Comments

By robert, March 2, 2010 9:16 pm

I read the volume of anti-APP threads on the TES forums, I listen to the comments of my secondary colleagues and I speak to friends who teach in the primary phase.  On top of this I’ve checked out the growing software industry making APP tracking products and I’ve spoken to colleagues who are responsible for moving APP forward.

Yes APP arose from the need for consistent assessment data between schools and more importantly to fix the discrepancy between primary and secondary NC levels (I’ve yet to find a secondary teacher who uses primary science levels as a reliable baseline!).   Yes APP came from the National Strategies team but the bank of APP statements represent a very useful resource for AfL – after all what is the point in having accurate and reliable assessment data and doing nothing with it?

As a leader of APP practice within the authority I’ve given a lot of thought to the subject.  The points below summarise my thinking about APP

What APP is:

• An assessment system that allows for consistency between teachers, between schools and between key stages
• An opportunity for AfL linked to meaningful (sort of) criteria
• Customisable to suit the needs of you, your school and your learners.
• An opportunity to gather reliable formative assessment data for every learner

What APP isn’t:

• Statutory – no one can tell you what you MUST do
• Hours of trawling through students’ work and books
• Something that need increase our workload
• A tick-list of what a student has or hasn’t achieved (software companies take note)
• Just another type of summative assessment
• Perfect!

I teach in a special school where teacher assessment has been for norm for years.  APP is nothing new to us – we’ve been following a very similar process for years, finding new ways to make assessment work.  I know APP isn’t perfect, but it occurs to me that a lot of teachers seem to be getting into a flap about nothing – APP will be what you make it!

Click on the APP tag to read my other posts about APP

My opinions are based on my experiences of using the Science APP framework.  Whilst I’ve looked at APP materials for other subjects I haven’t used them with students.

Comments

By robert, February 17, 2010 3:59 pm

We’ve all seen PowerPoint used where students are asked to prepare a presentation on a topic.  More often than not this turns into a cut-and-paste-athon and students can’t always be said to be engaging with the content of the lesson.  There is also the time one spends playing with the fonts and animations (and I’ve seen adults guilty of some pretty bad presentations on this score too!).

I looked for some other ways that PowerPoint (and possibly its Open Office equivalent Impress) could be used as a teaching tool with students who have special needs or perform below national expectations.

Sequencing

Give students a presentation in which the slides are in the wrong order.  Tell them to put the steps in the right order and then give a presentation based on the new order.  It is a good idea to use pictures/slides in which the order is ambiguous or where there could be more than one correct answer.  For extremely weak students this could involve sequencing photographs from a previous lesson e.g. ones taken during an experiment.

Example: Year 7 students (Wikid Science – Forensics) are asked to solve the mystery and explain how the forensic investigator came to be in hospital covered in burns.  Students have to solve the mystery and put the slides in the right order.  They then present their ideas to the group where they receive peer assessment/feedback.

Audio (or video) annotation

Give students a presentation with information to be interpreted on each slide.  Pupils must record an audio or video clip for each slide with an explanation.  Play back to group, possibly with some peer assessment.  Can also be exported as a video clip.

Example: Year 7 students (Wikid Science – Extinction) are asked to interpret the graphs and say what they mean.

Completing presentations

Using a partially completed presentation you would ask students to complete it.  This could include adding suitable graphics to text already created (or vice versa) or adding existing information to a scaffold.

Example: In this writing frame I would ask students to add information to each slide from planning through to conclusions and present it.  Students can add extra information and peer assessment information about the content.  To differentiate the activity, add more detail to the scaffold (e.g. sub-steps).  Students then present to another group or the whole class.

Story telling

Ask students to prepare the narration and present to a pre-created presentation.  This is similar to adding narration but is simpler to organise and doesn’t require microphones.

Example: In this presentation on the water cycle (from the TES resources site) students have to explain what is happening and present to another group of pupils (or the whole group depending on numbers)

Multiple choice questions

Just as it sounds – using a presentation with a quiz, let pupils answer the questions individually at computers, or on the IWB in a group.  If you search Google you can find pre-created templates, or you could make your own.

Example: Multiple choice quiz on plant classification.  Plays a different sound for right and wrong answers.

I hope you found some of these ideas useful.  Please leave a comment below (or via the contact me form at the top of the page) if you did, or if you have any questions.

Comments

By robert, February 10, 2010 9:00 pm

Last year I co-wrote some BTEC resources.  They were a huge success – I’ve had emails from schools all over the country about them.   These images show the stats from the TES site and the follow through clicks to my resources site over the same period.

The popularity could have something to do with being the near the top of the Google search results for BTEC Applied Science resources.

Good news.  I’ve continued working with Wheldon School in Carlton, Nottingham.  Working together with Helen Cawthorne we’ve looked at the changes from September 2010 and written a biology module, complete with assignment briefs and a full set of resources.  As with other resources we have shared them with the hope of raising the bar in science teaching across many schools.  Please treat these resources as a work in progress – they haven’t been tested with students yet! (The module could also be used with current specs with some tinkering).

This is our interpretation of the changes and implications for schools.

Please leave feedback if you find these resources useful – hearing from others is a good motivator both for myself and the other teachers involved.

Click here for BTEC biology resources.

Comments

By robert, February 9, 2010 9:51 pm

Having taught almost three of the new format Wikid year 8 units I had to post an update on my progress with Wikid, and my thoughts about the scheme.

In terms of organisation the new year 8 modules are a huge leap forward.  Lessons are organised into folders by lesson which makes a huge amount of difference when it comes to locating resources and lesson plans.  The content of the lessons is much the same, although they aren’t as heavily dependent on the power points to make them work which is a relief because the novelty of showing presentations soon wore off, both with myself and the pupils! The new modules have supporting video from Teachers.tv (anyone can download these from the teachers.tv website) which the Wikid team have skilfully woven into their topics, helping maintain the theme that runs through each.

The structure of the topics and activities makes it easy to add APP criteria to an activity turning it into an APP assessment with the minimum of effort.  Hot off the press is their mapping grid which helps you see which topics relate to which strand of APP, proving the Wikid team are listening to customer requests).

All is not perfect with the Wikid scheme though, and it still requires some work to use it well, and many schools may not feel confident adopting it lock, stock and barrel. 

To improve the scheme I would like to see Wikid:

• Reduce the content in the scheme and flag lessons as core lessons and lessons that can be skipped
• Less detail on lesson plans – they take ages to read!
• Lesson plans in one place (ideally one document) so you can see the progression from lesson to lesson and how they flow together.
• More AfL linked to APP built into the scheme – and not the absolutely ghastly Apprend scheme they are flogging like a dead horse.
• More support for SEN and lower achieving pupils.  Many of the activities are too wordy or too complicated and require extensive adaptation.  Not all pupils achieve level 4 – yet this seems to be the starting point for many of the assessment activities.  (And remember that many of these pupils have poor literacy skills – expecting them to write more than a few words is not an option).
• Fewer resources to photocopy – and in black and white please.  I haven’t seen a school yet that colour photocopies or prints whole class sets of colour worksheets.
• Promote the Wiki that the whole scheme is named after and encourage participation by ALL teachers who deliver the course.  At the moment the Wiki is difficult to navigate and is further let down by the lack of participation.
• Remove the Upd8 forums since Wikid staff never bother to reply to questions in there anymore.  If it’s obsolete, take it down!

Would I recommend Wikid to others? Yes.  In fact I’ve had science teachers come from out of county and within county to see it in action.  Wikid science shows enormous potential, and most students are engaged and achieving well on the course.  Of course the scheme isn’t perfect – but show me a scheme that is!