Benchmarking

Description
> [This concept is adapted from an article in ASCD //Educational Leadership// (Reference 1)]. > Share your state's content standards with students so they understand what they should know and be able to do. You might have to reword standards to be more student-friendly. Students can mark their progress towards meeting learning goals and (hopefully) take some ownership of their learning. > List the unit content standards along with four levels of proficiency: > * Recall: knowledge of facts, definitions, simple procedures, formulas > * Conceptual understanding: knowledge of principles and the ability to apply them in routine situations > * Problem solving: the ability to reason, plan, use evidence, and apply abstract thinking in novel situations > * Extended and strategic thinking: the ability to apply understanding to extended, novel and complex tasks > Students can periodically check-off progress towards proficiency. > Better yet - have parents do this at Open House and play "Are You Smarter Than A __th Grader."

Example
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Resources

 * 1) Joan Herman and Eva Bake, "Making Benchmark Testing Work," //Educational Leadership.// 63:3 (November 2005).
 * 2) [|MCREL standards] (fairly student-friendly, but very broad)