Leveraging Mastery Connect to Support Instructional Practices

[RoryMcCourt]

LEVERAGING MASTERY CONNECT TO SUPPORT INSTRUCTION

THE ITS MODEL IN ACTION | TRACKER & REPORTS

The ITS Model

• The ITS Model is a cyclical way of thinking about instruction and assessment occurring regularly through Mastery Connect. 
  • Identify levels of understanding
  • Target students for appropriate interventions
  • Self-evaluate teaching and learning

Leveraging Tracker Visuals & Standard Stop Light

• Tracker visuals and the Standard Stop Light feature can be used to give teachers quick feedback about student progress towards mastery of the standards. 
• Just from scanning your tracker, some questions to consider could be:
  • Are there any areas of clear mastery on a class-wide level, or areas in need of support?
  • How many times has each standard been assessed? Is there enough data about student progress per standard? 
  • What does the Standard Stop Light tell us about how students are doing as a class? Do only a small number of students need intervention? Or, is additional whole-class teaching required?

Leveraging Item Analysis & Student Mastery Reports

• Item Analysis and Student Mastery reports can be used to easily identify which standards students need additional support in.
• The Item Analysis report highlights how students performed on the standards for individual questions, and the Student Mastery report provides general information on how students performed on mastery of the standards as a class.
• Some questions to consider when leveraging these reports are:
  • What strategies were used to teach this standard?
  • Was this consistent or unique with past assessment results? 
  • What assessments were used to gauge student learning and mastery?
• The Assessment sub-tab within both reports allows one to look more closely at which questions students may have performed poorly on an actual assessment. One can then reflect on performance on standards across questions, as well as question types.  

Leveraging Tracker Comparison & Teacher Comparison Reports

• Tracker Comparison reports can provide key information to teachers who teach more than one section of a particular class, etc.
• For Tracker Comparison reports, some questions to consider are:
  • Are there any trends in performance across the standard?
  • Are there any demographic differences between classes?
  • What instructional strategies were used in each class? Were they the same? Different? How might that impact results?
• Teacher Comparison reports can foster teacher collaboration in identifying trends or areas in need of support across a grade or subject-area.
• For Teacher Comparison Reports, some questions to consider for teachers working collaboratively are:
  • Are there any trends in performance across the standard?
  • What strategies did each teacher use to assess student mastery?
  • What instructional strategies were used by the whole team?
  • Are there any historical or systemic issues that might impact the results?

Leveraging Student Reports

• Reviewing student reports enables one to view how individual students performed on assessments in Mastery Connect.
• One can view this for each standard assessed, as well as view the assessments used to measure performance on each standard.
• Some questions to consider are:
  • Which standard is the student having issues with? 
  • How has the student performed in other classes?
  • How did the student perform on previous grade level standards?
  • Are there any trends or insights from the historical data?

FINAL THOUGHTS

Leveraging both the mastery tracker, and a variety of reports in Mastery Connect, can provide teachers with invaluable information to help support instructional practices. Putting Mastery Connect into action enables teachers to truly identify levels of understanding, target students for appropriate intervention, and regularly self-evaluate teaching and learning.

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Also don't forget to watch the Video Blog about this post as well! 

[ShelbyRouse]

This is great I think using the data would be a great way to drive our instruction and make informed decisions.  How are others using the data to shape how they are teaching? 

[RoryMcCourt]

Thanks @ShelbyRouse! These are certainly some of the more prominent ways that we find users leverage data to help inform instructional practices with Mastery Connect. And, our PD sessions that a district/school can purchase goes into even greater depth on the topic. However, I thought you might also find our recent blogpost on Getting Ready For Spring Testing helpful as well, as it covers some additional practical ways that teachers can leverage data to support students.