The results of provincial assessments in math, reading and writing have been sent home with students of the English Language School Board and are available to parents online, says Education, Early Learning and Culture Minister Hal Perry.
“Island math teachers are involved in an intensive provincial math project which teachers say has been extremely positive, so it is encouraging to see some improvements in math,” said Minister Perry. “The assessment results do show that we need to do similar work to help our students succeed in reading and writing.”
Assessment results are used to identify gaps in learning and to implement targeted interventions to improve student achievement.
The Department of Education, Early Learning and Culture organized the Prince Edward Island Summer Writing Institute to provide additional professional learning in teaching writing. Teachers were shown strategies on how to recognize strengths of student writing and how to build on those strengths.
To continue this work, the Department of Education, Early Learning and Culture will collaborate with teachers and school board specialists to collect examples of student writing to show how students progress from one stage of writing to the next, highlighting the success criteria for each stage.
This work will be launched by Sandra Herbst, one of the nation’s leading experts on assessment for learning. Once the student writing examples are collected, there will be professional development opportunities for teachers so they can learn how to these incorporate strategies in their teaching and ultimately support improvements in student writing.
“We value the data we receive from our assessments, and we are committed to measuring success in our school system,” said Minster Perry. “At the same time, I am committed to working in collaboration with teachers to review our assessment process to ensure all data we collect is used to directly improve student achievement.”
Assessment results are shared with school boards, principals, teachers and parents. Parents are encouraged to take time to review the material and discuss the results with their child’s teacher. The assessments give parents and teachers an idea of how well students are doing in reading, writing and math at critical stages of learning.
For more information and to view results, visit http://www.gov.pe.ca/eecd/studentassessment