (fcit.usf.edu/matrix) is a website that offers examples of teachers using technology at 5 levels from entry level to transformational. This allows teachers to find videos and resources at their own comfort level. There are also evaluation tools so teachers can create technology assessments.

The next tool was the Orange County Department of Education Site (ocde.us/commoncoreCA/pages/default.aspx).  This site was included because it provided a very easy to navigate common core site. Included are professional development tools, lesson templates, and parent resources.

Livebinders (livebinders.com) is a social bookmarking site. It contains binders of information on any number of topics and the user can also create their own. Each binder contains lessons, links, resources, videos, online handouts, and more. Any resource that can be found online is connected in this binder.

Main Points – Student Assessment – Sites used for assessing students or instant feedback.

Socrative (socrative.com) is a student response system that can be used from computers or hand held devices. Teachers can load questions or polls and students can respond in short answers or quizzes. Teachers can use this type of assessment to immediately adjust instruction to fit students’ needs.

Another tool that was mentioned was infographics. Infographics are easily designed visuals that can be used to present or share information and data. The term infographics refers to the format, not a particular website. The authors recommended 4 websites, but only two Easel.ly and Glogster are still free or low cost and geared toward education. The other two are now high cost and geared toward business or professionals.

Myon.com is a paid subscription that provides online leveled texts from any device. There are quizzes after each story to provide assessment. Teachers can monitor and track progress. This is geared to elementary students but could be used with older students depending on their reading level.

Scholastic Math Inventory (http://www.scholastic.com/education/assessment/mathematics/smi-index.htm) provides mathematics progress monitoring. This is a computer adaptive tool that is aligned with the CCSS. It is paid, but the authors feel it fills a needed gap and is very important for RtI.

Main Points – Leadership Tools – Geared toward organization and data driven improvements.

Data-Driven decision making as well as other valuable content can be found on cosn.org, the website for the Consortium for School Networking. This site offers resources and tools that focus on using technology to grow learning environments. The authors especially liked the area on how to develop data-driven culture within the school.

Pearson Assessments for a Changing Landscape (http://paframework.csprojecthub.com/?page=home) hosts many different assessment types on their website. There is information for those trying to understand the different types of assessment. Additionally, there are digital resources and video tutorials.

Tableau Public (tableausoftware.com/public) is a free too that allows the user to create visuals such as charts, maps, or graphs from different types of data sources. The authors suggest that this would be useful for parents and community members, as well as students, when trying to help them understand complex information. It is only available for use on PC.

Recommendations

The authors point out that if the reader finds one new resource that they can use then progress has been made. They ask the readers to look at at least one resource from the lens of the teacher. They also remind the readers that they need to work with networks to make sure the sites are accessible and that new applications emerge quickly and that these resources are likely to change.

Reflection/Application

It was interesting to look at these tools from the view of administration and how their perspective is different than ours.  I especially found this true on the cosn.org site. It is geared toward technology experts at the district level. There was information about instructional focus and infrastructure that I don’t always get to look at. I think the article as a whole really reminded me to look at tools from everyone’s perspective.

There were many different tools that I might try in the near future. I really liked LiveBinders and I think it might be one that I like better than a few of the social bookmarking sites we looked at in class today. I have previous experience with Myon and really found it to be a great program to use with students.

*Note: as of today, all the tools or websites I have mentioned are current and functional. I have updated Kathy Schrock’s to the newest link. One feature of Google was also listed, but this feature is no longer available.