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this the standard that scares me the most - being able to troubleshoot technology issues will be tough for me

My goal is to make expectations for behavior and the consequences if not followed - very clear at the outset of the course.

This is just good sense. We do this in the traditional classrooms, so it definitely needs to be WELL defined in an online classroom.

Since I'm currently working on blending my classroom, I definitely don't do this as explicitly online as I have been doing in our face to face environment. It's definitely something I need to build into the online component.

My District is pushing teachers to be very explicit about this! Has anyone heard of the 5D model? The first dimension is all about naming and explaining the learning that will be taking place. We also need to mention it as we teach and at the end of the class. I know I can do better with this.

Not only do we need to identify and communicate the outcomes and expectations at the beginning of the course, they need to be restated throughout the course.

Probably my #1 when it comes to importance. People think they are the same. They couldn't be more different.

I am still trying to find the balance between what I move online and what I am doing face-to-face and how to inform all of the stakeholders involved. I think that understanding the differences are essential to meet all of the needs of my students.

One of the reasons driving online learning is that it is more personalized to meet the needs of the students.

However, it will be up to the individual to let the instructor know of difficulties that are being experienced. Communication is a key component of a successful online learning experience - including both the instructor and the student for success.

Modeling best practices for all students, whether they are face-to-face or traditional, really needs to be a priority. Online students will likely have more digital citizenship opportunities than many other students. Teaching them and modeling compliance with the policies is crucial.

Patterns in lesson sequencing is very important so students are comfortable with the familiar format.

This is very important because I could see assessment types getting repetitive with online learning. I imagine it would take some creativity to continually rethink assessment for the online paradigm.

Multiple assessments is important so participants have a variety of ways to show their understanding. However, I think you can have TOO many different formats which can add stress to students.

This is critical! Since your students may never see you face-to-face, they must feel that you are there to help them and are accessible in a reasonable amount of time.

Yes, it can also be the most demanding one. With students doing things at various times of the day, you would have to communicate your "office hours" otherwise you might find yourself always having to be available.

In my experience, online tools make it so much easier to provide feedback to students. This feels even more important in the online environment where regular, in person check ins may not exist.

I agree. I feel like feedback is much more a focus with online tools. It IS the interaction. In face-to-face, we have a lot of interaction with students that isn't specific or personalized feedback but in an online setting, that changes.

The word "timely" sticks out to me here. If students are working somewhat at their own pace, it is important for feedback to be given fairly quickly so that any misconceptions can be addressed right away.

Timely feedback is very important as students want to know how they are doing and cannot 'approach' you physically to ask. Constructive feedback also helps students adjust their work accordingly.

This is something that I plan to do now that I am implementing Moodle in my courses. It would be interesting to conduct an online learning survey for students before and after having them learn using Moodle rather than Google Classroom.

If I am not knowledgeable to use the system, I will not be able to effectively lead students in their learning. Also it would be important to use more than one avenue to be the most effective.

I'm constantly looking for feedback, although I feel my students are afraid to be honest with me, even when I assure them it is anonymous and nothing punitive will happen. I've tried Google forms and set them up so they do not collect email addresses, stepping out into the hall and having students leave sticky notes on the board...

I believe this will be essential so that I can help my students navigate between everything they need in the course. I often find myself double and triple-checking things in my Moodle course to make sure students can access them and everything runs according to plan. It definitely requires patience as well when assisting students with the technology.

I think this key and sometimes the hardest part. For many students, this new territory for them. There is so much to learn about taking an online class, that it can be overwhelming.

Everything stood in this standard stood out to me as critical. It aligns logically with my schools move toward standards referenced grading.

This seems so critical in the online environment! Written text can be misinterpreted so easily, especially when the reader doesn't actually know the writer in person. Extra time and care will need to go into communication. Additionally, recorded videos could be a helpful tool to add a human element to online coursework.

Technology is fast paced and keeping current is essential to the profession. Professional development in the district needs to address the current technology needs of teachers.

As a PBIS coach in my district this resonates with me. "Pre-correct" or remind students of the expected behavior EVERY time- in other words, prior to each course, even if they have taken 3 courses prior.

This is so crucial in making sure that we impact ALL learners equally.

This one is interesting because I feel like when done online it can be tricky due to the fact that it's harder to get that instant feedback from students.

This one really pushes us to think "is this meaningful? Does it reach my goals? Does it feel like it is worth the valuable time of the learner?"

A very powerful one. When we don't feel futuristic to learners we begin to feel irrelevant. We have to work hard to stay two steps ahead.

I think this is very important. I have been guilty of grabbing something from the internet then realizing this wasn't the best for my students. What kind of PD is available for this? What OER is available that is aligned with Iowa Standards?

This is an interesting indicator because teacher often resort to shutting technology down for students who use it inappropriately. More learning would be needed to help teacher use these as teaching moments.

The purpose is so important! I feel like sometimes we test just to test...and then send the results off to someone else. The kids need to understand the purpose as internal motivation is not always there.

So important! I think about myself and the hoops we need to jump through in our lives without understanding the purpose. That purpose definitely leads to motivation.

