Data Collection, Planning, and Assessment

Hannah-Rose Mabe

Regent University

UED 496: Field Experience E-Portfolio

Dr. Flannagan

April 11, 2022

 Data Collection, Planning, and Assessment

Creating lessons and activities that target students’ strengths and improve their areas of

weakness can only be accomplished by assessing what students know before you start teaching.

For this reason, giving pre-assessments and using their data to guide instruction is of paramount

importance when it comes to seeing every student succeed and reach their full potential. For

assessments, pre and post, to be effective and dependable they must be aligned with the

standards and learning outcomes students need to know (Wiggins & McTighe, 2005). To make

pre-assessments worth their time, Guskey and Wiggins say that it is important to “keep in mind

the purposes and potential benefits that have been identified by literature” (2016). Some of these

benefits include, but are not limited to, “determining students’ prior knowledge and skills,

monitoring student progress, communicating expectations, focusing students’ attention on

learning targets, checking for misconceptions, and identifying students’ interests, talents, and

preferred ways of learning” (Guskey & Wiggins, 2016).

This pre-assessment was given in my second placement, which was at Portlock Primary

School. I student teach in first grade and have sixteen students. In our class, we have six students

with Individualized Learning Plans (IEPs), two of these students are also English Language

Learners (ELLs). We also have one student that is in the process of getting a 504 plan for

suspected ADHD. Portlock is a title one school, and all our students receive free breakfast and

lunch. The current unit that is being unpacked in math is about the passage of time. This unit

focuses on telling time on digital and analog clocks, as well as interpreting a calendar. This unit

is based on Standard of Learning (SOL) 1.9, which states “1.9 The student will investigate the

passage of time and a) tell time to the hour and half-hour, using analog and digital clocks; and b)

read and interpret a calendar” (Virginia Department of Education, 2016). The pre-assessment
was based on this SOL. The pre-assessment included 6 questions on time and the calendar.

Question 1 required students to circle the digital clock that showed the time 12:30. Question 2

required students to look at a digital clock and select the answer that had the correct written time.

Question 3 requires students to circle the analog clock that read 7:00. Question 4 asked students

to draw the hand on a blank analog clock so that it would read 3:30. Question 5 required students

to look at a date on the calendar and determine what day the date fell on. Question 6 required

students to use the calendar to determine how many Sundays were in the month.

There were two pitfalls to the pre-assessment that I created. The first pitfall was in

relation to question two. The clock shown on the pre-assessment was 11:00, however this answer

choice was not available for students. My CT and I both overlooked this as we proofread the pre-

assessment. I unfortunately did not realize this oversight until students were taking the pre-

assessment, so students had to skip this question. The next pitfall was in relation to question 3.

Students had to choose which clock read 7:00 from four analog clocks. While there was nothing

wrong with this question, it could have been better. To make this question a better question, I

should have included one clock that read 7:30. This would have allowed me to see which

students already knew the difference in hour and half hour. One strength of this pre-assessment

was that it included two higher-level thinking questions that would allow me to see if some

students knew more than what was anticipated. Question 4 required students to draw the hands

on a blank analog clock. This would allow me to see if any of the students already knew how to

read an analog clock and see if they knew the appropriate length to make the hands. The second

higher-level thinking question was questions 6. This question required students to know how to

read and interpret a calendar. Below is a blank copy of the pre-assessment and a graph of student

scores.
 Key
O 100+ N 70-79
S 90-99 U 69 or less
P 80-89

Pre-Assessment Score
Student 1 20%
Student 2 80%
Student 3 40%
Student 4 40%
Student 5 100%
Student 6 20%
Student 7 80%
Student 8 80%
Student 9 60%
Student 10 60%
Student 11 60%
Student 12 60%
Student 13 80%
Student 14 60%
Student 15 80%
Student 16 80%

Activities and Student Work Samples

The first activity we did that I feel made a huge difference in my students’ understanding

of the analog clock occurred on our second day of this unit. On day two, I introduced the analog
clock to students. We started by creating an anchor chart as a class on analog clocks. In the

creation of this anchor chart, we talked about where they had seen the analog clock before, its

parts (face and hands- hour and minute). We talked about the hands on the clock and their

lengths. Then I taught my students a song I wrote about the hands of the analog clock. The song

helped students to remember the short hand is the hour hand and the long hand is the minute

hand. After students learned this song, they got the supplies to create their own analog clock.

