Student -Teacher Conferences
During large class projects I hold student-teacher conferences with each individual students. These are designed to give feedback to students, as well as receive feedback from them. I have found that these conferences give me an opportunity to get to know my students by meeting with them individually. I can also assess if students are on track to finish with a quality on time project. This lastly also allows students who would not usually ask for help the space to get the attention they need. I also give students a voice in these meeting to both defend their work and give feedback about ways to improve the overall class. The first set of parent teacher conferences went well, however I found that they did not have enough structure and therefore students did not find value in them. Since revising the student teacher conference form to include more reflection, as well as more direct relations to the rubric which will be used for grading, students seem to find more value in these one on one time for reflection.
Rubric Progression
For every unit that we have covered first semester students have been required to complete a project to demonstrate their learning as well as a test. All of these projects had some implementation of choice for the students. I have found with time that this requires a very specific set of skills, especially in regards to successfully creating a project description and rubric. I have found that I struggle when creating effective rubrics that limit the amount of questioning and assumptions made by students. My rubrics have gone through a progression, however their is still room for growth.