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We share evidence-based K-12 learning strategies that empower you to improve education.

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Blogs on Comprehensive Assessment

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What Exactly Is "Understanding?" And How Do We Assess It?

Terry HeickMay 10, 2012

Tags Comprehensive Assessment, Formative Assessment, Performance Assessment, Standardized Testing

Assessing understanding might be the most complex task an educator or academic institution is tasked with. Unfortunately, professional development gives a lower level of attention to developing quality assessments, training that is rarely commensurate with this complexity. The challenge of assessment is no less than figuring out what a learner knows, and where he or she needs to go next.

Student Calls for a Learning Revolution

Nikhil GoyalMay 4, 2012

Tags Comprehensive Assessment, Education Reform, Performance Assessment, Student Engagement, All Grades

Last year, industrial designer Dean Benstead unveiled the 02 Pursuit -- a prototype for a motorcycle ruled not by gas or electricity, but by compressed air. Just last month, Google announced to the public its secret initiative, Project Glass, the company's first venture into wearable computing.

And yet, in the world of education, the "next big thing" is merit pay for teachers and boosting test scores. Do our policymakers not understand that the world is going through a revolution in the way we live, interact and learn?

Can Innovation Skills Be Learned?

Tony WagnerApril 20, 2012

Tags Comprehensive Assessment, Education Reform, Mentoring, Professional Learning Network (PLN), Teacher Development, All Grades

The "DNA" of innovators might be considered a set of skills that are essential elements in design thinking. One cannot have empathy without having practiced the skills of listening and observing. And integrative thinking begins with the ability to ask good questions and to make associations. There is also a kinship between collaboration and networking. [At the root of innovation is] the importance of experimenting -- an activity that, at its root, requires a kind of optimism, a belief that through trial and error a deeper understanding and better approaches can be discovered.

Case Study: What Does it Take to Turn Around a School?

Rick WinterApril 12, 2012

Tags Accountability, Charter Schools, Community Partnerships, Comprehensive Assessment, Primary (K-2), Teacher Development, Upper Elementary (3-5)

How does a school go from struggling to success? My goal in this blog is to share success stories and resources to help you make a difference in all the schools with whom you make contact. There is a role for everyone here: principal, superintendent, teacher, parent, school board member, politician, community member and taxpayer.

How Did School Do? A Crowdsourced Study

Shelly Blake-PlockApril 5, 2012

Tags Comprehensive Assessment, Teacher Development, All Grades

"The internet is made for questions," says Sean Wheeler.

It wasn't long ago that language arts teacher Wheeler and his Lakewood City School District biology-teaching colleague Ken Kozar -- along with a class of eager 10th graders -- realized that certain questions weren't being asked online. And one question above all resonated with teacher and student alike: How did school do?

A Trayvon Martin Tribute

Dr. Richard CurwinMarch 23, 2012

Tags Comprehensive Assessment, Diversity, Mental Health, , Urban Schools, All Grades, History

The tragic death of Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida reminded me of an incident that happened four years ago in the San Francisco Bay Area where racism reared its ugly head to a black teenager on his way to school.

Four Strategies to Spark Curiosity via Student Questioning

Kevin D. WashburnMarch 22, 2012

Tags Brain Research, Comprehensive Assessment, Performance Assessment, Primary (K-2), Project-Based Learning, Student Engagement, Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle (6-8), High (9-12)

British archaeologist Mary Leakey described her own learning as being "compelled by curiosity." Curiosity is the name we give to the state of having unanswered questions. And unanswered questions, by their nature, help us maintain a learning mindset. When we realize that we do not know all there is to know about something in which we are interested, we thirst. We pursue. We act as though what we do not know is more important than what we do, as though what we do not possess is worth the chase to own it. How do we help students discover this drive?

Neuroscience and the Bilingual Brain

Judy Willis MDMarch 22, 2012

Tags Brain Research, Comprehensive Assessment, English-Language Learners, Global Education, Parental Involvement, , English Language Arts, Math, World Language Learning

A selective attentive focus and the ability to block out distraction are seminal executive functions that are minimally developed in youngsters. These functions gradually become stronger throughout the years of prefrontal cortex maturation, which last into the twenties. It is with regard to these executive functions that research about the "bilingual brain" is particularly exciting.

A selective attentive focus and the ability to block out distraction are seminal executive functions that are minimally developed in youngsters. These functions gradually become stronger throughout the years of prefrontal cortex maturation, which last into the twenties. It is with regard to these executive functions that research about the "bilingual brain" is particularly exciting. Read More

James Gee: What Do Video Games Have to Do with Project-Based Learning?

John LarmerMarch 21, 2012

Tags Comprehensive Assessment, Game-Based Learning, Project-Based Learning, Technology Integration, Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle (6-8), High (9-12)

It was September 13, 2011, and we were just about to hear a talk by James Paul Gee, author of What Video Games Have to Teach Us About Learning and Literacy. The talk was part of our annual community meeting of the Buck Institute for Education. Here's a summary of our conversations -- before and after watching Gee speak. (Please scroll down for a video of highlights from Gee's presentation.)

The Creativity Index: No Artist Left Behind

Mark PhillipsMarch 20, 2012

Tags Arts Education, Comprehensive Assessment, Formative Assessment, Primary (K-2), Student Engagement, Upper Elementary (3-5), Middle (6-8), Drama, High (9-12), English Language Arts, Music, Visual Arts

Some of you may remember the scene in The Dead Poets Society in which Robin Williams' Mr. Keating mocks the approach to poetry of Dr. J. Evans Pritchard. In a nutshell, Pritchard has a method for mathematically calculating the measure of a poem's greatness. "If the poem's score for perfection is plotted along the horizontal of a graph, and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the poem yields the measure of its greatness." Keating has students rip the pages out of their books, sardonically exclaiming, " . . . we're not laying pipe, we're talking about poetry . . . I like Byron, I give him a 42 . . . "

Some of you may remember the scene in The Dead Poets Society in which Robin Williams' Mr. Keating mocks the approach to poetry of Dr. J. Evans Pritchard. In a nutshell, Pritchard has a method for mathematically calculating the measure of a poem's greatness. "If the poem's score for perfection is plotted along the horizontal of a graph, and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the poem yields the measure of its greatness." Keating has students rip the pages out of their books, sardonically exclaiming, " . . . we're not laying pipe, we're talking about poetry . . . I like Byron, I give him a 42 . . . " Read More