After spending only a couple of days at my school, H. Bautista, I have so many thoughts and impressions about the public school system that I have been struggling to organize my thoughts and to evaluate the significance of each experience. First, let me contextualize my setting. My fellow teaches three subjects in the fifth grade: Character Education, Filipino, and HEKASI (Filipino History). All three subjects are taught in Tagalog. She also teaches an elective journalism class for the fifth grade before school starts.
One of the reflections I would like to share is on assessment. At the end of last week, my fellow gave her Filipino and HEKASI classes a quiz to assess how much her students had learned this week. These assessments were described as being summative and counted towards the final grade. Throughout my training, summative assessments have been described as the final evaluation of a students’ learning; formative assessments are used to gauge where a student is in their learning. However, my fellow was applying the formative assessment concept to her summative assessments. This made me think that assessment here is much more high stakes, especially with the lack of formative assessments during the week. I do not know if this is just the current state of the Filipino education system, if it is cultural, or something else. However, the nature of student assessment does seem to be dramatically different than in my context.
One of the reflections I would like to share is on assessment. At the end of last week, my fellow gave her Filipino and HEKASI classes a quiz to assess how much her students had learned this week. These assessments were described as being summative and counted towards the final grade. Throughout my training, summative assessments have been described as the final evaluation of a students’ learning; formative assessments are used to gauge where a student is in their learning. However, my fellow was applying the formative assessment concept to her summative assessments. This made me think that assessment here is much more high stakes, especially with the lack of formative assessments during the week. I do not know if this is just the current state of the Filipino education system, if it is cultural, or something else. However, the nature of student assessment does seem to be dramatically different than in my context.