You want your students to apply a Biblical perspective to what they study. You’ve heard that assessment can help. So, you want to learn more. Good.

Question: How can you learn more about using assessment?

Answer: By exploring the following list of 12 questions.

1. How does assessment impact student learning?
2. What type of assessment can you use?
3. What makes a good assessment good?
4. How good is your assessment?
5. How can you make your assessment even better?
6. How proficiently do you want your students to use a Biblical perspective?
7. How much practice do your students need?
8. What makes a good rubric good?
9. How can you use a rubric?
10. How can you use assessment data?
11. What's your vision for using assessment?
12. How committed are you to having your students apply a Biblical perspective to what they learn?

Remember: The real question isn't "How can you learn more about using assessment?" The real question is "How will you use assessment help your students apply a Biblical perspective to what they study?”


Additional resources:

1. Videos: Teach and assess Biblical perspective, Biblical perspective assessment helps, Assessment helps students value and get proficient at Biblical perspective,
2. Teacher testimonials regarding using assessment
3. Self-assessment: To get started with using assessment, take this self-assessment
4. Tutorial: Use assessment to help students understand and apply a Biblical perspective
5. Use assessment

You want your students to apply a Biblical perspective to what they study. You’ve heard that assessment can help. So, you want to use assessment.

Question: How can you get started?

Answer: By taking the following self-assessment. Rate each item, using the following scale:

4: Strongly agree • 3: Agree • 2: Disagree • 1: Strongly disagree

___ I understand how assessment impacts student application of a Biblical perspective.
___ I know what type of assessment to use to help my students apply a Biblical perspective.

___ I know what makes a good assessment good.
___ The assessments I give my students are good.
___ I work to make my assessments even better.

___ My students proficiently apply a Biblical perspective to what they study.
___ My students apply creation-fall-redemption-restoration to what they study.
___ My students get sufficient practice in applying a Biblical perspective to what they study.

___ The rubrics I use to score my assessments are good.
___ I use my rubrics effectively.
___ I use my assessment data to modify instruction.

___ I use assessment to help my students apply a Biblical perspective.
___ I have a clear vision for using assessment to help my students apply a Biblical perspective.
___ I want to learn more about using assessment to help my students apply a Biblical perspective.
___ I am committed to helping my students apply a Biblical perspective to what they study.


Now, ask yourself 4 questions about the data:

1. How many 4s, 3s, 2s, and 1s do I have?
2. What satisfies/concerns me about the data?
3. Which items would it be helpful to learn more about?
4. What will I do?

Additional resources:

1. Videos: Teach and assess Biblical perspective, Biblical perspective assessment helps, Assessment helps students value and get proficient at Biblical perspective,
2. Teacher testimonials regarding using assessment
3. Tutorial: Use assessment to help students understand and apply a Biblical perspective
4. Use assessment
5. To learn more about using assessment, explore these 12 questions

Gary (high school English teacher) has asked Michael (director of school improvement) for coaching. Gary wants to get a more specific answer to his own question “How proficiently do I want my students to use a biblical perspective?” Seated at desks in Gary’s classroom, they have just started talking.

Gary: Thanks for coming today. I’ve been thinking about our recent inservices on helping students understand and use a biblical perspective. I’ve really enjoyed the inservices. I’ve started asking my students questions like “What’s wrong with the world?” and “Who is my neighbor?” The discussions are really good—kids are connecting course content, their lives, and a biblical perspective.

And I’ve started designing and giving unit assessments that fit these questions. For example, for the last essay, I used the following prompt:

In an essay (700-100 words) reflect on the power and prevalence of stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination; how are Christians to think about and respond to them? Support your answer from literature, history, current events, your experience, and the Bible. Be sure to:

1. Describe power and prevalence of stereotyping, prejudice, and discrimination with examples, including at least 2 quotations from Night.
2. Analyze the biblical principles regarding how God intends for people to treat other people, using at least 3 quotations from the Bible.
3. Give at least 1 general action people can take and 1 specific thing you can do.

Michael: You’ve made real progress on implementing what you learned from the inservice meetings. Good.

Gary: Yeah, I’m feeling pretty good about the results. And here’s a sample of what one student wrote on a recent short-answer test question for a unit on discrimination: “Discrimination, prejudice, etc., is wrong. No one has any right to decide they’re better than others. Although I don’t go around killing people from a single race, by disliking people, I’m dishonoring God because that person is made in God’s image.”

I really want my students to be able to apply a biblical perspective to course content. I think I could help them more effectively if I had a clearer understanding of how proficiently I want my students to use a biblical perspective. The inservices were about getting students to apply a biblical perspective to course content. I want to take it a step further and define a goal of some sort regarding the proficiency with which I want them to apply a biblical perspective. Having a goal will help me focus efforts.

Michael: Well, with what level of proficiency do you want your students to apply a biblical perspective?

Gary: Let me think about that… My overall goal is for my students to apply to a biblical perspective to the course content they have learned. To be honest, my goal used to be having kids learn course content. So, since applying a biblical perspective is now my goal, I want my students to do as well at applying a biblical perspective as they do on their essays, projects, presentations, and the AP English test.

Michael: Tell me more about that.

Gary: I want my students’ use of a biblical perspective to be automatic. Being educated involves being able to do some things automatically. You know, typing the correct letters on the keyboard, knowing when to go left in a basketball game, using the writing process when doing an essay, knowing that 5 X 5 = 25. Using a biblical perspective should be automatic.

Michael: So you want your students’ application of a biblical perspective to be automatic.

Gary: Yes. It should be efficient and effective. My students need to be proficient. Their scores for biblical perspective application need to be at or above standard. The scores should be based on rigorous assessments. On a variety of assessments. Like essays, projects, and presentations.

Michael: You want your students to apply a biblical perspective efficiently and effectively on a variety of rigorous assessments.

Gary: Yes. That sort of puts it all together. But I need something more definite. More specific.

Michael: How will you know if you are achieving this goal?

Gary: Good question. What I have so far isn’t very measurable. I think having a measurable goal would help me answer my question. I think I need to set a learning target that includes the percentage of my students I want to be at or above standard. You know, C or above.

Michael: What criteria will you use to set that percentage?

Gary: Overall, my students do pretty well. Class average is about a B+. About 90% of them will attend college. It’d be great if 100% of my students could meet the standard (you know, get a C) on applying a biblical perspective. But I think that’s shooting a little high. So, I think I’ll go for 90% of my students scoring at or above standard on applying a biblical perspective. I’ll base their scores on 3 types of assessment—projects, presentations, and essays.

That’s a good place to start. I can change the goal later if I need to. I probably need to do it a bit, collect the data, and decide if the goal needs to be revised.

Michael: How do you feel about your goal now?

Gary: Seems clearer, now that I’ve added a percentage. And now that I’ve added the 3 assessments I’ll use. Seems clearer.

Michael: Earlier you asked, “How proficiently do I want my students to use a biblical perspective?” To what extent have you answered your question?

Gary: I think I have a pretty good answer. Knowing the percentage and the types of assessments will help me focus my efforts. Might be a good idea to set a schoowide goal about this. But right now, I need to figure out how to work on my goal. A good place to start might be developing rubrics for the assessments. I’ve already got a rubric for essays. I need to add a section on applying a biblical perspective. Then when I assess the essays, I can pull out the data and see how my students are doing.

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Make your own goal:

_____ % of my students will be at/above standard on applying a biblical perspective, scores being taken from the following assessments: ____.

Take action on your goal. Today.