Rubistar

We have been introduced to this AMAZING! website rubistar and I think that whoever made it is a GENOUS!! It has helped me alot and I really think that teachers should use it. It makes it much more easier to make a rubric instead of having to do one from scratch in a microsoft program. I actually recently worked on a rubric for a lesson plan I did and it took me literally less than 1o minutes. I really like this site and I really think I will continue to use it, not only as a student but also later on in when I am out working as a teacher in a classroom. =) If its out there, lets use it and take advantage of it =)

Rubrics

Rubrics, a tool that is used by teachers to grade a student. There are some advantages to using rubrics and one of the main ones is that they (rubrics) help studentsknow what is that the teacher expects from their students in the final product of their assignments. Also I think that rubrics help students recognize their own weaknesses. Also they are a good way to grade because when an assignment is given back, students know exactly where they made a mistake and also it tells the students exactly where the grades are coming from. For example, if a teacher is going to grade an essay, he or she needs to know what he/she is looking for in this assignment. It is going to be easier and fairer, if he/she has a rubric rather than just look at an essay and give a grade. Because what happens if she/he just graded an essay, but the next essay it is of a better quality than the previous one?

When I first heard about rubrics, I had no idea what it was but as I read about it and Dr. Luongo talked about it in class (Teaching Language Arts) I have come to understood the purpose of them and appreciating them. They helped me understand what my weaknesses are and by looking at my future career as a teacher I think that Rubrics is definitely going to be used in my classroom.

Learning Targets

When I first read the topic "Learning Targets" the first thing that came to mind was, especific learning areas that should be targeted by the teacher in a lesson, and I wasn't wrong. After reading some articles and the book, I have realized that Learning targets are not only points that should be taught, but rather that MUST be taught. These targets are targets that the state gives and should be followed, because by planning a lesson is that we will be know for sure ourselfves as teachers what the point of the lesson is, because if we don't how are students know at the end of the lsson?
Also, by knowing the learning targets, it will be easier to select the appropriate assessment teachniques, and also we will know that student's performance of learning targets is also numerous and varied.

http://www.bham.wednet.edu/departments/currdept/curroff/LTIndex.htm
http://depts.washington.edu/ctltstaf/example_portfolios/williams/pages/92583.html

Fairness in Assessment

As I was doing some research on fairness in assessment, I came across a very interesting article. An article that I clearly relate to. The name if the article is "Fairness in Assessment" http://www.cs.nott.ac.uk/~smx/PGCHE/fairness.html which highlight the issue of whether it is fair to grade students at the same level or should the cultural background be considered as a factor that might affect the performance of the students. This article talks specifically about students whose first language is not english. Me, being a non-English native speaker, I can say that learning English was not easy. I had always liked the language, but when it came to actually learning it, I had a very hard time, especially when it came to the writing part, because when I translated sentences, it made no sense. Also, for me it was double the work as a english native speaker, because my thoughts came in spanish and in my mind I had to translate it and the even harder part was to try and make sense when I spoke, or wrote it. For me, it was not only having to become accostumed to a new language, but also to a new "world" to me.
As I read the article, many questions came to mind, questions that are so hard to answer by reading articles and readung the book, because teachers have to be fair when it comes to grading his/her students, but what happens when a students first language is not english? is the teacher supposed to be a bit of a hard grader on those that english is their first language? Another fact that is mentioned in this article is that students compare their work, and what is supposed to happen when two ro three students think that they did a very similar work, yet received different grades? So as teachers, what are we supposed to do or better yet how are we supposed to explain that we have graded them based on their english level? and my final question still is, how are we as teachers try and "seem" fully fair?