Students had to cut out the face with the minutes, the face with the hours, and both hands for the

clock. The minute and hour face were glued together in the middle. A brad fastener was used to

attach the hands to the clock in a way where they could still move. This activity required a lot of

modeling from me, and then the students repeated what I showed to create their clock. This math

manipulative took an abstract concept, time, and made it more concrete for the students. Once

students had created their clocks, we played a “time drill game”. I called out a time and the

students had to make their clock show the time I called. All the students in my class created this

clock. Students with IEPs sat with a teacher during this time for extra help with the kinesthetic

portion of this activity. These students needed a little extra help at first understanding how to

move their hands on their clock. This clock could then be used to help scaffold assignments

throughout the week. If students were struggling to understand the minutes of the clock, or if

they had a more advanced task to complete, they could pull out their analog clock to double

check. Below are some examples of the clocks students made.

 The next activity I had students do was a time worksheet that was differentiated by

ability. Students completed this worksheet in a math station while I met with math small groups.

For my group of students that were not quite ready, they had to color a set of watches based on

the time the watched showed. There was a key at the top that told them what color to make each

time. This group could use the analog clock they made earlier in the week to create the time and

check the minutes on the minute face of the clock. This groups worksheet only had times to the

hour and half hour. My next group was my group that is on grade level. They completed the

same watch worksheet. However, they did this side of the worksheet without their analog clock.

To do this side of the worksheet, they had to remember that when the minute had point to the six
it represents half hour and when it points to the twelve it represents the hour. Students who were

on grade level then flipped the worksheet over and completed a set of clocks that had times

outside of hour and half hour. On grade level students were able to use their analog clocks they

made for this since it included times outside of the hour and half hour. I had a small group of

students who grasped the analog clock from day one and needed a worksheet with more of a

challenge. These students completed side 2 of the worksheet on their own without the help of

their analog clock. This allowed them to practice times outside of the hour and half hour. Below

are some pictures of student examples. The first two photos are from my not quite ready group.

The third photo is for my on grade level group. They are showing how they used their analog

clock to help them find the last time on their worksheet. The last photo is from one of my

students who is above grade level and needs an extra challenge.

 The next set of activities were done for calendar at the teacher table during math centers.

Students have talked and learned about the calendar since the beginning of the year. However,

the skills they have been learning throughout the year have been basic calendar skills like

reading the calendar to interpret the current month, day, and year. In this unit, we are focusing on

reading and interpreting a calendar in deeper and more complex ways. These activities were
done at the teacher table on day one of calendar and were based on ability levels. I have a small

portion of my students with IEPs that struggle to answer higher level thinking questions. Before

giving them a big calendar with a lot of questions, I decided to start them out with an activity

where they had to use clues to determine a specific day of the week. The clues were read to the

students, and they sang the days of the week song for each question to help them figure out the

answer. All students learned the day of the week song at the beginning of the year and sing it

every day when we review calendar. My group that is on grade level received a calendar for

February 2022. This calendar was in a sleeve protector. I asked a series of questions and students

had to circle the answer to the question on their calendar. The questions were things like “how

many days are in February? Valentine’s day is on February 14th, what day of the week was

Valentine’s Day? Suzie went to a party the day before Valentine’s Day, what was the date of the

party? etc.” My last group was with students who are meeting the grade level standard for

calendar with ease and need a little bit more of a challenge. These students received a blank

calendar in a protective sleeve. I told the students we would create an April calendar and asked

them where we should write April. Then I asked the students how many days were in April.

Once we established there were 30 days in April, they had to fill out the blank calendar. They

were instructed to start the month of April on Friday. Once students had completed this, they

answered a series of questions about their calendar like the on grade level group did. Below are

pictures of student work from each group. The first two pictures are from my not quite ready

group. The third and fourth picture are from my on grade level group. The last two pictures are

from my on grade level and needs a challenge group.

 The next activity we did was an interpreting the calendar assignment. For this

assignment, students were given a calendar of September and a page with directions/questions

about the calendar. Students had to correctly follow these directions or questions to read and

interpret the calendar. This activity was not differentiated because it was done towards the end of

the week and all students need to be able to do these kinds of questions on their own. Students

with IEPs/read aloud accommodations sat at the teacher table. The questions were read to them.

However, students had to answer the questions on their own. Students who were on grade level

completed this activity independently. Due to our guided practice taking so long, some students

were not able to finish this during independent practice. If students did not complete this, they

will complete it for morning work the following day. Below are some pictures of student

examples from this activity.

