Mod 7 Discussion: Data Action

Reviewing student data is the most important part of my research process as far as meeting the educational needs of my students because the data drives everything. As a practical goal, I strive to make sure every student is proficient in ELA; this is in fact the goal of our ELA department as well. The focus om a practical level is on student growth, so students take a district Benchmark assessment in the Fall, and Interim assessment in the Middle of the year, and a final assessment at the end of the school year. The initial benchmark assessment is essentially formative in nature as it allows us to see where the knowledge/performance gaps are and build our instructions outward based on this data. This way we can embed our overall goals (i.e. Bridging the gaps relative to the benchmarks; or simply improving performance) into our lessons and various formative and in-class assessments (portfolio of student work, group worksheets, etc.) throughout the first half of the year. Because we embed the benchmark goals into lessons and units, we make them relevant to the overall goal of bridging the gaps or improving performance.