During a collegial review today, we had a question
regarding an assessment task and verifying evidence for a social studied
AGLI.
1. Grade 5 Social Studies AGLI 33108: recognize the Pledge of Allegiance
or The Star Spangled Banner
The teacher wrote the following original task: "Student will identify
the Pledge of Allegiance among other written texts." She then provided
the student with a worksheet that had 6 historical quotes written in 6
separate boxes, one of which was the Pledge, and asked the student to
circle the box that contained the Pledge of Allegiance.
My question is this:
Is it considered a prompt that the directions include the words Pledge
of Allegiance, which can then be matched to identify the correct box,
since only one of the boxes start with the phrase "I pledge
allegiance...". I hope this question makes sense. I just want to ensure
that it will not be considered prompting the student.
RESPONSE: WE CAN SEE HOW THIS COULD CAUSE CONFUSION AND DISCUSSION FROM A SCORING PERSPECTIVE. HOWEVER, THE ONLY OTHER WAY WE CAN SEE TO CONDUCT THE TASK WOULD BE FOR THE TEACHER TO PROVIDE THE DIRECTION VERBALLY. IN FACT THE WORDING OF THE TITLE “THE PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE” AND THE INTRODUCTION OF THE ACTUAL PLEDGE “I PLEDGE ALLEGIANCE, TO THE…” ARE NTO EXACTLY THE SAME. THE STUDENT WOULD STILL NEED TO RECOGNOIZE THE PLEDGE AS THE PLEDGE.
2. My second question is more general. Is it acceptable to use an
identical worksheet for both pieces of verifying evidence? The worksheet
is appropriate and links to the task (which links to the AGLI), but I
was not certain if it will be acceptable to use the very same worksheet
to provide two samples of student work.
RESPONSE: YES, IT IS ACCEPTABLE. MANY TIMES REPETITION IS GOOD FOR STUDENTS WITH SIGNIFICANT COGNITIVE DISABILITIES AND HELPS REINFORCE THEIR KNOWLEDGE, SKILLS AND UNDERSTANDINGS. THEIR TEACHER SHOULD MAKE THIS DETERMINATION BASED ON THEIR EXPERIENCE WITH THE STUDENT. BEST PRACTICE IS ALWAYS TO PROVIDE THE MOST VARIED AND RICH INSTRUCTIONAL OPPORTUNITIES AS POSSIBLE.
Thank you for your attention to this matter. I appreciate your time.
