Authentic Assessment: An assessment that is taken informally and usually shows how the student is progressing. Many times teachers will use a student work sample or the student will choose a piece of work that they are proud of. There are four levels of understanding ranging from Recall/Reproduction, Skill/Concept, Strategic Thinking, and Extended Thinking. It is a goal to be able to achieve Extended Thinking.
Collaborative Learning: Students work in groups and are encouraged to work together to share concepts. A classroom is based on appreciating student's differences and the belief that collaboration is not only developing character, but students are teaching each other and each possesses a sense of power when doing so.
Depth of Knowledge (DOK): A resource to showcase student's level of complexity. It is used now to help students in advancing in higher levels of thinking, as seen in Common Core (similar to Bloom's Taxonomy).
Formative Assessment: These assessments are used during student learning to help teachers create groups based on strengths and/or needs. It also can help a teacher differentiate instruction in a class. Using these formative assessments allows teachers to see students individually in a daily classroom activity (Reading Samples) than a summative assessment, which shows what the student did learn. This can help catch holes in student' s learning to help them better understand concepts.
Montessori Method: Founded by Maria Montessori, a philosophy that encourages play for learning. Students learn at their pace and are encouraged to develop skills through discovery. As students develop they learn life skills such as sweeping, tying shoes, stringing beads, and pretend play. These are much more important skills the acquisition of reading.
Thematic Lesson Planning: Teachers plan instruction based on one idea and all subjects are woven into the theme. For example, if the theme is centered on Spring, students science lessons may be on weather changing or oviparous animals. All activities will be cohesive with one another and build upon each other.
Summative Assessment: Assessments taking place following concepts learned, such as test and final exams. Smarter Balanced, PARRC, as well as state testing are categorized as summative assessments
Unschooling: The belief that students learn best at their speed and students choose their emphasis of learning. Students are natural learners and will be drawn to ideas and concepts that are innately unique to each child (bugs versus animals, or space versus biology, etc,). It is the understanding that children will understand more when they are seekers of knowledge versus being taught it as the same speed and style as other children in the classroom. This style of learning is found mostly in homeschool settings.
Whole Child: The belief in teaching all aspects of a child, emotionally, mentally, physically, and spiritually. It is understood that a child needs to be well rounded in order to be successful in their education. Students will not be able be successful if their other needs are being met (lack of sleep, change at home, etc).
What educational jargon have you found interesting? Comment below to share your thoughts.
