The rubric is based off a grading scale from 1-4 in three category's: Planning and Ideation, Creation and Exploration, and Reflection and Connection. Students aim for a 4 which is advanced. These students are great participators, actively engaged and persisting, developing new ideas through exploration and constantly challenging themselves to think deeper with their art.
Strategies utilized to pre-assess and assess throughout the semester:
On the first day of our teaching, we did a scratch art activity to pre-assess their knowledge. To begin, they would write down their ideas in a sketchbook. This showed us their initial ideation processes and what their literacy skills were like. Then they envisioned their creature based off of their ideas and drew some examples in their sketchbook. Next we had them put their final ideas (for that day) onto a piece of scratch art paper. This gave us a good idea of where they were at as far as rendering and putting ideas onto paper. Towards the end of class, we had them reflect with each other in groups and share their ideas. All of these methods were informal and mainly based off of participation and engagement.
The one use of formal assessment we used was for the library day. This sheet consisted of the following questions:
What are key facts you want viewers to know about your creature?
1. Where does it live? (Hot/Cold, can you find it on a map?)
2. What does it eat?
3. How big is your creature?
Then we had two blank spaces for them to write additional facts about their creature and or environment. For instance, one student said his creature lived in New York and cooked pizzas for a living and flew airplanes. He stuck with these ideas throughout the semester. This type of assessment showed us teachers that some students did well, whereas others had problems articulating their ideas with words. It was important that they knew they could sketch their ideas as well, if words were not efficient.
Another informal assessment was the discovery table of textures. The students had the ability to show their clay expertise and how they related to textures. Some students were actively engaged and pumping out textures like factories whereas some were focused on a few. This allowed us to gauged their work ethic and who worked fast and who didn’t. It also showed us their ideation and what they thought “feathers” or “scales” looked like.
Throughout the semester we had students use their sketchbook as a resource. Whenever they had an idea or an image in their mind, we would have them draw it in their sketchbook. This was a continual form of assessment as far as planning and reflecting goes. At the end, we collected the sketchbooks and evaluated them as they related to each other. It was clear to see who took advantage of the sketchbook and who didn’t.
On the first day of our teaching, we did a scratch art activity to pre-assess their knowledge. To begin, they would write down their ideas in a sketchbook. This showed us their initial ideation processes and what their literacy skills were like. Then they envisioned their creature based off of their ideas and drew some examples in their sketchbook. Next we had them put their final ideas (for that day) onto a piece of scratch art paper. This gave us a good idea of where they were at as far as rendering and putting ideas onto paper. Towards the end of class, we had them reflect with each other in groups and share their ideas. All of these methods were informal and mainly based off of participation and engagement.
The one use of formal assessment we used was for the library day. This sheet consisted of the following questions:
What are key facts you want viewers to know about your creature?
1. Where does it live? (Hot/Cold, can you find it on a map?)
2. What does it eat?
3. How big is your creature?
Then we had two blank spaces for them to write additional facts about their creature and or environment. For instance, one student said his creature lived in New York and cooked pizzas for a living and flew airplanes. He stuck with these ideas throughout the semester. This type of assessment showed us teachers that some students did well, whereas others had problems articulating their ideas with words. It was important that they knew they could sketch their ideas as well, if words were not efficient.
Another informal assessment was the discovery table of textures. The students had the ability to show their clay expertise and how they related to textures. Some students were actively engaged and pumping out textures like factories whereas some were focused on a few. This allowed us to gauged their work ethic and who worked fast and who didn’t. It also showed us their ideation and what they thought “feathers” or “scales” looked like.
Throughout the semester we had students use their sketchbook as a resource. Whenever they had an idea or an image in their mind, we would have them draw it in their sketchbook. This was a continual form of assessment as far as planning and reflecting goes. At the end, we collected the sketchbooks and evaluated them as they related to each other. It was clear to see who took advantage of the sketchbook and who didn’t.