Earlier this month, I posted EIGHT WAYS WE ARE “ACCELERATING LEARNING” FOR OUR ELL NEWCOMERS THIS YEAR.

However, I forgot to include a ninth way – a strategy that I began to use last year.

I give my ELL Newcomer students a sixteen-question test each Friday covering the content we covered during the preceding four days.   As we review the correct answers, a peer tutor grades the test and shows each student their result before they leave that day.

Just learning those results are a good formative assessment exercise for everybody – I know how students are doing, who might need extra support or challenge, and if I need to provide additional instruction on a topic; and students learn what they know or what they need to do differently.

But it’s still a “one-off.”  In other words, it’s just a snapshot of one particular week.

The real value comes in students – and me – seeing patterns.

Peer tutors enter each student’s results into a Google Sheet and, as the image above illustrates, their results over a period of time is visually displayed.

And, boy, can that display be powerful!

I briefly meet with students individually each month to show them their data display.  Often, they will take a photo of it to show their guardians.   For others, it’s an opportunity to discuss what they might be able to do differently.

It works very well.

I’m adding this info to The Best Resources For Learning About Formative Assessment and to The Best Resources Showing Why We Need To Be “Data-Informed” & Not “Data-Driven”