- I remember my first parents’ evening. I was really nervous, even more when I had to talk about the report card. It was my first experience in leading a class and I thought the parents will not accept me as their children‘s teacher. The opposite happened! After this first parents‘ evening I reflected a lot about it. I wanted to know why it was a successful meeting. I think my evaluation plan was transparent from the beginning. I told them my method to have a mark in the report card at the end. Our school does the same. Every term we have eight marks (two speaking, two writing, two listening and two reading) . Here and there I have the pupils made some posters, presentations…Transparency to the children and parents is very important.
Unfortunately, there is no avoiding the irrational difficult parent! |
How are you collecting information?
Here is an example of a formal performance assessment. Each child read a book and had to WRITE a review (accuracy and range); READ it to us without notes (fluency); and comment on each other's presentations (LISTENING) by asking questions that showed they were listening.
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Vocabulary translation tests?
- Should NOT be used for report card information if they are to be used at all.
- They measure what learners might know (if that) but not what they can DO in a language.
- They test a child's knowledge of the local language of instruction (in our case, German). Thus a child might understand the English word but might simply not know the German word.
- They are not writing tests - writing tests measure accuracy, range and task fulfillment (among other criteria); vocab translation tests do not.
- If you are using them, are you teaching children memorization strategies?