After careful analysis of report cards,  the different requirements of teachers, and the variance with which a teacher has to represent student learning, I have prepared these sample comments to express my abilities. Afterwards, I write about my impressions of student learning documentation that I discovered as further evidence of my learning.

Warren, what a year that grade five has been for you! Your Language Arts progress is nothing short of amazing; I believe that you really are a Superhero. I am so proud of you for getting to level 5 in your reading journey, your skills really are emerging. When we read picture books together, I always have the best time, and I’ll never forget the laughs we shared during our reading of “Big Pizza, Big fail!” At the start of the year, you coloured your L.A. confidence square yellow, and after your “see my ability” presentation with Ms. Wu, you changed it to green. Self-assessment shows that you are aware of your growth and are becoming self-lead in your learning. I hope that you will continue to write your symbols in your journal over the summer. I am so proud of you, and I know that you are too. Congratulations, you are going to grade 6 next September, and I know you’ll continue your development, Hooray!!!   

Petra, I am amazed by your progress in Physical Education! While I review the plan that we developed together and compare it to your class actions, I find growth examples. Your self-regulation strategy of – When I feel too much emotion, I can go to my safe spot and “let it out” has been very helpful. I witnessed your ability to use this strategy during our floor hockey unit when you felt frustrated due to having the ball taken from your possession, and you sat on the bench and drew in your Feelings Journal. Furthermore, after you journaled, you returned to the game and participated (and even had two assists on Raj’s goals!!). Additionally, you showed the ability to reflect meaningfully in your “I’m sorry I hit you, Nathan” card, which addressed that you felt anger and identified that hitting him was not a respectful way to express yourself. Petra, your P.E. skills are emerging and improving every day; you have come so far since I met you in September. Thank you for allowing me to take this learning journey with you.

Mei-Li, my little scientist!! Your performance in science this term is nothing short of amazing. You are exceeding the standards in every aspect. Your soil erosion presentation was awe-inspiring, and the fact that you ended it with an explanation of why you felt it was place-based learning was genuinely profound. Also, thank-you for your suggestion of “Terry’s dog tips” on YouTube in response to my story about how hyper my dogs Rick and Morty are. I challenge you to continue your “Morning vs. Evening Temperature Chart” over the winter break to continue learning at home because I’d love to hear more about your fantastic research. You are curious, reflective, and confident, all qualities of a great Scientist! Thank you for everything that I learned from you this term; I look forward to learning more with you after the break.

Marco, while I reviewed your Social Studies portfolio for this term, I was blown away by your work. Your ancient civilizations inquiry assignment displayed your ability to find reliable, engaging, and diverse sources. Furthermore, your participation in our discussions has been exemplary; your connections and input during our talk about Haida fishing traditions were on full display when you told the class about your trip to the museum in Masset this summer. Additionally, your self-evaluation shows your ability to be honest, reflective, and growth-oriented. In particular, when you wrote, “I think that I can improve my communication skills because I sometimes get nervous when I speak,” followed by “I feel like I showed my improvement when I told the story about my trip to Haida Gwaii with Uncle Steve.” Overall, you showed that you are exceeding our learning outcomes in social studies, and I look forward to learning alongside you next semester.

Wayne-Arnold, I found so many exciting things in your science learning folder. Your mind map on wetlands is fantastic. I loved how you used a spider web design and had your ideas “caught” in it! When you compared your little brother Kevin to our “babies in nature” lesson, you showed your skill at making meaningful connections. Additionally, you challenged yourself to write full sentences rather than your preferred point-form summaries in our “Ants!” activity. Challenging yourself in this way shows that you meant what you wrote in your areas of improvement folder from September, in which you wrote, “I would like to make better sentences.” I hope you will continue to challenge yourself and be creative at home. Maybe you can make another “web” to catch your ideas at home. Thank you for allowing me to journey through the world of science with you; we both learned many exciting things from one another.

Bernadette, your progress this term in English Language Arts is something you should be proud of. Your poem “My Dog, My Heart” displays your ability to use classroom learning in a creative, meaningful way. Furthermore, the line “kisses as wet and cold as Momma’s dishcloth, that make me as warm as Papa’s hugs” is evidence of your abilities exceeding expectations. Additionally, your tutoring of Warren has been helpful to me and has improved his reading skills. Despite your advanced-level understanding of course concepts, you continue to challenge yourself and give honest reflections. Your honest thoughts were displayed when you wrote, “I can read and write fast, but sometimes I get excited and skip words in a rush, I need to find material that suits my level.” You have been a pleasure to learn with, and I know you will continue to be an essential part of our classroom community.

Randip “Big Lightning” Johal, how far we’ve come together. Your behaviour in our P.E. class has shown your ability to self-regulate wonderfully. The memories of our daily one on one strategy meetings seem so far away now. The last term, you only had three “Mr. Malm and Me” talks the whole time! As always, your physical abilities continue to be excellent, but, it is the way you have been able to use them respectfully with your classmates that has impressed me. I’ll never forget the day I had to run three laps of the gym when you beat me in DONKEY; remember how happy everyone was when you won? I hope that you and Grandma continue to use Basketball and Hockey as ways to “Let the energy out” when you feel like you can’t concentrate. In P.H.E., physically, you are exceeding expectations, and socially you are meeting expectations, both are amazing personal achievements.Thank you for working so hard this year. I know that you will continue to develop as a valued member of our community.

