Assessment Assignment

The difference between a formal and informal assessment is that one is more
casual whereas the other is more traditional. The formal assessment is more of
a paper test where students will answer the questions on the test paper and turn
it in to the teacher when they are finished. Informal assessments are based on
performance. An informal assessment is based on observing your children day
by day to assess their strengths and weaknesses in a casual way. I believe that
the majority of children in the first grade, learn better using the informal
assessments.
A formative assessment helps to figure out the strengths and weakness of each
individual child while watching and making sure they understand the concepts
you are teaching them. A Summative assessment, are more of a summation of
everything the student has learned at the end of that specific course.
Traditional assessments would be formal tests. Traditional assessing is like what
teachers have been doing since the beginning of time, giving each student a test
and giving no real instructions. The alternative assessments however, is more
informal. You can give a dictated test, a picture test, or even a mixture of the two.
I think that this would be much more beneficial for first grade student, because at
this point in the year, some of them are not able to read all of the instructions
given on the assessment.
Grade Level- First Grade
Subject/Content Area- Mathematics
Number of Students- Eighteen
Lesson Objective (The students will)- The student will count forward by ones,
twos, fives, and tens to 100 and backward by ones from 30.
Standard of Learning- 1.2 Place Value and Fraction Concept
The unit has lasted two-weeks. The students are learning about place value,
number, and number sense. The students will complete lessons during this time
involving counting, skipping numbers, and number patterns to help them
understand the objectives.
Learning Objective and SOL- 1.2 Number and Number Sense
(www.doe.virginia.gov , 2016)
Alternative/ Informal Assessment, students will be called forward one by one and
assessed using the grading guidelines. For this assessment, I will call children
up one by one during free time in the classroom and assess their understanding
of the lesson and objectives. I will ask the children to count forward from 1-120
by ones, twos, fives, and tens, and help them when need be. I will have each
student count backward from thirty. Lastly, I will assess their understanding of
the objective and their ability to perform the given tasks and give them a grade
based on their ability to perform on grade level.
 I have chosen the Alternative/informal assessment because I believe that
students learn best in a casual setting. I think that by giving them the
assessment in a casual way, that they will be less nervous and perform on a
higher level. In first grade, the informal assessment or an Alternative assessment
is more adaptive to each students needs as we are still trying to figure out the
individual learning style of the child.
I believe that first grade students will do better with this kind of assessment
because they will be able to focus more on just the tasks within the assessment
while separated from the rest of the class. The main objective of giving these
forms of tests, is to assess the individual childs understanding of the content and
I believe that by pulling each child to the side, we are better able to see where
their level of learning is at against the SOL objectives. The alternative or informal
assessments will give me more freedom as a teacher to test students how I think
they will learn best.
The students will complete their assessment at any time during the lesson that I
feel they are ready. I may give a mid-level assessment and see who excels and
who still needs time to work on the specific learning objectives. If I feel a child is
ready to take the assessment before another child, I have no problem giving
them the assessments so that they are able to move on to higher level
instructions.
Students will complete this assignment individually. I made this decision
because I feel that students are too easily distracted at this age to have their
entire focus on their assessment if they are working with the rest of the class or
in groups.
Students who complete the assessment will have: understood the objective-
been able to count up to one hundred and twenty (by ones, twos, fives, and tens)
with little to no help from the teacher, and counted backwards from thirty to zero
successfully with little to no help from the teacher.
My role during this assessment is to give instruction to the child and help the
individual child overcome the obstacles they may get stuck on. I will help the
children to move from one objective to another smoothly and show them the
number patters when they are having a hard time getting from one number to
another. I will mark a paper test as they recite their answers to me for them to
take home and study.
I will write down the results of this assessment in my gradebook for future
reference and send the actual paper assessment and notes home with each child
so that their parents can see what areas we need to work on.
I may have a written or formal assessment as well to give students that might be
better at writing their answers a better chance. The formal assessment will help
students see their number pattern and understand which numbers will come after
 one another. This assessment will be used to pre-assess each student and will
be considered, if the student completes the assignment perfectly, as their final
assessment. I may switch between the informal assessment and the alternative
assessment as well depending on which one is more compatible with our
classroom dynamic.

Bibliography

Education, V. D. (n.d.). The Standards & SOL-based Instructional Resources. Retrieved October
08, 2016, from http://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/standards_docs/