September 9, 2012
A little note, this post shows the beginning of my journey to find a way to measure interpretive. As of 2016, I have found that an IPA type of assessment is the best measure of their skills and it’s more real world. – What can you DO with the information? Then their output can be measured with the rubric. Read this post to see where I am now.
What a great 3 weeks of learning! My level one students are flying through the “Nice to meet you” unit. Since they are new language learners, they understand SO much more than they can produce. I ended the unit with a simple Reading Assessment. They were so engaged while taking it, excited when they finished, and no one tried to cheat!
At this point in the year, the expectation is that they can understand words and a few simple phrases, may not understand the main idea. I used readings that are authentic (PeopleenEspanol, Facebook, Twitter, flyers) and simple. I included a few paragraphs to see if anyone could do more. I emailed a Keynote to them on the iPads. It helped to have it in color so they can see the images better.
Here is a sample of an average student’s answer sheet and rubric. I will use this sheet for each Interpretive assessment. I graded it by writing the level (NL = Novice Low, NM = Novice Mid) next to each answer. I need to better explain to them that they need to write down the main idea or what the reading is about if they can like she did in #2.
This rubric is my first attempt at an Interpretive rubric. I will improve it as I go. I decided the main idea and details should not be tied to the proficiency level.
My main professional goal for the year is to have an Interpretive Reading or Listening assessment for each unit. This is not perfect, but a great start! Here’s my newest version:
Adapted from JCPS WL Dept.
How do you assess their reading skills?
Love this!
I think this is great! Would you be willing to share your rubric and your readings? Maybe on your TPT store?
I think this is great! Would you be willing to share the rubric and readings on your PTP store?
I think this is great! Would you be willing to share the rubric and readings on your PTP store?
See if it is working on the wikispaces page:
http://creativelanguageclass.wikispaces.com/Nice+to+meet+you
I love it and like Lee I was wondering if you would be willing to share it.
I have been teaching Spanish for 9 years and I love reading all of your ideas. I wish I taught with you! Where do you get your “tweets” and those other articles from?
Go to twitter, put a keyword in the “buscar” or “search” bar. So for this one, I used words like “cumpleanos” “me llamo” and “estoy bien.” It will pull up all tweets with that word and I search through for a simple one. Then I “cut it” (command + shift + 4 on a Mac OR fn + prt scn on PC). Then I paste and crop it if needed. Viola!
How do you find relatively simple Spanish tweets?
Here’s my thinking: I’ll put it on our wikispaces page. Then you can send your students to this site or you can copy the images. I can put on TPT too, but there are so many copyrighted pictures I’m afraid to put it there.
http://creativelanguageclass.wikispaces.com/Nice+to+meet+you
I am a veteran teacher getting back into teaching after several years hiatus – I find your site the BEST source for fantastic ideas! And I really appreciate your patient explanations about all things tech related!
Thanks and welcome back! It is getting exciting in the classroom now!
Or try this if you want the Keynote version:
https://skydrive.live.com/redir?resid=F81D8780FC14B4CF!271
Let me know how this works!!
In my school district we have at least two performance assessments per unit; most have three. An interpretive, presentational and interpersonal. We also have common rubrics.
Is there a way to share them like our JCPS site? I’d love to see some others! Interpretive assessments take me hours to make. :/
I think the ‘What else do you understand?’ question is excellent – I’m going to include that in my assessments from now on! It’s such a simple question, but it really makes the assessment much more open-ended and makes it much more possible for pupils to surprise/impress you with something that you may not have expected. Thanks 🙂
Curious how you determine if their response qualifies as novice low, novice mid, etc.? I am trying this tomorrow with my classes and I’m just not sure what to do with the data LOL
I match what they understood to the rubric. So words = novice low, phrases = novice mid, sentences = novice high, etc. After this first round, I made the rubric better formatted and put it on creativelanguageclass.wikispaces.com. I’ll update this post soon.
This is not a perfect system yet, but so much better than points/right or wrong. There’s an ACTFL webinar coming soon about this and I’ll let you all know.
I love the feedback that you gave to her responses, and the activity is awesome, too! I appreciate that you begin by analyzing the proficiency level for which they are aiming at the skill that is being assessed, consider what that looks like as an assessment, and then use strategic questions with authentic resources to determine whether or not they meet the target. Great assessment 🙂
Kara,
Do you ever use the Unit Assessments from the JCPS Website?
