Pre assessment

The pre assessment was made up of 11 questions.  I chose mostly questions that required an answer of a word or short phrase because short answer questions, such as true/false can involve guessing and I wanted to see what the students knew in a way that still allowed those who didn’t know too much about the topic to get the answers right and not feel discouraged.  This is why I didn’t choose long answer questions for more than one question, because I wanted to give students a fair chance to show their knowledge without feeling the pressure of coming up with a long answer.  The test was set out with the easier questions first and the more difficult questions later to give students an opportunity to warm up their brains and think about the topic before they had to think about it in depth.  For example, the first question merely asks students to name 3 major world religions.  What I was hoping to achieve by putting this question first was to draw to mind information about these religions.  The second last question asked students to compare and contrast 2 major religions, which is involves more higher order thinking, so I put it closer to the end of the assessment.

The test was straightforward in terms of the answers that I was looking for.  Most of them were one or two word answers to simple factual questions such as “Name 2 Eastern religions that believe in reincarnation” (question 3).  In fact, all the questions were straightforward answers that didn’t require personal opinion or thinking outside of the box.  I set the test up this way because I wanted to give students a chance to get to know my teaching style and expectations before I asked them to give their opinions on such a personal and sensitive matter as religion, and the pre assessment was the first thing I did on my first day of teaching.  The instructions on the test were pretty clear.  I asked students to answer on a separate sheet of paper, number all the questions and put their names on it.  I made sure to tell them that it would not be graded but was intended to show me what they knew so that I knew what to teach.  The aim of this pre assessment was to get a feel for what students already knew and what I would have to teach them in order for them to meet the unit objectives and state standards.

Each question on my pre-assessment related back to the state standards for seventh grade geography in Oregon.  The questions on the pre assessment reflected the core components of the three standards I covered.  The three standards I addressed in this unit were: 7.1 Describe world religions and compare their beliefs, 7.12 Analyze the religions of the Eastern and Western Hemispheres and 7.18 Investigate current issues in the Eastern Hemisphere and how they relate to other countries, including the United States.  Questions 1, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 11 of the pre assessment referred to standard 7.1, questions 2, 3, 4, 7 and 10 related to standard 7.12 and question 12 reflected standard 7.18.

My 5 objectives for the unit were related to the pre assessment because the questions addressed various aspects of what I had planned to teach in order to fulfill the objectives.  My 5 objectives for the course were:

SWBAT describe the key terms related to religion.

SWBAT compare three monotheistic religions.

SWBAT explain the core beliefs of at least 3 different religions.

SWBAT research a religion choosing important information and report the information on a poster.

SWBAT compare and contrast the origins and tenets of the World’s major religions.

The first objective is addressed implicitly in all of the pre assessment questions because they all require a basic knowledge of key religious terms, however, this standard is explicitly addressed in questions 2, 4, 6, 8 and 10.  The second objective is addressed in question 10.  The third objective is addressed in question 11.  The fourth objective is not explicitly referred to in the pre assessment because it is an objective that requires research and not specific knowledge that can be shown in a pre test.  The fifth objective relates to 4, 10 and 11, but is also shown more implicitly in some of the other questions because they all require knowledge of different parts of different religions.  I chose objectives for this unit that represent the state standards in an accessible way, and I aimed to present the information outlined in the state standards and the unit objectives in a testable way in the pre assessment, making the information as clear and practical as possible.

The class has 34 students but only 27 students took the pre assessment because the rest were absent from school.  The average scores were low, with the average score being 26%.  The lowest score for the test was 5% and three students got that score.  The highest score for the pre assessment was 70%.  It was clear that some students did not take the pre assessment seriously, as is shown in the examples of student work in Appendix A.  This student clearly did not take it seriously because their answers had nothing to do with religion.  Students struggled with question 1, where many students put Catholicism as a religion, which is a common misconception.  20 of the 27 students got question 8 right, probably because it asked, “In which religion is Jesus the central figure?”  The Unites States has been a predominantly Christian country in the past so it makes sense that students would have a greater knowledge of Christianity than other religions.  12 students got questions 4 correct, which asked for the definitions of monotheism and polytheism.  I was surprised that 44% of the class was able to clearly identify the definitions of these words, which they may have broken down and realized that “mono” means one and then applied that to religion.  This showed some higher order thinking and analysis and application of words.