 Post Assessment Data and Conclusions

The post assessment used to collect student data was an assessment the whole grade level

used to assess this unit. This assessment came from the district and is directly aligned with the

state standards for time. The post assessment had ten questions. The first five questions were

about time. These questions were a mix of digital and analog clocks. The students had to identify

which clock(s) identified the time given. The next five questions required students to read and

interpret a calendar. One of the questions required students to determine the number of Sundays

in a month given the calendar. The rest of the questions required students to use the calendar to

determine the day and/or date something occurred. Below is a blank copy of the assessment as

well as a table and graph of student scores. This table and graph compare the pre and post

assessment data for all students.

 Key
O 100+ N 70-79
S 90-99 U 69 or less
P 80-89

Pre-Assessment Post Assessment

Score Score Notes
Student Student is an ELL with developmental delay. Did
1 20% 40% really well. Just needs more time with the material.
Student Student knows all the material. He rushed through
2 80% 80% the test and made silly mistakes.
Student missed all instruction on calendar. He got
Student all the time questions correct but missed all the
3 40% 50% calendar questions.
Student
4 40% 80%
Student
5 100% 100%
Student struggles with all higher-level thinking
Student questions. He also gets pulled during a lot of our
6 20% 30% instruction time for his SPED services.
Student
7 80% 100%
Student
8 80% 90%
Student
9 60% 100%
Student
10 60% 90%
Struggled with time on pre-assessment. On the
Post assessment, he made 2 silly mistakes on time
Student and struggled with more complex calendar
11 60% 50% questions.
Student
12 60% 90%
Student
13 80% 80%
Still working on analog clock. Has gotten a lot
Student better. Sometimes still gets the hour and minute
14 60% 90% hand confused though.
Student
15 80% 100%
Student
16 80% 90%
 Based on my pre-assessment, I realized my students knew how to read the digital clock. I

believe this is because they see digital clocks on so many things they use every day- our

smartboard, their computers, tablets, phones, etc. However, most students did not know how to

read an analog clock. Time can be a very difficult topic for students to learn, so we started out

with a brief lesson on digital time and how to read the clock. We used this lesson to talk about

how you should use the phrase “o’clock” when a time ends in two zeros. We also talked about

reading times to the half hour and how to tell what number the hour hand was pointing at when it

read a half hour time. This lesson was mainly to give students a confidence boost before we went

into the analog clock. The analog clock can be very tricky for students because it is very

abstract. To help students have a more concrete visual, and to help create a scaffold students

could use throughout the week, we made our own analog clocks using an hour and minute face

template. We spent one week on time. When creating my math groups for our week on time, I

specifically looked at the questions on time and how students did on the assessment. My below
grade level group for time consisted of student 1, 6, 9, 11, and 15. My on grade level group

consisted of student 3, 8, 10, 12, 13, and 16. My on grade level and needs a challenge group

consisted of student 2, 4, 5, 7, and 14. After teaching clock for one week, I taught calendar for

one week and students practiced clock in their spiral review station. The students have been

working on basic calendar reading/interpreting skills since the beginning of the school year, so

we jumped into how to figure out more complex calendar questions from day 1 of our calendar

instruction. The main differentiation/scaffolding for our calendar activities was for things at the

teacher table/independent work, not whole group instruction. I also used the pre-assessment data

to form my groups for calendar. For calendar, I had three groups. One below grade level, one on

grade level, and one on grade level but needed a challenge group. My below grade level group

consisted of student 1, 3, 6, and 15. My on grade level group consisted of students 8, 9, 10, 11,

12, and 14. My on grade level but needs a challenge group consisted of students 2, 4, 5, 7, 13,

and 16.

The six students whose data I will discuss are student 2, 3, 5, 6, 11, and 15. Students 6,

11, and 15 tend to be in my below grade level group. All three of these students have IEPs and

get pulled throughout the day for a few different services. Student 6 made some improvement

from our pre-assessment to our post assessment. However, it was very minimal. The student did

well with reading the digital time. However, could not grasp the minutes on the analog clock

without a scaffold. This student also missed a majority of our math block due to being pulled for

sped services during math time. This student needs more time to be able to make connections

with what they have learned about the analog clock. This student knows how to read and

interpret the calendar, but rushes through the calendar and makes silly mistakes. Student 11

showed a regression of progress from the pre-assessment to the post assessment. This student
also gets pulled during our math time and misses out on valuable instruction. I believe the reason

he did worse on the post assessment is because he made some silly mistakes on the time

questions, which based on his activities and station work, I know he grasps time. He also missed

several of the complex calendar questions. I had students in my low group do a days of the week

clues worksheet before introducing them to more complex questions. Looking back, I do not

believe this was the best scaffold. I liked that they got some practice using clues/question stems

