When my son Scott was a toddler, he would grip the windowsill of our farmhouse, stand on tippy toes, and peer out the window to supervise farming activities. Grandpa, who lived in town but worked on the farm, took great pleasure in monitoring Scott’s growth through the window. First, just the top of a tiny head and bright eyes were visible. Before long, the toddler grew and a wide grin revealed itself to the outside world while little hands pressed against the pane. Grandpa and the little overall-clad boy shared a common goal; both were waiting for Scott to reach a size suitable for tagging along and helping with calf chores. The window made measuring progress toward that goal easy.
Wouldn’t it be great if we had a window that allowed us to monitor the academic growth of our students? One online tool that may prove valuable is Formative. While there are many online formative assessment tool options, Formative has several advantages. Teachers may integrate images, videos, audio recordings, and even embed learning tools in Formative. Check out an introductory video here.
In addition to multiple choice, true/false, and short answer, responses may include drawings and uploaded images. Students like that they sign up using their Google accounts and appreciate the clean, clear interface of Formative. Quizzes may be taken by simply entering a Quick Code, which is easy for younger students; however, the creation of classes makes saving and exporting results possible. Quizzes may be assigned to selected classes, and Formative will automatically score most types of questions.
Tools within Formative allow teachers to override scores and provide immediate written feedback while watching live results. Student names may be made invisible to project an answer to discuss with a class.
Learn about these features and more on the Formative community page, which includes excellent, short video tutorials.
You just may find that Formative provides a window through which to view students’ academic growth. Contact me or another instructional coach if you would like assistance getting started.
How do you measure students’ progress toward a goal and provide feedback? How do your students track their own growth? Add a comment if you have a tip to share.
For those of you using Google Classroom, Formative does play a little with Classroom. You still need to have students sign up in both platforms, but they have added a direct post to Classroom option when assigning, and say they are working on integrating in more ways soon. If any of you tried PearDeck last year, this is similar, but in my opinion, much better and completely free!
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