Work Hard Play Hard

 Assessment

Over the past few weeks I have been slowly wrapping my brain around how assessment and evaluation are implemented across the system and how classes are coordinated. New students come into the school, take an electronic standardized test through the CASAS system, and the score places them in a course level. Most levels are available both day and night, so the students' availability will place them. 

Once students have been added to a class roster, barring any requests to the school staff, that is where they will attend, however changes are made as requested by the students. Throughout the semester the students are monitored closely by the teachers by daily informal assessments. Classes sart big and the teachers all admitted that the first few weeks are quite overwhelming, however after the first few weeks of any given semester, daily student attendence often drops down to 12 or less, which makes informal assessment much more feasible. Daily assignments are collected and given informal grading to store as record for the staff and university, however the real money maker for the school is the formal evaluation(quite literally, the classes are free to students, so the students must test in order to have the school recieve federal/state funding). Each semester 1-2 times students will be formally assessed by CASAS online testing for progress checks. Once a student has reached a particular score, they will be ready for the next level of class.

This is where the teachers often find it tricky: students don't want to leave the class they are in. To me, this is entirely understandable. I've been in formal lessons and tutoring sessions for Japanese and it does take a leap of faith to start working in a new setting or a new teacher. Generally students who work hard and progress accept their new assignment and continue on, but often times students will stop coming to class in that new semester and lose interest in the program. Other times students request to stay with the teacher they are most comfortable with and that is sometimes honored by the school. Most of the courses can be labeled as mixed level, and if a student is in the right score range, they can stay in the same class again. There is 1 student in the beginners class again. He was a VERY hardworking student (worked 10 hour days roofing, and almost never missed class at night). When the class restructured for the new semester, he actually had some hiccups with assignments, which is great in my opinion because no two classes operate the same and he will grow from it.

End of the day the primary struggle the classes face are attendance issues. When the students show up they improve, and when they don't they stagnate. It was almost 1 to 1, the students with the most attendence improved significantly and passed tests to either move up in classes or exited the program into an associates track at the college, or continued community English classes hosted by one of the teachers a couple times a week. I have to say it's a great community of educators that really care about the students and bend over backwards to help those who want to learn.

Class Dinner

This week we were able to go on a class field trip for the beginner students. We met up as a class and walked down the street to a local Italian restaurant. By this point in the semester (the last week) the students had grown accustomed to having me around and we all happily talked about our hobbies and work on the way. We showed up early before the evening rush, to try to eliminate any extra background noise that might make hearing the waiter difficult. 

We worked with students to study the menu and decide which foods they like from the selection, a lot of dishes they had never tried, so we made our recommendations based off what we worked on in class. We had done activities talking about our favorite foods etc. All students this day were Spanish L1, so they worked as a group to help each other and we just supervised and made our recommendations as were needed. Everyone practiced their orders with both teachers before we called over the waiter. Dinner went smoothly and everyone had a great time. Afterwards we all stopped back at the classroom to pass out cake and sing happy birthday for one of the students! The students request had been a pineapple tres leches cake, and it was delicious. It had been a good semester for them all and it was a great way to have the last class before breaking for a few weeks. 

Above is an example of CASAS standards for level 1 Listening skills. It covers the 4 skills of language learning similar to WIDA, just set up different, and without the CAN DO(tm) descriptors.