space.template.Student+Profile



Course Overview Curriculum Challenges Portfolio


 * Is there enough evidence for anyone to be able to asses the student’s performance?
 * Is it the right selection of evidence to provide a useful representation of the student’s work?
 * Are there clear signs of development in the evidence?
 * Has the student handled the analysis and evaluation of the evidence effectively?
 * Is there anything about their learning that I’ve observed, but that is not reflected in the Portfolio in some way? Do I have suggestions about how the student might document it?
 * Is there anything the student needs to know about preparing observations and work samples and listing them in the Portfolio ?
 * Are there any formatting or transporting issues that should be addressed by the final Assessment?


 * ====== ||  ||  When did the observation occur?  ||   ||
 * ===Date entered here:=== ||  || These two dates should not be more than 48 hours apart, or the observation is nearly useless. Human cognitive studies have made this clear. ||   ||
 * ===Context (choose one):=== ||  || It’s important to establish the context of the observation here: Individual, pairs, small group, large group, class discussion, lab, field research ||   ||
 * ===Activity:=== ||  ||  Reading a text? Working on a web site? Workshop on a draft? Class discussion? Drafting a paper? Posting to a class blog? etc.  ||   ||
 * ===Observation:=== ||  ||  This should be very brief, no more than a few sentences, describing just what was observed, as distinct from a reflection, interpretation, judgment or opinion about it.  ||   ||
 * ===Teacher’s comments:=== ||  || In my response I focus on whether the observation is actually an observation rather than something else, on the clarity of the description and its accuracy, on its usefulness in capturing something about the student’s learning, on its appropriate length. Most importantly, I note those observations that have nothing to do with activity related to the class.

||  || Paste here to create your first observation. Repeat for each new observation.



Work samples
Please include the following information for //each// work sample. Copy the fields here and paste them into the space below. Copy and paste these work sample fields for each new work sample. Copy the whole box below, with all of its fields:  Here students need to link the listing of the work sample to the work sample itself. If the work sample is online, give the URL for it. If not, it should be in the student’s “work samples” folder, and linked to from here. Since they often have idiosyncratic file names, this helps associate the work sample with its listing here. // It is very important to stress that the work sample itself must be either in the work sample folder, or in an accessible online location. //  || || ||
 * ===Name:=== || Title of the work sample or descriptive title (Project 1 draft)  ||
 * ===Assignment:=== || What was the assignment? If this is unassigned work (for example informal writing), put “unassigned” here.  ||
 * ===File name:=== || (Please type the file name here, select the text, and choose Insert/Hyperlink from the menu above. Then make a link to the work sample file in your Learning Record folder)
 * ===Location:=== || Online, in the teacher folder, or in some other location that can be accessed by readers  ||
 * ===Your comments:=== || The student comments on the work sample with anything he or she would like readers to know about it. (“this was my first web site...”)
 * ===Teacher’s comments=== || The teacher responds to the work sample. You may also have a file that contains the work sample with your comments. It can be simply returned together with the LR.

==

(Provided by the teacher)
We will focus on constructing and presenting well-designed, mindfully developed proposals, projects, documents, and informal messages. Students will learn about: Please note that a course strand represents a trajectory along which we expect to see development in students, or an objective for their performance. If it is necessary for students to master certain skills or knowledge to successfully pass the course or meet a grade criterion, that should be noted here. For example: All students must demonstrate that they know the names of the bones of the body to pass this course. ||  ||
 * ===Course strand=== || ===Description=== || ===Weight=== ||
 * a keyword for the strand, for example: //rhetoric// || A description of what this term means in your class; what the objective is for students’ learning. For example, for rhetoric:
 * A process approach to writing
 * Online research skills
 * Ability to use bibliographic software
 * Understanding of search engines
 * Properly citing research in published work
 * Web writing
 * Writing to take a position
 * Rhetorical analysis of online communication
 * Documenting, evaluating, and reporting their performance and achievements || Different course strands may have different weights, depending on their significance in your class. Try to make sure the percentages add up to 100% if you use this option. ||

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Learning theorists have argued that learning and development are not like an assembly-line which can be broken down into discrete steps occurring with machine-time precision, but an organic process that unfolds in complex ways according to its own pace and rhythm. Teaching and learning occurs in complex ecosystems, dynamic environments where teachers, students, materials and supplies, texts, technologies, concepts, social structures, and architectures are interdependently related and interactive. Using the Learning Record, teachers (and students) are actively searching for, and documenting, positive evidence of student development across five dimensions: confidence and independence, knowledge and understanding, skills and strategies, use of prior and emerging experience, and critical reflection. These five dimensions cannot be "separated out" and treated individually; rather, they are dynamically interwoven. Our goals for a particular class should describe a trajectory of learning across multiple dimensions, and our measurements should be able to identify the paths taken by students and their progress from their individual starting points along that trajectory. Individually, learners can expect to make progress across these five dimensions:

Confidence and independence
We see growth and development when learners' confidence and independence become congruent with their actual abilities and skills, content knowledge, use of experience, and reflectiveness about their own learning. It is not a simple case of "more (confidence and independence) is better." In a science class, for example, an overconfident student who has relied on faulty or underdeveloped skills and strategies learns to seek help when facing an obstacle; or a shy student begins to trust her own abilities, and to insist on presenting her own point of view in discussion. In both cases, students are developing along the dimension of confidence and independence.

