With the end of the school fast approaching (only a month and a bit away for some!) many dedicated teachers like yourself are working endlessly trying to get things done by the end of the year. Time is going fly by and before you know it the end is already there! In the meantime, things are getting busy so we decided help you out with a checklist.
Formative Assessment Strategies for the End of School Year
1. Gather the evidence
There are several ways in which you can gather the evidence of learning and which can be used throughout the year as well. The approaches you choose depends ultimately on the type of evidence to be accumulated. Some methods you might already include:
- Saving and printing documents at various stages of completion;
- Asking students to log their decision making at key points in an activity;
- Using photographic evidence;
- Informal observation and;
- Structured observation.
2. Record the evidence
It is no use gathering the evidence unless you plan to record it too. Long-term tracking is important as it can be used to be transferred from class to class or school to school. They need to show the coverage of the overall ICT use and the progression initially planned. It should be important to you as a classroom teacher so that you will have a quick way of remembering which group of students have done which ICT activity.
3. Personalising student learning
The general capability – ICT capability – like the others, has been set up to help you understand the nature, scope and sequence of this general capability. As well as using it to plan for student’s development throughout the year in ICT capability, it is essential that you have determine their level of capabilities in ICT at the end of the year in accordance to the Learning Continuum.
4. Prepare information for other teachers
Your colleagues and you should all share the same perspective about teaching and developing student ICT capability. Otherwise, there is no point doing what you do. The information you share with other teachers, for example, the next year’s level of year 4, should be more than just the level description of the ICT capability Learning Continuum. It should contain information for example, if a student could use ICT to develop and present their work, ‘which media they had experience in doing this’, ‘was it with text as in a word processor, with text and graphics like a DTP program’, or ‘with an image manipulation program’?
5. Write meaningful reports for parents
Despite Victorian teachers just having the requirement to report on the progress of students in this general capability, it is still a very good exercise to do for the dedicated teacher. With parents these days expecting their children to use technology widely throughout their schooling career, it would be nice to discuss with them their capabilities in ICT. The best way of course is to not write using teacher terminology but phrased in a way which more meaningful to them. Use more information and forget about the level descriptions. Take care to make sure that undue pressure is placed upon them to purchase software or a computer for example.
Tips for Teachers at the end of Year
It is the end of the school year, and just about all teachers and educators can agree is hasn’t been school as usual. In fact, I think that many teachers at the end of the school year will breathe a sigh of relief.
So here are nine teaching strategies that you may feel appropriate to use during this end of the school year as we continue to struggle with Covid.
These ideas are not my own so I hope that these tips for teachers at the end of the years are beneficial to you all.
Number 1 Year-End Reflection for Students
I love this idea as I believe that we all have a lot to reflect on. You may have had the students writing a journal diary throughout the year already. Reflection is critical to lifelong learning and it is a great way to consolidate learning, process our feelings, and share about ourselves.
Number 2 Looking to the past and the future
Sounds a bit like reflection doesn’t it? This is apparently good for a distance learning environment. You can provide students with a final project and promote creativity.
Number 3 Turn to your students for guidance
What a great idea? Ask them to help you plan the content and activities. Collect their feedback and combine their ideas with open ended writing prompts to help students process and reflect on their distance learning experiences
For all teachers at the end of the year, 2020 will be quite different. It will be important to apply the right teaching strategies for primary school teachers throughout so that you will be ready to share the appropriate data with colleagues for them to effectively make plans for student progression in learning.
To learn more about these ideas for the end of the year click here.
Preparing for School Year
As the holidays come to an end, some teachers may be excited about the beginning of the school year. Others may dread it, but either way it is a good idea to ensure that you know how to prepare for the school year. Another academic year is just around the corner and your goals as a primary teacher should be clear and well thought out and planned.
So here are some great tips to help you understand how to prepare for the school year.
FOR TEACHERS
Set some goals
Technology integration should always be about developing student ICT capability. Set some clear goals for this to occur and try to set goals that you can realistically achieve. Consider what you can improve on from the previous year.
Think about ways to expand student ICT learning opportunities
As a teacher, the use of ICT can be incorporated in all key learning areas so search the curriculum.
FOR STUDENTS
To you know how to prepare for the school year, you could:
- Complete administrative tasks;
- Organise your study space;
- Plan a budget and save money.
