Assessment
Assessment is one of the most
important tools a teacher has to use when preparing lessons for their class. In
order for a teacher to teach effectively in ways that will be meaningful to
their students they should base all instruction from assessment. Assessment
should also be ongoing with multiple ways for teachers to look at their
students and determine their strengths and weaknesses. Teachers also need to
ensure that assessment measures are culturally and linguistically relevant to
their students.
To begin this unit it will be very
helpful if the first lesson you have with the class, is a KW to find what your
students already know about the history of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter
Day Saints, and what it is they would want to learn more about. There is so
much material teachers need to cover that there is no reason to teach things
your students already know, so doing this KW can prove very helpful to
teachers. Also students are naturally curious and they want to learn, so if we
give them a chance to voice what it is they would want to learn about, and then
do our best to teach this, we will find students are more interested and
motivated to learn. Once teachers have this information they can use it to more
explicitly teach their lessons according to the needs and desires of their
students. Teachers can also expand on this and use it as an assessment tool by
making a KWL chart where students add what it is they have learned from the
lessons or unit. To use this as more individual assessment teachers could have
each student make his or her own KWL chart and then they can add to it as they
go and you can see the progression they have made.
For this unit the journal entries the students
will be making each day serve as an ongoing assessment of the information being
used. The teacher can assign the students to make different journal entries
relating to different topics covered in class and then read the entries to
assess the student’s knowledge. There may be some students who have difficultly
writing either with the actual action of writing, or with organization or some
other aspect of writing. Teachers need to be aware of this and could teach mini
lessons about different aspects of writing some students are struggling with.
Also if you have a student who has a hard time doing the actual writing you
could have them make the journal entries on a computer using a word processor.
Also throughout the unit the students will be doing various art projects to
show different aspects of the history they are learning. Teachers can look at
the art work and hold individual conferences with students so they have the
opportunity to talk about their artwork and what it means to them. The students
will also be working on a big group project, researching another people who
have been persecuted, comparing and contrasting it to the persecution the
members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints received before
moving to