Introduction
When talking about conducting an assessment, there are two schools of thought as to why one needs an assessment. There were times when children were held back to repeat the same class if they didn’t get through these assessments/exams. With the changing dynamics of learnability and learners’ profiles and changing needs of the world, one may wonder if there is a need to conduct such “paper and pencil exams.” If schools continue to practice the archaic methods for conducting the exams and overall skills are assessed by regurgitating the information, then we are setting our children up for failure. In a world where information is readily available through a prompt on devices – Google, Alexa, Siri… How are we preparing these children if we are only evaluating the children’s competence through these tests? Something to ponder on… isn’t it?
Periodic evaluation of Academic skills at Diversity
We at Diversity believe our children are ever ready to learn and reflect when they need to. Reflection and application of learning are beyond assessment through an activity sheet or in a written form. At Diversity, we provide a detailed Transcript that gives a holistic perspective on a child’s milestones and skill development. This transcript is not limited to a child’s academic skills but some of the things which you may see in this transcript include but not limited to a child’s self-management skills, social skills, design thinking skills, psychomotor and psychosensory skills. We stand by our principle when our goal is to develop a whole child as well-being, i.e., concept building and character building.
In addition to that, the periodic evaluation of our Vividers’ academic learning is an endeavor to demonstrate an organized reflection. The goal of these evaluations is to aid us in differentiating learning and needs for the children, concept reinforcement, and as means for gauging the needs of a child for further academic development and concept building.
Although Diversity records, manages, analyses, and interprets a child’s developmental milestones and skills through a wide variety of tools on a day-to-day basis. Periodic Academic Evaluation is for the below objectives
- Concept:
- Knows
- Does not know
- Critical (LOTS) Lower-Order-Thinking Skills:
- Remembers
- Understands
- Applies
- Critical (HOTS) (Higher-order-Thinking Skills):
- Analyzes
- Evaluates
- Creates
- Critical HOES (Higher-Order Execution Skills): Higher-order executive functions are a set of action-oriented processes that involve a wide range of cognitive functions (including planning, reaching the finishing line, course-correction, foresightedness, and crisis management), focusing attention, goal-directed persistence, flexibility, response inhibition, and emotional self-regulation.
Key Differentiators
One may wonder how conducting the periodic evaluation is different from the conventional exams and how this will be beneficial for the child.
- At Diversity, we do not disclose the date of the evaluation to the Teachers, children, and Parents.
- We do not intimidate the children that there is an “exam” and that they must adhere to certain rules. Nobody will gain anything with this kind of setting.
- We do not always use written format for tests… this can be as simple as going through flashcards for sight words.
- There is no grading system for the periodic evaluation, it is as simple as if the child knows the concept and applies it, if not we have a reinforcement plan.
- At diversity, we do not assess the children purely on these academic skills, therefore we also provide the transcript of overall developmental milestones and skill set the child has achieved.
Periodic evaluations at Diversity are part of a comprehensive assessment strategy, tests are age-appropriate, well-designed, and not overly stressful for young students. The primary goal is to support learning and growth rather than create unnecessary pressure on the child and stunt their overall development.
