Assessing the Damage

The start of every new school year brings excitement and jitters and hopes and dreams and reality. The weeks leading up to school I think about all of the things I am finally going to get "right" this year. How I am not going to get behind in grading. How I am going to find time for more one-on-one time. How I am not going to miss a deadline for grades. How I am going to find more innovative ways to deliver this lesson or that lesson. Basically, how I am going to be even better than I was last year. It is interesting to consider that if these are things I am thinking about, so are my kids. They start each school year with the same hope: to be better than they were last year. So, doesn't it make sense to start the year off with reflection, to start the year off with assessment, and to start the year off with figuring out exactly where we are. After all, the only way we can determine if we are "better" than where we were is if we all know where we were.

For this reason, I start every year with a series of "pre-tests." I jokingly tell my kids we are assessing the damage, and it is my job for the remainder of the year to repair the damage. Every one of them has a different type of damage, a different amount of damage, and needs a different course of treatment. That is my job. To figure all of that out and to ensure that each one comes out "better" than they were when the started. For a few ideas about "assessing the damage" check out a list of pre-tests my kids take in the first few weeks of school:

1. GETTING TO KNOW YOU: As a part of my class setup, I like to have student emails saved on my iPad, which does not populate the school address book for me automatically. So, I started asking my kids to send me an email on the first day of school. Then, I respond from my iPad, and all of their email addresses are saved in my iPad. I ask them to tell me important, memorable things about them. This is my first opportunity to get to know them.
2. REFLECTION: My first official assignment of the year is to create a "Confessional Video" where the kids answer a series of questions. The point of this video is not just a getting to know you, but also for them to tell me where they think their "damage" is most noticeable. I ask them about their personal feelings towards English, to be brutally honest about their previous experiences in English, and to tell me anything else they want me to know. The instructions include a promise that I will not disclose information divulged in our secret confessional (within legal limits, of course). If I attach a grade to this, it is generally just based on completion, following directions, submitting on time and correctly, etc.
3. WRITING SAMPLE: In the first few days of school we give an on-demand, timed essay over their summer reading novel. This essay is used simply for feedback and for me to assess their writing abilities. I follow these timed essays up with a one-on-one conference to get the ball rolling on really getting to know the kids individually.
4. PRE-TEST: I also have a multiple choice test set up in our LMS that tests the most basic knowledge of rhetorical terms, grammar knowledge, close reading skills, and a few other miscellaneous things I want them to know. This, just like the writing sample is not for a grade. It is just for assessing the damage.

The most important things to happen in my class are the things I learn in the first two to three weeks of the year. I learn who they are, but I also do my best to assess the damage. I need to know what the students need so that I can design my lessons in a purposeful way that is responsive to their individual needs. I require a lot of pre-tests in the beginning along with quite a bit of reflection. None of these things are ever for a grade, because the point of all of this is to assess the damage not to assess their learning.