Examining Student Work and Thinking, and Scoring Assessments

"Real student work gives teachers a starting point for conversations that get to the essence of what happens in classrooms. Samples of student work are concrete demonstrations of what is known and what is not known" (Evans, 1993, p. 72). Using the professional development strategy of examining student work and thinking, and scoring assessments is based on several assumptions about teaching, learning, and professional development.
The closer a professional development opportunity brings teachers to student learning, the better. This philosophy is in contrast with professional development that focuses on teaching practices. Examining student work focuses teachers' attention on the consequences of their teaching and demonstrates discrepancies between what teachers believed they were teaching and what students appear to have learned (Driscoll & Bryant, in press).

It stands to reason that more learning occurs when teachers confront real problems. Such is the case with student work and assessments, which teachers use to judge the quality of learning and, in some cases, teaching. As Ball and Cohen (1995) indicate, there is value in using a real task of practice as a context for learning.

There are many who see this strategy as the most powerful way to help teachers improve their practice. Clearly, it is totally "authentic" in that teachers work with products of student thinking and study closely the very thing they are responsible for improving. As professional development becomes more results oriented, there is no better way to focus on learning.

The Strategy in Action

The availability of student work may make this appear to be an easily applied strategy for professional development. However, professional developers need to keep in mind that student work samples should be varied in their nature and quality. Rather than consisting of short answers, the samples must include students' explanations of their thinking (e.g., why they answered the way they did).

The focus of teachers' discussion of student work may vary. Sometimes disappointing student performance on a standardized test will give teachers a compelling reason to examine the actual examination questions and their students' answers. At other times, teachers might discuss examples of student classroom work that puzzle them. In some situations, teachers may begin with a rubric supplied by others to apply to a set of student work or may take the opportunity to develop their own rubric through examining student answers. Or, the focus for a discussion may be a videotape of children's explanations of their understanding of a problem or situation.

Although individual teachers can certainly examine student work on their own, there is power in discussing the work as a team. As elementary teacher Christine Evans (1993) points out, working together greatly enhances the process. Across her teaching group, ideas differed about the content, the tasks, and particular students. Together they began to develop shared standards that could guide their collective efforts. Creating a supportive environment allows teachers to work with each other and examine their own values.

The guidance of an expert with deep science content knowledge is especially important in this strategy. Often, understanding what students are thinking by analyzing their written work requires substantial knowledge of the science topic. Similarly, if students' responses on standardized tests or the effectiveness of the tests themselves are being examined, it is helpful to have the guidance of someone with experience in assessment.

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