Title: Unit II Test

Date: February 2015

Description:
This artifact is the test I created for Unit II Early Inhabitants in
Wisconsin History during my student teaching experience. Included are
a blank copy and a copy of a students completed test. This test
includes terms, matching, and short answer questions about early
inhabitants of North America and the Native Americans of Wisconsin.
Wisconsin Teacher Standard Alignment:
I believe this experience best aligns with Standard Eight: Assessment
The teacher understands and uses formal and informal assessment
strategies to evaluate and insure the continuous intellectual, social,
and physical development of the pupil.
This best aligns with Standard Eight because this Unit II test was a
formal assessment to evaluate the understanding of the concepts
taught to the students in Unit II. I created this test to incorporate a
wide variety of testing strategies. Students were asked to fill in the
blank with terms associated with the aforementioned sentence. This
requires a very basic level of thinking. Next the students were asked to
label where each of the Wisconsin Native American tribes are located.
Here they had to recall a past homework assignment that asked them
to do the very same action. This raises the level of thinking. Finally,
they were asked to complete a variety of short answer questions. The
level of thinking varies greatly from just writing down a very
straightforward answer to ones where they have to predict and reflect
on various outcomes. An example of the latter would be the question
explain the significance of developing agriculture for the early
inhabitants. For this question the students had to think back to the
timeline of early inhabitants and understand that as agriculture was
developed, early people were able to then specialize in other things
such as tools and culture. This not only assesses how well the students
were able to understand a timeline, but how well they are able to
connect the dots between various concepts.
I am more competent now in this standard because this was the first
time I had ever written a test to assess how well my students
understood the lessons I was giving them. Overall the tests went well
with a majority of students in the A and B range. The process of writing
a test to assess my students was a learning experience. I know that all
my students are at different levels when it comes to how they learn
information. By creating a test with various levels of questioning, it
allows my students who struggle to be able to answer many questions,

while also push my advanced students to answer the higher level

questions with more detail and information. A formal assessment like
this is a good way to test student learning and development.
UW-Platteville Knowledge, Skill and Dispositional Statement
Alignment:
This experience best aligns with KSD1.f. Assesses Student Learning The candidate understands, is committed to, and can develop
assessments that are clearly stated and congruent with instructional
goals. The students are aware of how they are meeting the
established standards and are involved in the goal setting process.
This best aligns with KSD1.f because this assessment fully met my
instructional goals. I know this because on our review day I presented
the students with the unit objectives as a reminder and we went over
and filled them out together. Students were also able to see the test
they would be taking. The tests are not a mystery and I dont ask trick
questions. My formal assessment of Unit II is to gage how well my
students are able to recall what they have learned and also carry that
information further to answer the questions.
I am more competent after this experience because I understand how
developing assessments that align with my instructional goals is the
best way to assess student learning. These instructional goals are to be
developed before the test day so I know what I need to teach the
students and the students are aware of what information I am
expecting them to know. This was the assessment with be most
beneficial for understanding how well the students were able to
understand the information and what I may need to work on for future
lessons.
Secondary Alignment:
KSD1.c Selects Instructional Goals
KSD3.d Provides Feedback to Students
Reflection about teaching/learning:
I have learned a lot about assessment during this experience. First off I
learned the importance of setting up my unit test to meet my
instructional goals. It is important that the students know what they
are going to be tested on. Also when creating the test it is important to
have varying levels of assessment to make sure students in all ranges
of ability are able to perform well on this test.
Reflection about myself as a prospective teacher:

This experience has taught me many things that I will use in my future
classroom. First of all I will make sure I have instructional goals set in
place before I start the unit. Therefore I am able to plan my lessons
around those goals and able to assess how well the students were able
to understand and meet those same goals. I will also use this kind of
formal assessment in my future classroom because not only is it a
good assessment to see the development of my students, but it is also
a check on myself and my teaching practices. If I see that many
students missed a certain question on the test I know that I will need to
cover that more clearly in the future. If students do poorly overall on
the test, I may have to re-teach some lessons. Finally, if most of the
students do well on the test I know those instructional strategies
worked well and will continue them in the future.