Skills and strategies
Skills and strategies represent the "know-how" aspect of learning. When we speak of "performance" or "mastery," we generally mean that learners have developed skills and strategies to function successfully in certain situations. Skills and strategies are not only specific to particular disciplines, but often cross disciplinary boundaries. In a writing class, for example, students develop many specific skills and strategies involved in composing and communicating effectively, from research to concept development to organization to polishing grammar and correctness, and often including technological skills for computer communication.

Knowledge and understanding
Knowledge and understanding refers to the "content" knowledge gained in particular subject areas. Knowledge and understanding is the most familiar dimension, focusing on the "know-what" aspect of learning. In a psychology class, knowledge and understanding might answer a wide range of questions such as, What is Freud's concept of ego? Who was Carl Jung? What is "behaviorism"? These are typical content questions. Knowledge and understanding in such classes includes what students are learning about the topics; research methods; the theories, concepts, and practices of a discipline; the methods of organizing and presenting our ideas to others, and so on.

Use of prior and emerging experience
The use of prior and emerging experience involves learners' abilities to draw on their own experience and connect it to their work. A crucial but often unrecognized dimension of learning is the capacity to make use of prior experience as well as emerging experience in new situations. It is necessary to observe learners over a period of time while they engage in a variety of activities in order to account for the development of this important capability, which is at the heart of creative thinking and its application. With traditional methods of evaluating learning, we cannot discover just how a learner's prior experience might be brought to bear to help scaffold new understandings, or how ongoing experience shapes the content knowledge or skills and strategies the learner is developing. In a math class, students scaffold new knowledge through applying the principles and procedures they've already learned: algebra depends on the capacity to apply basic arithmetic procedures, for example.

Reflection
Reflection refers to the developing awareness of the learner's own learning process, as well as more analytical approaches to the subject being studied. When we speak of reflection as a crucial component of learning, we are not using the term in its commonsense meaning of reverie or abstract introspection. We are referring to the development of the learner's ability to step back and consider a situation critically and analytically, with growing insight into his or her own learning processes, a kind of metacognition. It provides the "big picture" for the specific details. For example, students in a history class examining fragmentary documents and researching an era or event use reflection to discover patterns in the evidence and construct a historical narrative. Learners need to develop this capability in order to use what they are learning in other contexts, to recognize the limitations or obstacles confronting them in a given situation, to take advantage of their prior knowledge and experience, and to strengthen their own performance.

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Please read carefully!
The Learning Record is a public record that documents your activities and accomplishments for this class. However, no one except you and your instructor will have access to identifying personal information, such as your name or email address. You may request that only your classmates and your teacher may have access to your Learning Record by checking the appropriate box on your Learning Record's first page. ("No"). In your class, you turn in all assigned work so that your teacher can give you credit for it. You keep a portfolio of all of your work as well as the teacher’s responses to it. At the midterm and at the end of the term you review all of your work and select the specific examples of work and observations to include with the Learning Record. You control the content of your Learning Record.

Who has access to your Learning Record? What do they have access to and when?
During the class term I n other words, any archives of student work are intended to support research, professional development of teachers, program evaluation and improvement, and sound public policy.
 * Your tea cher has access to all information in your Learning Record that you have kept public, as well as identifying information (to allow your grade to be assigned)
 * Your classmates. Several of your classmates may have access to the public parts of your Learning Record during the peer review process called Moderation Reading. They may have access to work samples for peer review. They will not have access to anything you have marked private, to your notebook, or to your Part C Evaluation and grade estimate.
 * After the end of the class term and after final grades have been submitted,** Learning Records may be saved to an archive by your teacher. If you have checked the “no” box on your Learning Record front page, your LR will not be contributed to the archive. Information identifying students will be removed in the archive; no one will have access to this information.
 * Researchers will have access to all public information in archived Learning Records except student identification information. We expect that the archives may serve as an important resource for research on teaching and learning
 * Other teachers will have access to all public information in archived Learning Records except student identification information. Teachers read the Learning Records of other teachers in Moderation Readings, which are used for large-scale assessment and professional development. We expect that the archives will be an important resource for preparing new teachers and for professional development of experienced teachers
 * Administrators will have access to all public information in archived Learning Records except student identification information. We expect that administrators will use the archives to develop, evaluate, and improve programs
 * Educational policy makers will have access to all public information in archived Learning Records except student identification information. We expect that government agencies and other policy makers will use the archives to improve educational policies on a wide range of issues affecting teachers, students, and educational institutions. We also hope that the archives will help policy makers recognize that the Learning Record model is a powerful and trustworthy alternative to standardized testing.

What if I don't want to allow access to my Learning Record by people outside my class?
Remember to check the “no” box on your Learning Record's privacy question.

How might material from my Learning Record be used?
Learning Record information will only be provided for non-commercial educational use, including: Except for your teacher, no one will have access to any of your identifying information. To ensure confidentiality, be sure to remove any information that identifies you or any classmates from files that you upload to your Learning Record. Use first names only when referring to classmates in your observations or work samples.
 * Academic research, including publication in books, articles, conference presentations, and technical papers.
 * Professional development of teachers.
 * Development, evaluation, and improvement of programs.
 * Informing public educational policy.

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