By Grant Davies
CEO, Teaching Strategies Inc.
As I reflect on the last five years, it’s hard to ignore the growth of technology-driven assessment initiatives, and it makes sense. Assessment, essentially the collection and aggregation of data, is perfectly suited for the digital age’s limitless processing power and vast data storage capabilities. Advances in technology, though, haven’t been the only driver of assessment priorities. Initiatives like No Child Left Behind and the addition of Head Start Performance Standards make assessment and accountability of student progress a central part of the educational experience for all learners, infants to adults. As a response, each stakeholder in the educational process has employed technology to transition to an environment focused on assessment. And, of course, to ensure that our stakeholders are well equipped to meet these expectations, we as educational publishers face the unique challenge of providing meaningful and relevant content.
Prior to the technological advancements in educational assessment, the challenge for administrators was to effectively monitor current and past performance economically without overburdening or overextending staff. Today, technology allows administrators to aggregate assessment data for a single class to an entire district. Perhaps the greatest affect technology has had on teachers is that it allows them to assess students’ progress on a daily basis.
In classroom after classroom, we’ve seen the use of digital, hand-held devices literally transform the once onerous task of assessing and tracking student performance, allowing them to focus more of their attention on the art of teaching and meeting the needs of each learner. Educational publishers recognize the need to reduce the time teachers spend outside of the instructional day and have designed software aligned with the curriculum enabling them to plan and produce developmentally appropriate learning activities generated by assessment data. Progressively, more Web-based products and services furnished by publishers are providing teachers with the flexibility of monitoring, planning, and assessing classroom performance from any computer with Internet access.
How does all this technological growth in the classroom affect the parents? As we can all remember, there used to be a time when parents had to wait for a quarterly report card to be sent home tucked in their child’s backpack before getting any real sense of their child’s progress. Now, online communication and reporting tools give parents a real-time understanding of their child’s progress so that they are engaged beyond the quarterly report card. Parents and teachers can communicate and exchange information digitally and never run the risk of something important from the teacher getting “lost” on the way home. This results in well-informed parents who are able to reinforce the learning experience outside of the classroom.
For students, technologically driven assessment is allowing educators the chance to refine instruction like never before. Research has taught us that every human thinks and learns differently, and educators have focused their efforts on differentiating their instruction to meet the needs of each learner. However, assessing the student on newly acquired concepts and knowledge has always been a few steps behind. Until recently, the traditional paper-pencil, multiple-choice bubble sheets were the standard in assessment across the curriculum. But thanks to a wide variety of technologically advanced, interactive tools, the learner has alternative ways of demonstrating his or her understanding of certain concepts beyond the traditional means. Publishers often provide alternative forms of assessment through technology that is tactile, interactive, and engaging. These tools help ease the anxiety of the learner, but ultimately allow the student to show retention of concepts learned in a variety of ways.
But the question still remains: What does this all mean for our key stakeholders as publishers? Where will advances in technology take assessment next?
Looking ahead, one certainty is that publishers and educators will be quick to incorporate cutting-edge technological advances in the future generations of assessment tools. So when we see incredible developments in voice recognition, video imaging, and touch-screen computer monitors that make today’s computer mouse feel like a rotary phone, the possibilities for building increased assessment tools are endless. Imagine seamlessly communicating with parents in multiple languages without ever needing to consult a human translator and quite possibly ever typing a single word with smarter voice recognition capabilities.
As these technological advances allow computers to essentially observe the educational environment and record assessment data with little interruption of the instructional process, the amount of data available to educators will be astounding. The challenge for educators in the future may in fact be in weeding through a virtually unlimited amount of assessment data to find the metrics that truly matter. As publishers, we must strive to develop smarter systems that will help educators respond appropriately to the needs of each learner and avoid the plague of “analysis paralysis.” Our goal should be positive outcomes for each student, not glitzy student outcomes reports.
The greatest challenge for all of us, though, will be in simply remembering that the human element is, and always will be, essential to providing quality education. Despite the ever-changing technological capabilities we will encounter, one thing must remain constant:
“At the heart of good teaching and learning are caring teachers who form warm, supportive relationships with children. In spite of all the advancements in technology, the human side of teaching and learning cannot and should not be replaced.” — Cate Heroman, co-author of The Creative Curriculum for Preschool.
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Grant Davies is Chief Executive Officer of Teaching Strategies Inc., an early childhood education services company. Prior to joining Teaching Strategies Grant worked, as a consultant, in many multi-cultural and multi-national organizations in Europe, North America, Asia, South America, and Australia. He has collaborated with numerous clients to develop and implement strategic plans for improving market success, strengthening organizational effectiveness and producing bottom-line results. As a consultant his clients included Fortune 500 companies in education, international finance and development, pharmaceuticals, publishing, and energy services. Grant is a member of not-for-profit Boards including, among others, the American Hospice Foundation.
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