The purpose has to be tied to helping the students discover information about himself. How to improve? What has been learned? Then move forward.

All teachers know that they have choice in the types of assessments to give students but I wonder if we all really think through what type we are giving every time. Do we just give what we did last year? Do we give what is easiest? The fastest to grade? Things to think about...

Feedback can be challenging as we all know. I tend to get frustrated when I have taken the time to provide detailed feedback and the students could care less about it, they just want to know a grade and move on.

so true...

This would go along with students taking ownership for their own learning....we would WANT them to want to know where they are at for individual purposes!

Most of my formative assessments have been multiple choice or short answer quizzes. After learning more about rubrics, I would like to start using rubrics in two ways for formative assessments. One the students will do a self assessment on where they feel they are at. Then a teacher to student-conference with the rubric to see where they are at. With the end goal of making the assessment portion less stressful for my students, because they know where they are at.

^^^ Love this idea! I hope I can get there also with some projects!

I was thinking the same thing about rubrics that you wrote here. Students would hopefully see themselves moving on the rubric as they improve their skills /learn. This should be motivating and students would know exactly what is expected.

which leads to frustration...

Although I would say this is definitely still true in the courses we teach (we still emphasize bigger, summative assessments), I think we have changed how we view student progress. Our summative assessments aren't all tests, some of them are projects or performance assessments. Those assessments are also no longer considered "one-and-done" opportunities. Students can retake assessments or make corrections, etc. to show progress in their learning even if they didn't get it right the first time. It's less focused on the final grade and instead, assessing what students have learned.

This is great. However, when juxtaposed with having 200 students like I do, it is not always feasible to have numerous projects and reassessments. How do we change the change the way that teachers spend their day so this is possible?

I find this distinction between summative and formative assessment interesting. In our freshman group of teachers, we have a category for both formative and summative assessment. Formative is weighted at 20% and summative is weighted at 80%. So although in my courses we were taught not to grade formatives, we still assign a score to it and put it into the gradebook. Also, if formatives weren't graded, I wonder how much of them would actually be completed by students?

This has been a goal of mine this year, to use formative assessments to help make instructional decisions in my class. It has been a work in progress, but I have seen some success. I use the information from the formative assessment to decide is it a small group that needs reteaching or is it an entire class that needs reteaching. I don't normally grade my formative assessments, but I go give them completion points. For the most part if a student sees they are not getting something, they appreciate the reteaching opportunity.

Too often I see teachers not fully use the formative assessment data they have to intentionally inform instruction. If done properly formative assessment is very powerful. I also like the idea of giving participation points for formative assessments.

Some teachers give 0% for formative assessments at my school. The Science department has figured out a way to have labs count as a way to assess a standard. I think practice is important and should have some weight.

My school has increased its emphasis on learning targets this year. We are all using a 5D+ template to write unit plans and the learning targets are similarly broken down into knowledge targets, academic targets (transferable skills), and performance targets. I think that writing unit plans and sitting down and thinking about the individual types of targets has really strengthened the types of instruction teachers are carrying out in their classrooms. They are more familiar with the targets they want students to meet, and in turn, students are also more familiar with what's expected of them.

I like the specific targets here. I guess I have been generalizing them for awhile. My plans would be better defined for myself and students if I focused on them more.

Our middle school is beginning this work as well. We are trying to get a system wide learning plan template developed and going. Our goal is to help all teachers fully understand their learning targets and how they relate to student understanding. I know that all teachers look at them, but I'm not sure how many break them down to fully understand them and what students outcomes should be.

I also do this on other assessment types such as short answer. I've gotten into the habit of bolding things that I want to make sure students don't forget to do. For example, they may be required to answer a question but then they need to follow that with explanation or justification. I often bold the second half so that they don't forget to include the explanation, which often highlights their thinking, which can be more important than the first half of the answer.

I do this too. I find this is very helpful for kids. Sometimes in rubrics when going through them, I'll have kids underline or circle key words instead just to force their attention a bit. It does help.

It is SO important that our feedback is more than a score or letter grade if we want to emphasize progress and the ability to improve for our students.

Agreed! And if the targets are clear and communicated to students, they should know what steps they need to take to grow! It shouldn't be a mystery!

"Do the results provide clear direction for what to do next?"

I see some teachers more hopeful that ISASP, with its better alignment to state standards, will be a truer indicator of success. Other teachers, however, are still so jaded toward standardized testing.

Good point! ISASP should be a better indicator of student achievement.Some of the best indicators are teacher formative and summative tests. These are still the most useful for teachers.

This is a helpful breakdown of learning targets for me. In a core discipline area like history, it's easy to forget about performance skill and product targets. But there are definitely areas where these type of learning targets are present, and knowing those areas can help me decide how best to assess.

Easy to forget about bias! So many other things take our time and attention when we write tests, that it's easy to forget about spelling, formatting mistakes, and other unintentional things that give students a clue as to the right answer in ways that don't truly test mastery of content.

