New Reporting System
Level: Years 7-8
School: Rosehill Intermediate School (plus Takapuna Normal Intermediate School/Remuera Intermediate School)
Teachers: Joyce Shankar-Kay, Jan McEwan (plus Jackie Jones/Lorraine Herbert)
Joyce Shankar-Kay and Jan McEwen created and trialled a new reporting system to better reflect what their students were learning. They had both arrived at Rosehill Intermediate in 2009 and joined the Resource Development and Facilitation: Years 7-10 Technology Project the same year. As part of their involvement in the project, Jan and Joyce developed a programme of learning which incorporated the Components of the new strands – Nature of Technology and Technological Knowledge. This, in turn, led to their trialling a new system of reporting.
Jan and Joyce teach students from seven client schools, in weekly one-and-a half-hour blocks over a term or weekly three-hour blocks over five weeks. Part of the Rosehill Intermediate Technology team, they operate on a different timetable to their colleagues (who teach the intermediate's students as well as some client schools). Students take home their assessment sheet at the end of each Technology cycle and the client school is given a formal hand-written report at the end of the year. This is a Technology-specific report and in 2009 showed student achievement in all four Technology areas over the year.
The "outdated" report wasn't making clear to parents how their children were achieving in Technology. It didn't refer to the three strands of the Technology curriculum and it didn't show student progression. Because the report form was printed with the technology areas listed in columns, it meant that in most cases these weren't shown in the order that the students had taken them and it could appear that a child wasn't progressing or was even "going backwards" in Technology.
Proposing a new report
Changing to a digital format would allow extra information to easily be added to the report and give, says Jan, a more professional look than hand-writing results. A digital report would also let teachers share information without having to rewrite it and allow for better data analysis – student progression could be tracked within a year and over two years, by gender or ethnic categories, and easily provide information on, for example, students performing exceptionally well in Technology or those requiring extra assistance.
Jan and Joyce originally planned to enter student results onto the school management system but were informed that adding students from another school might invalidate total results in the system. Rather than pursuing it they decided to accept this advice for the trial year, recognising that it provided an opportunity to "test any bugs in the system" and make changes.
Jan and Year 7-10 Project Facilitator Selena Hinchco combined their IT skills to create a digital report using Word 2007 and the Excel mail merge function. Jan wrote a 'How to' sheet for their guinea pig, Joyce, to work through, to test the data entry system. They found that although it seemed slow at first, "after doing it two or three times you remember the process so it's just click, click, click". Filling in the reports at the end of 2010 was time-consuming because it involved a year's worth of assessment results, but in future years the data will be entered each term which will make collating the final report much easier.
An important step in setting up the new report, Jan and Joyce note, was that before approaching their principal Maria White to discuss the need for a new reporting system they created a rationale (.pdf, 145kb) and a proposal for how it would fit into their 2010 programme. By clearly identifying what they wanted and how the new format would operate, they could justify the need for change and were immediately ready to move on to the next stage.
The content
Rather than creating a completely new report, Jan and Joyce modified the old one to reflect the changes in the Technology curriculum. [Ministry guidance states that assessing and reporting on students should be based on the Achievement Objectives (AO), that all AOs should be reported on at some stage during the two years, and that student progression as they move from one Technology programme to another should be covered.]
The new report (.pdf, 334kb) was designed as a two-year record of achievement and the 'Technology progression table' lists the eight Technology cycles students take during Years 7-8. In their course overview Joyce and Jan have allocated Components to be assessed in particular cycles. They had planned to insert NA (Not Applicable) for the Components they weren't assessing but felt that it gave a negative look to the page. They decided instead to use a dash to indicate a Component which they might have discussed, taught or highlighted during a unit but which wasn't a focus component so therefore hadn't been assessed.
To make the report "friendly" and easier for parents to understand, Jan and Joyce simplified the language in the Technology curriculum. One page of the report lists 'Technology curriculum aspects' – giving a one-sentence explanation for each Component. Additional information on the Component 'achievement levels', in a disclaimer at the bottom of the student's results, explains that the levels are progressive and overlapping so that children aren't expected to be achieving the same level at the same time. It also notes that students have limited prior knowledge and experience of the newer Components so may be achieving at a lower level in those ones.
Jan and Joyce also simplified the language in the AOs for their rubrics . In the Year 8 assessment rubric for Soft Materials, Technological Products, for example, is written as 'I can identify materials and some of their properties' for Level 1 through to 'I can explain how the materials in a product work together so that the product is fit for purpose' for Level 4.
Rosehill Intermediate and most of the client schools report to parents using BPA – students are assessed as Basic, Proficient or Advanced in relation to the curriculum level – from asTTle (Assessment Tools for Teaching and Learning). asTTle was designed to assess students in numeracy and literacy but doesn't align with the Technology curriculum, so Joyce and Jan developed their own set of criteria, informed by the Indicators of Progression. B = working with the teacher basically alongside, P= working with some teacher support, A = working independently, so a student working at a proficient standard at Level 3 will be marked 3p. They note that BPA is only useful if the teacher has developed criteria which clearly show what it means in a Technology environment.
