Secondary / High School

Accountability in Three Realms: Making Learning Visible Inside and Outside the Classroom

Abstract: This article describes the changing culture of a public school as members of its community explore new ways of being accountable to progressive ideals in an age of skills-based learning and standardized testing. Using documentation makes adult and student learning visible in and outside the classroom, supporting three forms of accountability: (a) accountability to self (looking at what one intended to teach in relation to what actually happened); (b) accountability to each other (contributing to collective learning as well as one's own); and (c) accountability to the larger community (evaluating the relationship between the school's mission and classroom practice). Documentation leads to more intentional and reflective teaching, provides evidence of student learning not represented by standardized tests, and supports the development of a school's identity. The authors conclude that documentation, although not a replacement for standardized tests, is a versatile tool that blurs the line between formative and summative assessment.

The Good Work Toolkit

The GoodWork Toolkit is an approach to engage individuals and groups in conversation and reflection about good work. The Toolkit consists of a flexible set of materials, including vignettes of individuals who struggle to carry out good work, and accompanying questions and activities. Since 2007, educators at all levels—elementary school to graduate school—from around the world have implemented these materials in their coursework in a variety of ways.

Good Work: Theory and Practice

A summary of the research around Good Work.

The Nature of Scientific Thinking Lessons Designed to Develop Understanding of the Nature

From the background: Students in many science classrooms are presented with the scientific method as the fundamental plan scientists use to gain their understandings. Scientists throughout history have come to their conclusions in a variety of ways, not always following such a specific method. Interestingly, even when scientists do use the scientific method, they rarely use it in the stereotyped, step-by-step way that schools tend to teach it. This is a curricular unit that helps students understand why and how scientists think through their process.

The Qualities of Quality: Understanding Excellence in Arts Education

Many children in the United States have little or no opportunity for formal arts instruction, and access to arts learning experiences remains a critical national challenge. In addition, the quality of arts learning opportunities that are available to young people is a serious concern. Understanding this second challenge: the challenge of creating and sustaining high quality formal arts learning experiences for K12 youth, inside and outside of school is the focus of our recent research initiative, The Qualities of Quality, commissioned by The Wallace Foundation and conducted by Project Zero. The study focuses on the character of excellence itself and asks three core questions:

How do arts educators in the United States including leading practitioners, theorists, and administrators conceive of and define high quality arts learning and teaching?

What markers of excellence do educators and administrators look for in the actual activities of arts learning and teaching as they unfold in the classroom?

How do a programs foundational decisions, as well as its ongoing day-to-day decisions, affect the pursuit and achievement of quality?