to figure out the day of the week. However, it took time away from being able to get extra

practice with the more complex calendar questions that they would see on it test. I think it would

have been better to give them the same assignment as their peers but give their group more

modeling for it at the teacher table. I think these 2 students would have benefitted from having

more time to work on the complex calendar questions. In the future, I would try to pull these

students in the morning while they are having breakfast to teach them what we will be learning

in math. That would allow them to at least see some of the material since they get pulled for

services during math. I also would try to have some extra time and calendar activities for them to

do with the sped teacher if they finish their work early. Student 15 also tends to be below grade

level. However, this student caught on to the material we were learning very fast. This student

really benefitted from the math manipulatives for time. They also understood calendar very

quickly. The activities this student did were perfect for their skill set. It gave the student a little

bit of a challenge, but it was not too easy.

When looking at the pre-assessment for student 3, I could tell they had a good grasp on

digital time, they needed some work on analog clocks, and calendar was a struggle for the

student. For time, this student was in my on grade level group. After our whole group lesson on

analog clocks, the student was able to consistently meet grade level expectations on time. The
pre-assessment showed this student struggled with calendar, regardless of the level of thinking

the question required. The students’ post assessment does not show much improvement because

the student was absent for our instruction on calendar. This student was able to correctly answer

all questions on time but missed all the calendar questions. I will be going back and working on

teaching the calendar material to this student. I will pull the student for a few minutes in the

morning during breakfast. I will also try to keep this student for a few minutes after their math

group is done to review calendar.

The last two students, student 2 and 5, were in my on grade level and needs a challenge

group for time and calendar. According to the pre-assessment, student 2 needed a little work on

analog clocks. However, when I taught my first whole group lesson on the analog clock, this

student brought up the fact they knew how to count the minutes on the analog clock and showed

me how to count the minutes by 5’s. This student tends to rush through their work, so I believe

that is why they missed the questions on analog time for the pre-assessment. On the day of the

post assessment, the student rushed through the test. The student made silly mistakes on two

questions because they rushed through the test. For example, one of the questions asked students

to circle all the clocks that showed the time eleven o’clock. The student circled one clock that

said eleven o’clock and one that said 11:12. While I was grading, I called them over to ask them

about the two questions they missed, without saying they got it wrong. The student was

immediately able to point out their mistake and tell me what the correct answer was. Even

though I know this student knows the material, even beyond what is required, their score looks

like they made no improvement. The other student in my on grade level and needs a challenge

group was student 5. This student knew all the questions on the pre-assessment and consistently

solved higher level thinking problem at the teacher table and in independent work. For both
students, and the other students in their group, I had them create a lot of their own calendars and

times. They even got to drill each other on questions for time and calendar. They enjoyed the

challenge of having to create a time or calendar based on the information I gave them. They also

loved being able to create questions for their group.

All but one of my students were able to make progress in this unit. I still have a lot of

remediation to do with my students who are below grade level. I have 2 ways I plan on getting

this remediation in. First is in the morning during breakfast. During this time, I can pull small

groups of students to my table to review our skills for time and calendar. We have lots of

different time card sorts and review games we can play. This way, it will feel like they are

playing a game, but we are also getting in valuable review. I am also going to try to spend the

last 5 minutes of their math small group reviewing either time or calendar. We will switch off

each day so that students can get more teacher table help with both skills. Then all my students

will be getting some remediation on the skills of time and calendar throughout their math

stations. Students go to 3 stations ever day during math. One station is teacher table, where they

work on the skill we are learning that day with the teacher’s assistance. Station 2 is a station

where they practice the new skill we are learning independently. Station 3 is a spiral review

station. At this station, student review other skills we have learned throughout the year. For the

next couple weeks, I will include a few different time and/or calendar related activities for

students to do during this time. This will help reinforce what they have learned and help

preventing them from losing that information.

 References

Guskey, Thomas R. and McTighe, Jay, "PRE-ASSESSMENT: Promises and Cautions" (2016).

Educational, School, and Counseling Psychology Faculty Publications. 17.

https://uknowledge.uky.edu/edp_facpub/17

Virginia Department of Education. (2016). Mathematics 2016 Standards of Learning Grade 1

Curriculum. Virginia Department of Education. Retrieved April 4, 2022, from

https://www.doe.virginia.gov/testing/sol/standards_docs/mathematics/2016/cf/

grade6math-cf.docx

Wiggins, G. P., & McTighe, J. (2005). Understanding by design (2nd ed.). Association for

Supervision and Curriculum Development.