The issue of how to clearly show student progression over two years was addressed by creating the report in two formats. In one form the first column shows a student's Technology cycle starting with Jan and stays in order as that student moves through the other Technology areas, while the second form shows students starting in Joyce's class. Creating alternative formats is easier with just two teachers teaching four technologies, but Jan and Joyce comment it would still be workable with four teachers despite requiring four different formats.
The report was printed in colour for the first time and made individual for each client school. The report is still issued by the Rosehill Intermediate School Technology Centre but the client school name and logo now feature in the centre of the front cover.
Trialling the new report
Joyce and Jan had introduced the new Components during the annual meeting with their client schools, and held an extra meeting to discuss the new report before trialling it in 2010. At the end of Term 4, as they entered the data into their new reports, the two had already identified some aspects which needed to be changed. They realised that allocating Outcome Development and Evaluation (ODE) as a focus for Term 4 Electronics was a problem –Jan's students had to complete their unit before she could assess that Component which is difficult in Term 4 due to reports having to be completed before the cycle ends. During their review of the course overview, Jan and Joyce will either shift ODE to another term or make it a Food Technology focus and assess it earlier in the cycle.
During the review Joyce and Jan will also look at changing the focus Components. They found that their current programme of learning meant they hadn't gone into as much depth as they would like, so in 2011 will implement a new programme. For Technological Practice, for example, they will do Planning for Practice in depth and one other Component. Most of the units they teach have two major Components that are assessed, and they will each do a minor one that they might just talk about. Joyce will discuss Technological Modelling in her class and lead on to what Jan is doing, and Jan will assess that Component. The revised report will therefore show two assessments per cycle.
Students will also be assessed on effort, respect, integrity and self management – all of which come from The New Zealand Curriculum Key Competencies and Values. To ensure that there isn't any confusion with the Technology assessment, this will be placed in a different section of the report and student attitude will be assessed as Always, Usually, Sometimes or Never.
The client schools, which had been very positive about the proposed changes, will be asked to provide feedback on the trial report at the next meeting. Jan and Joyce have also decided to hold an open afternoon after school when teachers from the client schools can visit their classrooms. If this is successful they might run them every term to keep the client schools fully involved in what their students are working on and open them to parents as well. Joyce adds that any teachers interested in discussing the development of a new report are welcome to contact them.
Sharing the report
The rest of the Technology team was kept informed about the development of the new report. They have also been working on understanding and teaching the new Components and developing their own course overview, and are also in the process of developing a new report. The new reporting system has also been shared with some of the other schools involved in the Year 7-10 project, two of which have adapted it for their own use.
In 2011, Remuera Intermediate School will trial a Year 7 report based on Rosehill's. They have started with Year 7 because all Year 7 students do all four technologies, whereas Year 8 students choose which technologies they will do. In the future they plan to extend this and make one report for both Year 7 and Year 8.
The Remuera report has the same title and Component descriptors but only lists five Components, because in their programme of learning the Technological Knowledge strand is not covered in Year 7. Student achievement is rated from 'Below expected level' to 'Well Above expected level' to align with the general school report. The language in the Indicators of Progression has been simplified for the rubrics – Characteristics of Technological Outcomes, for example, is rated 'I can describe the physical and functional attributes of a Technological Outcome' at Level 2 and 'Using examples, I can describe what proper function and alternative function are' at Level 5. A watermark in each column shows which level the assessment relates to. The Technological Practice rubrics go from Level 2 to Level 5 but the newer strands start at Level 1 and go to Level 4. This report also uses dashes to show that a Component has not been assessed and has a descriptor explaining the curriculum levels.
The non-Technology aspects of Attitude and Self management, set out under a thick grey line to differentiate them from the curriculum assessment, are assessed using the school-wide ranking A-D. The Remuera report will be processed through the school management system and include electronic teacher signatures.
Takapuna Normal Intermediate School has also adapted the Rosehill report for their proposed reporting (.pdf, 56kb) system. The Technology team is encouraged to use the school system of BPA, so they have split the criteria in their rubrics into BPA. Their assessment rubrics have five levels, with the three middle levels using BPA. The proposed report shows the level achieved in the Components assessed, with a basic description of that Component. The descriptor for the team-wide major focus on ODE, for example, is 'Your child can design, create and evaluate their Technological Outcome'. A disclaimer at the bottom of the page explains that several of the 'aspects' listed in the report are new to the Technology curriculum, that students have limited prior knowledge and experience of them and therefore may achieve at a lower level.
The Takapuna report has a section for assessment of student effort, practical skills and self management which, like the revised Rosehill version, is set out separately from the Technology assessment. It is marked with an A-D ranking, not BPA. The Takapuna Intermediate school management system will be used to generate the new reports.
Remuera and Takapuna Intermediates will trial their reports in 2011 and review them at the end of the year.
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