Teachers Participate in OGAP (Ongoing Assessment Project) for Math

Paine Primary math coach, Donna Brumlow and teachers Gina Lackey, Donna Walker, Jeanette Cerisano, Kay Shumate, and Beth Ann Marshall recently participated in OGAP training with other regional coaches and teachers.

The OGAP formative assessment system is based on the belief that teachers make more effective instructional decisions resulting in improved student learning when they: (a) are knowledgeable about how students develop understanding of specific mathematics concepts and about preconceptions and misconceptions that interfere with learning these concepts; (b) have tools and strategies that allow them to systematically monitor their students’ understanding prior to and during instruction; and (c) receive professional development focused on that knowledge, those tools, and those strategies. Four principles about effective instruction and assessment underlie OGAP’s design:

1. Build on students’ pre-existing knowledge. Ignoring students’ initial thinking risks students developing understandings that do not match what the teacher intended (NRC, 2001b).
2. Teach (and assess) for understanding. Because teaching for understanding “improves retention, promotes fluency, and facilitates learning related materials” (NRC, 2001b), OGAP items and tools are designed to elicit conceptual understanding.
3. Use formative assessment intentionally and systematically. Research has shown that learning gains from systematically implementing formative assessment strategies into instruction are larger than gains found for most other educational interventions (NRC, 2001a).
4. Build assessments based on the mathematics education research. A key recommendation from Knowing What Students Know (NRC, 2001a) is that assessments should be built on research on how students learn specific mathematics concepts.

OGAP is both a product and a process: professional development focuses on research about how children learn mathematics, providing a rationale for the design of the item bank and frameworks. It also shows teachers how to use those tools, and models routines that allow them to use them well.

Source: http://www.cpre.org/ogap