Year-to-Date: 366.4; Mar 2023: 38.5; Last Week: 48.2
It is an easy trap to fall into the thinking that the higher the grade, the score, the total number of points, etc. equals a greater level success. In my experience, it is exceptional for one mark to summarize how much a student has grown, how far their skills have progressed, and how great they have developed as learners. Just take a look at these photos and consider to what extent they represent success for your child, for our learning community, and for our school. (I will answer my own query after the photographs, so please scroll down.)
Each and every student–in these photographs–has grown. At the beginning of the school year, students might have been able to research and write independently (and without interruption) for 30 minutes. At this point in the school year, students researched who owns the moon and wrote an opinion essay for an hour a day over three days.
Each and every student’s skills have progressed. Overall, all students understand why developing literacy and numeracy skills help them complete their personal inquiries. There is definitely enough evidence (in the photographs and elsewhere) that students really have agency over what they are learning, how they are learning, and why their individual approach to learning matters.
Each and every student has developed as a learner. In the G5 learning community, we often use a simple protocol–KnowBeUse–to reflect on our approach to learning. You might start an inquiry with your child by asking them, “What did you learn? What learner profile attribute helped you learn? What approach to learning did you use?”
Quite simply my success criterion depends on the ways in which I personalize learning for each and every student for them to demonstrate that–in that moment–they are the best version of themselves. See you for student-led conferences 🙂