Learning Media Assessments

Assessment is a tool used in education and it is an important component of learning. The primary purpose of assessment is to improve student’s learning, I administered four types of assessments to Camila, a 2 and a half years old Hipic girl.

The assessments administered to Camila were:

Denver II, checklist, anecdotal, and interest survey.

Denver II: Physical

The Denver II assessment was designed to monitor the development of infants and preschool-aged children; it includes the screening of the four domains, Personal-social: which is getting along with people and caring for personal needs,

Fine Motor-Adaptive: this includes eye hand coordination, manipulation of small objects, and problem solving, Language: it includes hearing, understanding, and using language, and Gross motor: it includes sitting, walking, jumping, and overall large muscle movement in general.

The scoring is as follow:

P= pass- child successfully performs item,

F= Fail- child does not successfully perform item.

NO= No opportunity- the child has not had the chance to perform the item, or report from caregiver is that child does not do the item due to restrictions from caregiver or other reasons, and

R= Refusal- the child refuses to attempt the item, this can be minimized just by asking the child to do the item rather than asking.

Purpose:

The purpose of the Denver II assessment is to screen children from 1 to 6 years of age for possible developmental problems or issues, to confirm suspected problems with an objective measure, and to monitor children at risk for developmental problems.

The assessment was administered with the mother participation; with the gross motor part done outside. I tried to make both of them comfortable; to do the fine motor screening, Camila sat at the floor and her mother sat beside her.

I explained to the mother that the child was not expected to pass all the items, but we were going to allow the child to manipulate the items to be used to feel comfortable by the time the activity was done. A set of blocks were given to Camila and she was told to make a tower with eight blocks.

Camila carefully piled ten blocks making sure all the blocks were straight. She made three other towers with the other blocks. Camila imitated a vertical line.Camila, her mother and I went outside to do the gross motor part, Camila’s mother showed Camila how to jump a broad jump and throw the ball over her head, she then encouraged Camila to imitate her; three trials were given to do the broad jump, the first two times scoring a F and the third a P.

Camila’s mother and I praised Camila for her efforts in doing the tasks.To minimized bias, I performed the assessment in Spanish; I explained the tasks we were going to work to Camila’s mother before doing them. I gave her a copy of the assessment for her to read the items at the same time I was asking them.

I asked the mother first about each item then we asked Camila to do each task to confirm her development.Checklist: Social and EmotionalA checklist is a tool for identifying the presence or absence of conceptual knowledge, skills, or behaviors. Checklists are tools that state specific criteria and allow teachers and students to gather information that can provide an informal profile of each child.

Checklists also help teachers to make judgements about what students know and can do in relation to the outcomes. Checklists allow teachers to consistently monitor and document progress and focus extra attention on the items that mark deficiencies in development growth.

The checklist may assess domains such as fine and gross motor, expressive and receptive language, intellectual, social-emotional, and self-help skills. These checklists provide information about what a child can and cannot do in each developmental area. Teachers can use this information to help set goals for a child and plan activities that help the child progress.

An example of a developmental checklist, Observation Checklist for Teachers, is at the end of this chapter. Other checklists provide teachers with a record of what learning centers the children choose, or which materials they use most often. They are helpful in assuring, for example, that children who spend most of their free time in the art area are encouraged to explore other activity centers.

The teacher can help the child make this transition by setting up a favorite art activity in another part of the room, such as painting clouds and the sky for a castle that will be built with blocks and small boxes

Purpose:

The purpose of checklists is to identify and record student’s, skills, strategies, attitudes, and behaviors that are necessary for effective learning. Checklists can also be used to communicate a student’s learning to his/her parents.The assessment was administered during several days of observation during play and circle time.

I observed Camila’s choices and decisions when she was playing in the pretend area. Camila played along other children and imitated what another girl did when playing with a small doll. During circle time she waited for her turn to hold the ball when playing a game.

Bias was minimized when I wrote only the facts and focus on Camila’s strengths Observation: Anecdotal record: CognitiveAn anecdote is an account of an event in a child’s day; the record of this event can be detailed or brief.

In other words is a short story detailing the facts of an event in the child’s day. These short reports described in a factual way, the incident, its context, and what was said or done by the participant. On most cases anecdotes focus on very simple, everyday interactions among children, adults and children, as well as materials and children in the environment.

Purpose:

Anecdotes capture the richness and complexity of the moment as children interact with one another and with materials. These records of child behavior and learning accumulated over the time enhance the teacher’s understanding of the individual child as patterns or profiles begin to emerge.

Behavior change can be tracked and documented and placed in the child’s portfolio resulting in suggestions for future observations, curriculum planning and student or parent conferences. The anecdotes or observations were done during center time; my observations were done of what Camila did and what she said while she was playing with the blocks and the farm animals.

Camila built a tower of eight blocks and called the teacher to see it, she then made other small towers and put the animals on the top of each tower; she clapped her hands when she saw the results. Camila also used other blocks to make a little cage for the baby animals.Bias was minimized when I wrote only the facts and quotes she used when playing.

I also focused only on Camila’s strengths.Interest survey:Interest surveys provide valuable information from students that teachers can use to establish and maintain positive relationships; provide information of the students’ individual needs and preferences.

Purpose:

The purpose of the interest surveys is to help teachers in choosing the appropriate materials and instructional decisions based on the expressed interests for each student. Students are more likely to be engaged if the instruction connects to their interest.

I started the survey with Camila by showing several books; Camila looked at the books and grabbed the book of Brown Bear. I let Camila look at the book for a while and then showed her the survey and explained to her what she needed to do.

I covered the survey and uncover just the question I was asking at the time. I also provided the stickers to use one at a time for her to choose the answer she wanted. Bias was minimized when the survey was done in Spanish and Camila was let to put on a sticker on each answer she chose. Camila took her time to put the sticker on the desired picture and I let her take her time looking at the survey’s question and pictures.