Evaluate 3.1.2 – Self-Reflection on Teaching Abilities Quest

As a child I was much more of an extrovert, but as I reached young adulthood, I slowly crept into my shell and began to learn how to reflect. I learned to close my mouth and think about things. Before I knew it, I was a total introvert. I must admit that this transition did seem to help me as I received my graduate degrees in education. By the time I reached my Specialist Degree, I could self-reflect on self-reflection while self-reflecting!

Now that TKES has taken over observations in Georgia, self-reflection plays a part in the teacher evaluation. This information is stored in the TLE platform, and is available to be viewed any time. I like being able to go back and view what I said at the beginning of the year and comparing it to how I feel now.

Evaluate 3.1.1 – Differentiation Quest

The student data sample that I am providing is a small screenshot of my actual grade book. I have only provided the past week's assignments for a very small amount of students, not including their names  to comply with FERPA. However, this quest is extremely easy for me, because I am differentiating for them in the exact way that I am going to describe. Here is the data:

The assignments were a bonding classwork activity, an atom model project that counted as an exam grade, a counting atoms classwork activity, and a periodic table test that counted as an exam grade. The two students at the top have a current average in the 90s and seem to be doing well. I will continue to work with them in the same way. However student #3 and student #5 have dropped to a C, with student #4 only one point away. These students need differentiation and intervention before they slip through the cracks.

My plan is to group them by ability. I will put these three students at a group together so I can make sure to work more closely with them at the same time. Their test grades were very low, so we will spend more time preparing for tests and covering the vocabulary.

Evaluate 2.1.2 – Rubrics and Competencies Quest

To create the competency that I chose, I simply took the state standard for Energy Transformations and reworked it into a writing prompt. The writing prompt includes each element of the standard. To create a rubric for this writing prompt, I would make sure each element of the standard was a required part of the essay. Below is a screenshot of my competency. 

Evaluate 2.1.1 – Data Driven Instruction, Analytics, Reporting Tools Quest

I truly appreciate this quest. I have been very curious as to how Georgia Virtual School provides teachers with ways to manage the class and view how students are progressing through the course material. As the charts show in the quest, teachers are provided with ample ways of viewing student participation in the online platform and how often they are logging in to the site. I love being able to view the number of times a student logs in to the course work and being able to see the number of assignments that are complete. The LMS seems to provide teachers with exactly the tools they need to help students be successful in the online classroom. As we have stated several times, data and feedback are some of the most important aspects of education. Providing feedback and teaching students to monitor their own learning is paramount to success.

Additionally, teachers of online students must keep a contact log. I always keep a contact log in my classroom for every time I make contact with parents whether it's for a positive or negative contact. I like the way the communication log in the quest includes the type of contact, the person contacted, the nature of the contact, the time stamp, and a place for a comment.

As far as things that the teacher could have done differently in the hypothetical course, I can't help but think that the students may have been struggling to complete the assignments due to trying to learn the online platform. The coursework was taken in the Fall semester of 2012, but according to their enrollment information, they did not take an orientation until the Spring semester of 2013. It is possible that they simply did not know how to find the required assignments and information.

Evaluate 1.1.3 – The Summative Assessment Quest

Here is the link to a Quizlet test that I have created for the Forms of Energy. My students get one chance at the questions and must submit the test to me. Since the forms of energy are mainly vocabulary and do not include the transformations, this test only has matching and multiple choice. I was sure to include distractors in the multiple choice questions. If a student does not know the different forms of energy very well, then he or she will not do well on this summative assessment.

Evaluate 1.1.2 – Quality Feedback Quest

Every year, during my waves unit, I give my students a RAFT writing activity. They are given several roles, audiences, formats, and topics to choose from, and they must write. The example I am giving was written by a student who took on the role of a sound wave who chose to write a love letter to a cave wall. See below for the comments that I gave to this student.

Evaluate 1.1.1 – Formative Assessment Quest

I love formative assessments. Without them, I would never know if my students were "getting" what I was trying to teach. I am continually giving them BrainPop quizzes, tickets out the door, Zondle assessments, OAS assignments, etc. Here is the link to a Zondle formative assessment that I created for my Physical Science class on Properties of Matter. To get my classes loaded into Zondle, I simply sent them a link in an email, my students created their username and password, and they joined my class. I can now assign them assessments, and the program grades it and records the student's statistics in my grade book.