Are your assessment rubrics available on TPT (the Interpretive one in this post?
I use at least one JCPS assessment per unit, or a slightly version. The interpretive rubric is on http://www.creativelanguageclass.wikispaces.com.
Is Keynote similar to Evernote? Not all of my students have smart devices/laptops/ipads. Does anyone have any suggestions on how to provide a reading assessment and not kill a tree in the process? Do you think it would be fair to have the questions in “stations” and the students rotate through?
Keynote is the Apple verision of PowerPoint. Evernote is a note sharing app. I haven’t played with it much because you have to pay to share on it. I usually email the reading assessments to the iPads (they all have the same generic email account on them. Their answer sheet is one page. Maybe another site like Quia.com would be a good way to do these tests? Again, you have to pay for a subscription. Any method is fair, but I would be concerned about cheating if they are moving a lot.
I just did a similar assessment using Edmodo as posting platform. Even though I am not quite happy how it turned out from the technology perspective (there were a lot of frustrating issues like kids not being able to log on, links to the video not working in the PDF document, etc.) I liked the fact that it was in color, kids could manipulate it, and it included authentic materials.
I do have a question for you, though. When you e-mail it to the iPads (I’m trying to figure out if I can do this too:), do you send them the editable version or the PDF version of the Keynote?
I also thought of using Junoed.com to do this but wanted to do this first. Junoed is a great site for testing (or practicing) and students respond right there, so NO paper is involved.
I send the PDF. Thanks for these reflections and ideas. I’ll check some out.
Kara,
Was able to print the Interpretive Rubric, but the wording is so light, it is hard to read. I tried using my copier to darken it, but it didn’t help. Would you send the source file? I would be willing to darken the font and re-mail it to you …Or if you add it to TPT, I could download from there. I am willing to purchase it.
Do you have Pages?
I’m currently working on this issue and making it better. I will repost when fixed.
No, we use Google Docs on our Mac and word on our PC
Do use this Interpretive Rubric for both listening and reading?
Yep!
I loved this activity, but what format or program did you use to create it? I would love to do something like this for my level 1.
I used Keynote (like PowerPoint) and emailed it to the students on the iPad. I really wanted it to be in color, but I can’t print that many in color. Once I also printed one copy, hung each page around the room, and they walked around to answer it. It could also work as a station.
Ok thank you! Where do you get the pictures for the presentation? And how do you upload them? For example, the people en espanol articles? Did you scan those in or did you get them online?
Thank you!
I use my iPad, so I just hit “save copy” or I screenshot from the internet.
I love this, and quite frankly, so much of what you do inspires me and I am thankful for your willingness to share. May I ask what platform you use to show the kids the readings? You give instructions about how they can manipulate the images… I have found a bunch of articles / readings and would like to set up something similar, but not sure the best venue to do so. We have received a technology grant in our district and are now all about ipads…any help would be appreciated.
Sorry – didn’t read last post – keynote – thanks and sorry for duplicate
Kara!
It’s Jessica from Wyoming! (You just emailed me a few days ago lol : )) Anyway, I know you posted this several years back, but I just wanted to thank you and let you know I am going to use it tomorrow for the first time!
I have been making stations similar to this, but my questions have been in Spanish. Should they be in English? Am I making it more difficult than I should at this level? Most of my kids are understanding the questions written in Spanish, but is it better practice to write the test questions in English? Would love to hear your reasoning and expertise on the matter 🙂
Thank you so much!
Jessica
Hi Jessica! I JUST got back from seeing the Great Tetons and Yellowstone. Amazing…
I think you can do it either way. We were advised to put the questions in English to eliminate any confusion. Also if the questions are in Spanish, then it is technically an interpersonal assessment. Also we have seen where they don’t know what the question is asking in Spanish, but can figure out the answer (well, the options are bailar, dormir, correr, and comer… the only one I see in the reading is comer so that must be the answer!). This can be avoided if the questions are more open, but that takes more variety of vocabulary. http://www.creativelanguageclass.com/assessments/3-steps-to-create-an-interpretive-final-assessment/
I’ll tell you this though, I’ve had some ah-ha moments lately about interpretive assessments. I’m finding it’s easier to use them in a more “IPA” type situation, where they are just the input for students to reference when they write or speak. http://www.creativelanguageclass.com/assessments/integrated-performance-assessments/ I want to post an updated look about all this, but you know how extra time goes. So little…