Dynamic Learning Maps Alternate Assessment Consortium

Neal KingstonProject DirectorCenter for Educational Testing and EvaluationUniversity of Kansas

The present publication was developed under grant 84.373X100001 from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs. The views expressed herein are solely those of the author(s), and no official endorsement by the U.S. Department should be inferred.

State Participants

Let’s start with lessons learned

• When an assessment system is embedded in an accountability system there will be consequences– Many teachers will narrowly teach to the test– Some teachers and administrators will act counter

to their professional responsibilities

Let’s start with lessons learned

• Teachers need more information about student learning– Timely– Actionable

How does DLM respond to these lessons?

• Common Core Essential Elements• Instructionally-embedded (and summative)

assessments• Instructionally-relevant tasks• Learning maps• Dynamic assessment• Professional development• Technology platform to tie it all together

Common Core Essential ElementsAre:

• Links to grade level Common Core State Standards (CCSS)

• Statements of content and skills that provide a bridge for students with significant cognitive disabilities to achieve grade differentiated expectations

• Provide challenge and rigor appropriate for students with significant cognitive disabilities in consideration of the significance of their disabilities

Are not:

• Downward extension to pre-K

• General essence statements

• Statements of functional skills

Identify Essential Elements and Create ALDs: Why

• Standardize meaning for users to understand targets for learning• Provide consistency in expectations across

grades and achievement levels• Emphasize similarities in content learning

and skill achievement even though ways of performing may be highly diversified• Ground the alternate assessments in clear

expectations for learning and achievement

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CCSS

Essential

Elements

InstructionalAchievemen

tLevel

Descriptors

AssessmentAchieveme

ntLevel

Descriptors

EXAMPLES

ExamplesAre

EssentialToo

Geometric measurement: understand concepts of angle and measure angles.

4.MD.5. Recognize angles as geometric shapes that are formed wherever two rays share a common endpoint, and understand concepts of angle measurement: An angle is measured with reference to a circle with its center at the common endpoint of the rays, by considering the fraction of the circular arc between the points where the two rays intersect the circle. An angle that turns through 1/360 of a circle is called a “one-degree angle,” and can be used to measure angles. An angle that turns through n one-degree angles is said to have an angle measure of n degrees.

Geometric measurement: understand concepts of angle and measure angles.

4.MD.5. Recognize angles in geometric shapes

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Grade 4 Mathematics4MD5. Recognize angles in geometric shapes

Example 1. Label different types of angles in geometric shapes.

Ex. Construct geometric shapes using styrofoam and toothpicks. Then determine whether angles are right, obtuse or acute

Ex. Given a square, determine whether the angles are right, obtuse or acute.

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4MD5. Recognize angles in geometric shapes

Level 2. Recognize angles in geometric shapes.

Ex. Teacher draws a geometric shape, student will draw an arc to identify the angles.

Ex. Give students pictures of different geometric shapes. Sing a song about shapes and ask students to hold up shapes with right angles (or acute angles...).

Grade 4 Mathematics

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4MD5. Recognize angles in geometric shapes

Level 3 example. Identify an angle.

Ex. Presented with drawings with angles and circles, point to the shape that doesn’t contain an angle.Ex. On the playground, identify as many angles as they can see or feel.

Grade 4 Mathematics

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Recognize angles in geometric shapes

Level 4 example. Attend to angles in the environment.

Ex. Use styrofoam and toothpicks to make angles.Ex. Bend a pipe cleaner and identify the bend as the vertex.

Grade 4 Mathematics

Instructionally-embedded (and summative) assessments

• Teachers need feedback on a timely and frequent basis– About student learning– About their teaching

• Students need feedback on a timely and frequent basis– Modeling increasing expectations

• Two important questions– Can results be aggregated for accountability purposes?– How do we do this without assessment diminishing the

time for instruction?

Instructionally Relevant Tasks

• Modeling good instructional practice– Set of activities related to a unit of study– Student interaction driven by cognitive goals– Structured scaffolding

Learning Maps&

Learning Progressions

Learning Progressions

• Vertical progression

toward learning target

• Sequenced building

blocks

• Research-based

• Linked to high-quality

assessments

Use numbers to decide which is bigger, smaller,

same size

Uses place value to distinguish and order

whole numbers

Uses decimal notation to two places

Uses the symbols =, < and > to order numbers and make comparisons

Uses percentages to make straightforward

comparisons

Masters, G. & Forster, M. (1997). Developmental Assessment. Victoria, AU: The Australian Council for Education Research Ltd.

What are Learning Maps?

Network of connected learning targets (nodes)Maps students’ “knowledge terrain”

Create a model of quantity

Recognize wholeness

Identify one

Identify more than one

Use perceptual subitizing

Compare two quantities up to

ten using models

Explain set

Compare sets

ImitateCompare objects

Identify different

number of

Identify same number of

Recognize same Recognize

different

Equal quantity

Identify more

number of

Identify fewer

number of

Learning Progressions vs. Learning Maps

Centralizes notion of “superhighway” Delineates

multiple pathways

Multiple Pathways ELA

Aware of same and different

phonological units as visual or

tangible

Can identify syllables

Demonstrates receptive rhyming

Aware of same and different

phonological units as sounds

Demonstrates understanding letter sounds

Can demonstrate articulatory movements

for letter sounds

Maps were intended to be an Internal System

1. Review of literature2. Node development and

placement3. Connection placement4. Validation process

Multi-disciplinary Team Completes the Following:

1. Review of Literature

Identify seminal literature

Synthesize literature with expert knowledge

Node (learning target)

Instruction

Curricular

Cognitive Develop-ment

2. Node Development

What is the observable knowledge (skill, conceptual, procedural, factual) we want

students to exhibit ?

In Sum….

3. Connection Placement

Connection = predicted relationship between skills

Single directionMultiple connectionsRepresents integrated

approach to skill development

Mathematics Section

Learning Map (Math)

Learning Map (Math)

English Language Arts Section

English Language-Arts

Learning Map (ELA and Math)

*Note – these will eventually be connected into a single map

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4. Validation

ReviewsInternalTeacherExpert

Cognitive labsPilot studyField tests

Dynamic Assessment

• Adaptive testing based on the learning map, not some general unidimensional concept of item difficulty– Navigating within neighborhoods– Navigating across neighborhoods

Professional Development

• On demand• Multiple approaches– “Raw” PowerPoint version– Narrated movie version of PowerPoint presentation– Fully prepared Facilitator Training Packet– Self-guided version– Video examples of students with the most significant

disabilities engaging in instructional tasks– Video examples of students with a variety of disabilities

doing similar tasks– Sample lesson plans

Technology Platform

• KITE – will be available to all participating states to

deliver DLM on computers and tablets– Can be inexpensively licensed to deliver any other

assessments

THANK YOU!

For more information, please contact: dlm@ku.edu

orGo to: www.dynamiclearningmaps.org

The present publication was developed under grant 84.373X100001 from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs. The views expressed herein are solely those of the author(s), and no official endorsement by the U.S. Department should be inferred.