One of our school's frustrations with the new ISASP format is that no itemization or further guidance is provided at the building/district level as to how our students performed on specific components of the test. Perhaps this will change, or maybe we're missing it, but it's difficult to program evaluate without this breakdown.

I think this is an important thing to think about. How often do we really use assessments to make changes in our instruction. When I was a student I was thankful for tests. I could cram the material into my head and once the test was over, I could forget it and move on; clearing the way for new information. As a teacher, I realize that isn't the intent, but I wonder how often we still get caught up the type of thinking. Are we assessing so we feel better about moving on or are we assessing so we can make course corrections to support student learning and understanding?

This reminds me of self-reported grading. Hattie says self-reported grading has an effect size of 1.33 but it seems that it is rare for teachers to actually use it.

This article focused solely on formal assessment, but I also think it is important to discuss the role and value of informal assessment opportunities and how powerful immediate feedback based on informal assessment can be in a F2F setting.

One of the easiest ways to ensure that students respond to feedback is to design opportunities that require them to engage with the feedback and do something with the feedback, but this is frequently dismissed due to the quantity of standards and learning required of students at each grade level. Many teachers feel like they need to prioritize "covering" all the standards over students truly engaging in their learning.

This is detrimental to English Learners-Kanost

Using data from multiple assessments can help determine where exactly a student is at in their learning. Kanost

This can really hurt our students with that lack background knowledge obtained in white, christian, middle class society. Kanost

It is especially important that students know what the intended learning is! Unfortunately, too many students think grades are given to them by their teacher instead of earned by their work. When they don't know what is being assessed, this adds to that narrative.

This is where it is important to have a clear rubric with student language. Students, even learning adults, need to have guidance on why they are learning so they can be assessed accurately.

This is an area I feel like we don't capture as much as we should as teachers. It's the process over product idea!

I'm glad to see a number of items for each target instead of just one or two in order to get a better understanding of the learning.

This is something that I have been improving on and is not something I knew about when I first started teaching. I actually used to think that a good test was a simple repeat of information that I told the students during the unit. I wrote tests over the "facts" that I taught them. Wow, have I learned a lot. Now in my PLC we take the time to organize the learning targets and make sure that our assessments match the learning targets in our curriculum.

My administrator and I were just talking about something similar. We are trying to work on grading practices in our building. We both agree that students need multiple opportunities to show what they know and that assessments shouldn't be viewed as a one a done item that is checked off. We even got into the idea if a student is assessed once and gets a 58%, a second time and gets a 78% and third time and gets a 98% do you average all those scores, or do you think to yourself, "It took them three times but they finally go it, let's celebrate, here's your A"?

What does quality and balance look like compared to the instruction?

In a data driven world, which I totally agree with, the data is only valid if the reason for the data is clear and understood.

This must be the purpose for data. What direction will come from the results? Otherwise, it becomes busy work.

Intersting it is not the same the same sampling of students.

I think too often we are told what data to take but do not know why and don't have a genuine investment in the collection. How many teachers have been involved in taking data from an IEP goal and have no idea what the actual goal says.

This is definitely an issue with rubrics. Once the criteria have been met - students stop working on the assignment and turn it in. I definitely like the idea of promoting creativity, application and going above and beyond to challenge students.

This is important. I can see myself creating a screencastomatic video as an intro to each of my classes in order to meet this criteria.

Moodle_iowa This is a good one. I have always known the "course syllabus" in my head, but especially next year, it would be super helpful to give a course syllabus to families. In the case that we do have to move online for a period of time, families could see where we are going like a roadmap to help their children achieve success.

moodle_iowa I agree, Jill! It gives families a roadmap, and if we have to suddenly switch modes, it is already in place. It will take some time, but the preloading should help in the long run.

This is something that I need to do a better job with in all my classes. This summer I have been working on updating and improving my class syllabus to be a much better overview of the class and showing what is expected of them throughout the course.

I need to be better about posting and discussing learning outcomes before every lesson I teach.

Identifying the objectives can be easy for a teacher to do but the communication piece is more difficult. Students need to see what does that objective mean and what should it look like.

This is where teaching online can sometimes be beneficial as long as you provide various ways to learn--videos, text, using text speak, etc.

Agreed! This is super important to meet the needs of all of our students!

moodle_iowa Yes! I think it calls for collaboration with specialist teachers to be sure we are providing the accommodations needed.

Visual graphics and videos for visual and auditory learners. Checking in with and offering office hours and extra support for students who may need this. Accommodations for students with disabilities or other needs.

I think this is very important in the classroom and online. When students collaborate they can share knowledge and learn from one another.

Allowing students to do their own PowerPoint presentations of lesson material. Always letting students ask questions which are answered during Zoom meetings.

I feel this is the part that can be missing in online learning. How do you get collaboration and provide a safe environment. As the instructor, do you need to be involved in every interaction between students? Yes when you are dealing with younger students. I am still looking for tools that allow collaboration with adult supervision.

In order to make an attempt to combat "cheating" in an online course, developing authentic assessments is crucial.

Just as in a F2F classroom, a variety of assessments should drive instruction. Assessment is important for both teacher and students.