1. Examining Student Work

2. Examining Student Work
Explore looking at student work as
a strategy for teacher learning.
Engage in examining student work.
Discuss implications for teacher learning.
Learn about protocols and facilitation.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

3. Why look at student work?
Reflect on evidence of student learning.
Reflect on intent of task.
Reflect with colleagues.
Reflect on evidence of effective teaching.
Increase teachers’ knowledge.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

4. Purposes for Looking at Student Work
Determine the nature and extent of student understanding.
Judge the quality of a task.
Determine the implications for instructional practice.
Clarify learning expectations.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

5. Looking at Student Work: Format
Identify the purpose, focus, or goal for looking at student work.
Select student work that relates directly to the goal and outcomes.
Engage in facilitated discussion of participants’ interpretations and understanding of the student work samples.
Reflect on the implications and applications of what is learned to teaching.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

6. An Example: Context Who: High school Algebra I teachers
What: Examined their students’ proficiency data
aggregated three-year trends
disaggregated by race, sub-skill areas, and item-level
analysis
Conclusions:
35% of students at or above proficiency
achievement gap between white and African American
17% of students proficient in TAKS Objective I: The student will describe functional relationships in a variety of ways.
greatest need in representing relationships among quantities using [concrete] models, tables, graphs, diagrams, verbal descriptions, equations, and inequalities.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

7. Next steps: Identify robust performance task that required students to show and explain their work.
The Algebra I teachers administered the task to their students and brought samples of student work to the next meeting.
Purpose: To determine the nature and extent of student understanding of using multiple representations to solve problems and making connections among the representations.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

8. Ground Rules for Looking at Student Work
Be in the spirit of dialogue.
Focus on the evidence, not what you think the student knows or can do.
Put your stake in the ground AND be ready to move it.
Be aware of personal biases.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

9. Looking at Student Work: Process
Complete the task yourself.
Determine the knowledge and skills required to complete the task successfully.
What was this task designed to assess?
Share and discuss your own solutions.
Review the TEKS and the criteria.
Does the task align with the TEKS and the selected criteria?
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

10. Mosaics problem from Algebra I Assessments (Dana Center, 2002)
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

11. Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

12. Criteria Selected for Mosaics Problem
Describes functional relationships
Uses multiple representations (such as tables, graphs, symbols, verbal descriptions, and/or concrete models) and makes connections among them.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

13. Group Share What are your solutions to the task?
What knowledge and skills do you need to complete the task?
Does the task assess what it is designed to assess (based on the two criteria selected)?
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

14. Looking at Student Work: Observation and Collaboration
Look at student work samples with a partner and discuss:
What skills, knowledge, and understandings do the students demonstrate?
What is the evidence?
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

15. Table Talk What are the patterns or trends across the samples?
What are the misunderstandings and understandings?
What implications for instruction and curriculum do these misunderstandings suggest?
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

16. Sample A student work from the Mosaics problem
(Taken from Practice-Based Professional Development: Algebra I Assessments
TEXTEAMS)
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

17. Sample B student work from the Mosaics problem
(Taken from Practice-Based Professional Development: Algebra I Assessments
TEXTEAMS)
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

18. Group Share
What teacher learning could result from this example of looking at student work?
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

19. Facilitation Protocol
Identify the purpose.
Provide information on the context of the task.
Participants “do” the task for their own understanding.
Share and discuss the task solutions.
Look at the student work in small groups.
What skills, knowledge, and understandings do the students demonstrate?
What is the evidence?
Share and discuss in large group.
Summarize learnings and questions.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

20. Facilitation Tips Take the time to do and discuss the task.
Stay focused on the evidence.
Separate observations from inferences.
Ensure time to discuss classroom implications.
Summarize learnings and questions.
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

21. Guidelines: Samples of Student Work
Several samples from different students
Samples from one student over time
Randomly selected
Representative of low-medium-high quality work
Representative of specific student misconception
The work represents a confusion or question for the teacher
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

22. Selecting Samples of Student Work
Problem: Teachers are often most comfortable sharing their best student work.
Solution: Provide guidelines.
2 samples that show that the student “gets it”
2 samples that show that the student does not “get it”
2 confusing samples
2 interesting or unusual samples
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

23. When to Examine Student Work
At weekly department meetings
During grade-level meetings
During ongoing study groups
In K-12 cross-grade group meetings
When selecting or implementing new curriculum
As part of a larger professional development effort
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

24. Information and Resources
“The Tuning Protocol: A Process for Reflection on Teacher and Student Work,” Coalition of Essential Schools
“Looking at Student Work” website
Algebra I Assessments and TEXTEAMS Practice-based Professional Development: Algebra I Assessments (Dana Center)
Algebra II Assessments and TEXTEAMS Practice-based Professional Development: Algebra II Assessments (Dana Center)
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work

25. Reflection
What teacher learning might result from this strategy for professional development?
How and when might you engage teachers in examining student work?
What structures or supports would need to be in place for this strategy to work in your context?
Ensuring Teacher Quality Leader's Resource Guide: Examining Student Work