The Best Assessment Strategy to Increase Achievement in Biology
One of my favorite models for assessing students in Biology comes from my current district. Even throughout my Master’s Degree in Curriculum and Instruction, I have not seen a better method for assessing students and holding them to a high standard.
In the assessment model that we currently use in the Science department, we allow students to complete retakes on quizzes that consist of about one chapter/topic worth of content.
There are multiple versions of each quiz i.e. version a,b, and c which are all the same questions just ordered differently for quiz and exam security and authenticity purposes.
Note: Students have been known to take pictures of quizzes/tests and sell them to other students. Be vigilant. NO PHONE or DEVICES when a quiz/exam is being used.
In addition, there are re-quiz versions that are mostly different questions with the same content. If a student fails a quiz and wants to improve their grade they can. However, students must complete test corrections and tutoring one day and re-quiz the following day. (ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING)
Re-quiz Procedures:
- Students can only achieve up to 90% on a re-quiz.
- They can only re-quiz once.
- For me, re-quizzes are slightly more difficult because I want them to know their stuff if they are going to make me put time into regrading I want them to know their stuff. I let them know they are slightly more difficult.
- If they get a lower score they do not take the lower score but I mention that if it occurs more than once I may change that.
What can’t they redo?
After we cover a unit of study, usually 3 or 4 chapters/topics, we take a Unit Exam worth 3 times more than a quiz grade. These are NOT able to be retaken. This is where students demonstrate what they know. (ASSESSMENT OF LEARNING)
The Unit Exams offer me the ability to say confidently that the student knows their stuff if they get an A in my course which demonstrates mastery of the content.
This assessment model also holds them accountable for actually learning the content even if they do not do well on a particular topic.
A 2-3 day review/reteaching is done before the exam through labs and various activities such as Quizlet Live and Kahoot. Again, this is another opportunity for students to solidify their content knowledge or relearn areas they struggled in.
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Students have an opportunity to improve their learning and their grades.
- It is extremely helpful at parent conferences to mention that re-quizzes are available to the student.
- Increase the pass rate for the state assessments.
- Puts the pressure on the students to achieve and takes pressure off of the teacher if they do not.
Cons
- Not all students care enough to take advantage of it.
- Some students care too much about a single point to get to the 90% and you will have to regrade a whole quiz for one point!
- It requires a lot of work and time up-front to create multiple versions of high-quality assessments.
- It requires a lot of regrading = more time. However, I rewrote many quizzes to use Zipgrade and it has saved tons of time.
- Your school schedule may not easily accommodate time for tutoring and re-quizzes. We have a 30-minute study period built in.
What are your thoughts or strategies? Comment Below.
While you’re reteaching, what do you have the students who already made a 90 or higher work on? Or does the tutoring happen after school?
The reteaching in my current school takes place during a 30 minute period at the end of the day that is structured for reteaching and clubs/activities. If you do not have a time in your schedule it would occur after/ before school.
An extension that I use when a student wants to re-take an assignment, in addition to the steps above, is to compose an open-ended retake. This encourages kids to effectively internalize the material prior to re-attempting an assignment and it also forces the students to know the information prior to re-attempting the assignment.
Yes. I totally agree. My retakes include more open ended questions!
Why are they allowed to take re-takes?There are no redo’s in life or college. Are we not trying to show them how the “real” world works. This is the problem with people giving the students every opportunity to do “better”, in life you get one shot and need to live with the consequences. Also this teaches kids that they will get another chance so why bother the first time. No consequences for their actions.
I understand your perspective. However, the retakes for my classes are only for quizzes (assessments for learning). Student then have assessments of learning or summative assessments that students are not able to retake. This strategies teaches students how to improve and it doesnt come without a consequence. For teachers who want to increase achievement the reality is when you push atudents to a high level you get push back from a lot of people ( students, parents and possibly administration). Having this opportunity puts achievement 100% on the backs of the students with no excuses.
Because it’s not real life, its school and they’re children. Allowing retakes, shows them that working for something and not giving up/settling is worth it. We are not here to teach them about the cold, hard realities of life, we’re here to be empathetic, increase their confidence and foster inquisitiveness. Sometimes we’re the support they don’t have at home.
Really? When my son failed his driver’s test he wasn’t told he would never get to drive for the rest of his life. In fact he could take it over and over until he passed. So yes there are redo’s in life and that is just one example. What’s the point of education if you aren’t allowed to continue learning?? This is a pretty narrow view point – in my education philosophy redoing work is real world and it is a consequence… if you do not understand or you make mistakes you don’t get to just accept failure – you are recquired to continue working.
Not all students are intrinsically motivated. This is also something to teach. Help students build a growth mindset so that when they get to the “real world” they can recover and move forward despite failure. What is described above involves consequence and a path to grow in.
This is what I have always done. If I am goigg n to do the work of writing you a whole new test, you are going to have to do some work to earn that right. Many teachers offer “test corrections” for up to 80%. I don’t think that’s fair or useful. A student should have the opportunity to study and earn 100%, and if they were just guessing, guessing another answer doesn’t show me anything besides the fact that they know how to narrow down their options. Eventually they’d get the right answer even if they’d never been taught anything.
I like the idea of getting up to a hundred percent however, it is unfair to those who got a higher score the first time and are competing for class rank. In my current school the higher performing students would quickly point that out.
I allow them to do test corrections. This way they have to demonstrate their learning in a writing. 1) Write out the question, 2) Write out the correct answer, **3) EXPLAIN WHY this is the correct answer and all the others are wrong. This is where I can determine if they know the material. 4) Fill out a Post-test Autopsy (Meta-cognition form). If everything is satisfactory, I give half the points back. This applies to all students who achieved less than 100%. Students win with a higher grade, I win in that I can read their essays demonstrating their knowledge. This is not automatic and if the student just writes non-sense, the test correction is not accepted. They also work on their writing skills — Bonus! 🙂