Professor Emeritus Randall J. Ryder
randall@uwm.edu
Purpose:
This assessment framework is designed to measure K-12 students’ level of understanding and their knowledge of thinking strategies as they engage in classroom assignments. The assessment has two goals. First, the results of the WILATA provide teachers, administrators, policy makers, and parents a measure of students understanding of educational tasks they complete in school. These results are more sensitive to the day-to-day learning in school and they provide a clear indication of the depth of students’ understanding. A second goal of the assessment is to provide teachers a more thorough awareness of the level of cognitive tasks they present to students and to provide the teacher with a better understanding of the value of engaging all students in a variety of cognitive tasks.
Audience:
The WILATA is designed for K-12 teachers in public, private, or parochial schools and can be administered to students of various abilities and language backgrounds.
Innovative Elements:
The WILATA distinguishes itself from other forms of academic assessment in several ways. First, it is a form of an authentic assessment—one that presents tasks that are used in the individual classroom thereby assessing learning by acknowledging the goals and objectives of the individual teacher, school, or school district. Unlike standardized, norm-referenced tests such as the Iowa Test of Basic Skills or the Terra Nova, the WILATA is sensitive to the content students are learning (defined by a school districts’ goals and objectives), provides an indication of the level of understanding as well as the level of metacognitive (one’s own thinking about the process of thinking), and is designed to provide scores that reflect the quality of students’ learning and metacognitive engagement. Being a form of an authentic assessment, the WILATA does not provide grade level or percentile scores. Unlike a standardized norm-referenced test, the WILATA presents a representation of the level of knowledge a student displays, the quality of that knowledge and how the level of knowledge and quality change over time.
The WILATA provides an assessment rubric to examine two dimensions of learning: (1) cognition, and (2) metacognition. The cognitive dimension is composed of seven levels that proceed from more basic levels of understanding to higher orders of thinking. These levels are: 1) automaticity, 2) recall, 3) synthesize, 4) analyze, 5) apply, 6) judge, and 7) create. Metacognition, simply put, is thinking about thinking. More specifically, metacognition involves not only thinking about thinking, but also control of thought processes necessary to meet a goal. It is knowing what one already knows, understanding the learning task, and knowing what knowledge and skills the task requires. The Cognitive Dimension consists of four levels: 1) non-metacognitive, 2) declarative, 3)procedural, and 4) conditional. Use of this rubric allows a thorough examination of students’ understanding of the tasks they regularly engage in your classroom and how well they are acquiring your curricular standards.
How Can WiLATA Benefit Teachers and Students?
For Teachers
- Provides a mechanism to allow students to engage in a broad range of cognition
- Helps address the curriculum in a manner that goes beyond factual information
- Provides more relevant learning experiences
- Provides a form of assessment that closely monitors individual students cognitive performance with the content that is actually taught in the classroom
- Provides the teacher feedback on student learning so adjustments may be made in instruction or the curriculum
- Provides a VALID measure of student learning throughout the school year
For Students
- Addresses the cognitive needs and abilities of all students
- Engages students in meaningful learning experiences
- Prepares students for “real life” learning tasks
- When instruction is scaffolded all students are provided opportunities to have success with various levels of understanding
- Increases relevancy of learning
For more information please contact:
Randall Ryder
Professor Emeritus
4420 McDonald Drive CT N
Stillwater, MN 55082
Home Phone: 651-342-1617
Cell Phone: 651-785-5259
randall@uwm.edu
