Most states have put in place curriculum standards and state-developed assessments to monitor the implementation of those standards. Most state standards define expected outcomes, that is, what students need to know and be able to do, but do not mandate specific strategies or pedagogy used by local districts. As researchers Paul Black and Dylan William (1998) note, standards are raised only by changing what happens in the classroom, beginning with teachers and students. This Digest describes a program used by two educators to help teachers improve instruction through a deeper understanding of state standards and test specifications.
The New Jersey Standards include macro, or big picture, statements and cumulative progress indicators that provide details about general performance expectations. The standards include knowledge specifications, which describe the specific processes and content that all students must know by the end of fourth grade (also known as content standards) as well as problem-solving specifications, which describe what students should be able to do with the content knowledge (also known as process standards). The following example is excerpted from the 4th grade New Jersey mathematics standards and test specification manuals.
Macro Standard 4.1: All students will develop the ability to pose and solve mathematical problems in mathematics, other disciplines, and everyday experiences.
Cumulative Progress Indicator 4.1.2: Recognize, formulate, and solve problems arising from mathematical situations and everyday experiences. Test Specification Manual - Cluster IV Discrete Mathematics: Knowledge (content standards): Students should have a conceptual understanding of: Tree diagram
Problem Solving (process standards): In problem solving settings, students should be able to: Draw and interpret networks and tree diagrams
After reviewing the entire body of standards and test specifications for fourth-grade mathematics in New Jersey, a teacher would be able to identify seven distinct mathematics strands or dimensions: Numeration and Number Theory, Whole Number Operations, Fractions and Decimals, Measurement/Time/Money, Geometry, Probability/ Statistics, and Pre-algebra. The test specifications for that exam imply that the mathematics test questions are primarily composed of problem-solving tasks. Therefore, it is safe to assume that test questions will require thinking in the application, analysis, and perhaps synthesis and evaluation levels of cognition.
Once teachers and administrators specify all of the subject area dimensions, the following activities can begin:
* Selecting and designing classroom assessments and practice questions.
* Revising and designing curriculum that is congruent with the content identified in the state standards and the district's delineation of the state-designed exams
* Designing teacher training using instructional techniques that support these dimensions.
Using and understanding the test specifications become even more important at this stage. Returning to the example above, a teacher seeking to ensure that students would be able to understand tree diagrams and solve problems using them would complete several alignment tasks:
1. Review classroom resources, curriculum, textbooks, teacher activities, student thinking strategies, and tests to ensure that the test specifications and macro standards are addressed on the knowledge and problem solving level. Do the teacher resource materials and classroom instruction address the proper skills?
2. Review the above factors to ensure congruency between the level o difficulty required by the standards and specifications, and the difficulty of the actual teacher resources and activities. Do the teacher's tests, lessons, and activities match the difficulty level required by the standards and specifications?
3. Consider format. Although less important than skills and difficulty, the teacher resources, activities, and tests should familiarize the students with state test question formats. Teachers must align classroom assignments and activities to the subject area delineation to ensure congruency.
Figure 1. Represents the sequence of events leading up to Calibration.
Delineation
1. Teacher performs content area delineation and chooses a unit of focus. In this case Standard 4.1, Cluster IV-Discreet Mathematics-tree diagrams
Alignment
2. Teacher examines a compares classroom resources, local curriculum, activities, skills level of difficulty, format, and tests to the Standards and test specifications to ensure congruency.
Instruction
3. Teacher uses and implements calibrated activities, tasks, resources and lessons.
Calibration
4. Teacher designs lessons and activities, gathers resources, and creates tests that are congruent with the skills and level of difficulty for the Standards, test specifications and curriculum.
Figure 1. Delineation, Alignment, and Calibration Flow of Events
Matt has four channels on his television. He has channels 2,3,4 and 5. If Matt watches only two channels each night, haw many different combinations of channels can he watch? Show all your work, and explain your answer. Matt can watch (2,3), (2,4), (2,5) or (3,2), (3,4), (3,5) etc.
A 4th grade teacher completing delineation and alignment and discovering that her/his program was missing a unit on discrete mathematics would develop objectives related to understanding, using, and interpreting tree diagrams. Figure 2 is a sample activity/test question created by 4th grade teacher Terry Maher to begin addressing the aspect of discrete math noted in the Cluster IV test specification.
Calibration is any action that helps teachers design activities and construct assessments based on the dimensions of state assessments and standards. This process helps to foster a collective understanding and agreement of the dimensions and domains of each content area. It should be a team effort based on group inquiry.
To begin the prediction process, the teacher uses a list of the students taking the test. Beside each name, the teacher enters a predicted score level. When the state assessment scores arrive, the teacher can compute the level of accuracy as shown below.
Name Prediction Score
Allan Proficient Adv. Proficient
Ann Proficient Proficient
Tamika Adv. Proficient Proficient
Bronson Partial Proficient Partial Proficient
The list above shows a 50% level of success in the predictions made.
The teacher making the predictions returns to each student's work and compares the successful predictions with the unsuccessful ones to gain a better idea of how the assessment performances reflect the aligned student work. Student work associated with actual test scores can form the basis for subsequent calibration discussions. Student work connected to state assessment score levels can also function as scoring examples that students refer to when judging their own work.
Delineation, alignment, and calibration are academic endeavors that demand unending commitment. Do not expect to accomplish alignment or calibration at an in-service day, or even during the course of a school year. The administration must provide the time and resources to conduct frequent calibration meetings to examine such things as classroom work and student assessment samples. Beware, it is easy to fall out of alignment and calibration and into test prep.
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This publication was prepared with funding from the Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education, under contract ED99CO0032. The opinions expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect the positions of policies of OERI or the U.S. Department of Education. Permission is granted to copy and distribute this ERIC/AE Digest.
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