Llewellen, while I inspected your Social Studies showcase folder, I was happy to see your work from our Tsimshian oral traditions lesson. When you wrote that “stories let our elders teach us of things from before,” I saw that you gained insights from the activity with Mr. Jacob. As I read your self-assessment, I appreciate your honesty in saying, “I need to listen better, but Mr. Malm’s socials lessons are boring.” After reading this,  I challenged you to think of a few topics that you would be more interested in, and I was excited that you listed “Ipad work.” I have access to the Ipad trolly for our class in January, and I will make sure to incorporate some activities that you can use the Ipad for during Social Studies. Overall, you are meeting expectations and reflecting meaningfully while engaging with the material. I look forward to learning together after the break and thank you for your constructive feedback.

My initial reaction to the example we have been provided and why it is meaningful is how visible the learning is, and I couldn’t help but think it offered a sort of visual narrative to the learning. The first section of the Seitz article asks, “What is documentation?”  and provides the answer, “Documentation typically includes samples of a child’s work at several different stages of completion: photographs showing work in progress” (p. 88). Given these criteria, the photo documentation shown in our example is documentation. It is meaningful because it effectively communicates the “story and purpose” of the assignment. The teacher provided pictures of the different stages of the building process, displayed the tools used and how the learners used them. By including these components, the teacher presented the topic, developmental progress and learning. These components are all listed as necessary to make documentation meaningful in Seitz’s article. This project’s documentation would lead to student and teacher reflection and a conversation opportunity, as mentioned in the “Extending the learning portion of the article” (p. 90-91). Furthermore, the documenter experience stages, as listed by Seitz, are all displayed in the photographs and captions from our sample assignment. Additionally, when parents view the documentation, it may lead to a conversation at home, as Seitz mentioned. The example is meaningful because it provides a step-by-step presentation of a learning process; by doing that, the analytical approaches that could be incorporated are almost limitless.

Three skills from the math curriculum that connects to this project are:

  1. Whole-number, fraction, and decimal benchmarks. This connects to the project because the learners would have been using this skill from the content while planning and building their sheds at all levels of the assignment.  
  2. Multiplication and division facts to 100 (emerging computational fluency). This connects in the same way the first reference does. Construction necessitates the use of multiplication and division in the planning and building stages.
  3. Equivalent fractions. This is probably the most used concept in construction. We use fractions in building all the time, and the nature of the building makes understanding equivalent fractions mandatory because everything must fit together. 

I used portions from the content section to answer this portion of our assignment. Every one of the Curricular Competencies would have potentially been used in the shed building assignment.

 The three skills I listed correlate to the testing component. Specifically, the “make changes and test again, repeating until satisfied with the project.” This correlates with all three pieces of content I listed above in the planning and building stages. During construction, you continually revise and test new designs and measurements, which involves benchmarks, multiplication and division, and equivalent fractions.  Another part of the applied design competencies that they correlate with is the “making, construct the final product, incorporating planned changes” competency. The three skills I used are incorporated into this competency because the learners would have incorporated the math into the building of the final product. The project incorporated this because the assignment requires them to build a final product. The third competency that correlates with the math skill I mentioned is “Demonstrate their product and describe their process.” As the learners do this, they would inevitably have to discuss the math that went into the planning and building. The sample assignment was a prime example of combining subjects to make a cross-curricular learning experience.

Different ways of assessing this project could include conferencing, self-evaluation, peer-evaluation, daily/weekly log, or a standard rubric. My method would be a combination of a diary/log, self-evaluation, and conference. For this assignment, I imagine having a final assessment conference with the student, their log, and their finished product. The teacher would engage in a dialogue with the student to present their shed and reference their record to display what they learned during the project; the teacher would ask questions that would direct the student to mention how they fulfilled the curricular expectations.

Sample report card comment. Jake displayed his ability to use math in a real-world situation during his shed assignment. He used estimation by doing multiplication and division when he calculated how much material he needed to purchase. Also, he displayed expert knowledge of fractions and decimals as he made his measurements and cuts for the roof trusses. Furthermore, he made connections to his previous experience in his comment, “I knew that half a square makes a triangle, so I just cut this board in half for my two gable-ends.” Jake did excellent work on this project and is practically exceeding expectations!

Freshgrade comment. (Picture of learner and project) Look at Jake hard at work building his shed. He is using a speed square to mark his cut-outs, displaying his math knowledge. Not seen in this picture are the three students watching Jake’s example for their reference. Throughout this assignment, jake has shown that he exceeds our expectations in both math and applied sciences and his ability to be a valuable team member. 

I love this assignment design because of the abundance of skills it incorporates. Students must learn to collaborate in the design process and during the build. Additionally, it gives students the chance to use math skills in a real-world setting, usually lacking in classrooms. Furthermore, it provides all students with a small introduction into the construction trades careers, which I think is vital because some demographics historically avoid shop classes. This assignment also provides students with an artifact they produced that they can use to showcase their knowledge, effort, and the pride they have in their creation. I think that assignments like this cause students to take their thinking to a different level than traditional classroom lessons because they must continuously be planning, testing, and revising logically. To conclude, I think that this assignment was terrific. I worked as a tradesman for 15 years and am in love with the idea of exposing children to the realities of the trades and the rewards that they can provide.