I the culinary field I start each day with a knife cut practical. I improves the students knife cut skills
Hi Cynthia- Thanks for your post to the forum. You have perfectly described the purpose of CATs! Best wishes - Susan
I often use this technique at the begining of new classes to establish the varying education levels of the student body. This process lends an opportunity to fine tune course materials and creating greater learning progress.
These are quick assesments that are non-threatening to the students, especially when presented in a "how am I doing as a teacher" way - this makes it comfortable for the students to answer if they know it's not going to affect their final grade. It's a quick way to see whether I'm reaching them.
Hi Chris- Thanks for your post! Review is really important- we are filling our students with so much information and they need to be able to understand it and retain it. Best wishes! Susan
I incoporate them into product identification groupwork especially because they can play games with how to memorize the different products. I also like to do review "quizzes" every class meeting which helps to recapture the essence of the older material as well as preview new material. It gives me direct feedback on how the students are doing.
i think you could incorporate these techniques at the begining or end of class to assess what they are getting out of my instruction. This I think would help me as an instructor to change up things to help them better understand the material.
would let me know how well material is being delivered and also how my teaching style is changeing to meet class needs
I try to base my test and lectures using differint cognitive objectives. It serves the student with a more useful and in depth education.
HI Tenisha - Thanks for your post about using CATs in your teaching. They really serve as a gauge of how we are doing and provide valuable information that we can use to fine tune our instruction. Best wishes for continued success in your teaching career! Susan
Hi Kimberly- I agree CATs can be an invaluable measure of how we are doing and whether we need to change course. Best wishes! Susan
Hi Jason - I'm glad you liked the minute paper idea - it's worked really well for me and our instructors! Best wishes for continued success in your teaching career. Susan
I really liked the "one-minute paper" idea that was presented in the lesson - I hadn't thought of doing that before! As instructor, I could use the papers to see how well I "hit the mark" during a session - the papers would also give me a "low-stakes" opportunity to comment directly on student understanding of concepts, and build rapport while assessing understanding.
thanks - great idea!
I can use the minute paper technique to ensure the students are getting the material I'm teaching that period. I can probe their background knowage of the subject matter I'm going to teach to determine what level of information they need to get from me.
Using the CATs allows an instructor to determine if they need to redirect their teaching style and/or mode to fit with the learning style of their students. It also informs the instructor of whether the student is gaining the information that was intended to be learned.
To incorporate CATs into my teaching I would need to first review my lesson plan for the day and the previous day. Secondly, I would then create an assessment test based on what I perceived the key factors were that the students should have obtained from the previous days lesson. Then, I would include a question or two based on the day's lesson. This would help me to assess if the students retained the previous days information and also help me to focus on and or modify my delivery for that day's lesson, to insure that I am conveying the information in a matter that my students are understanding. I can have the students correct their own papers and based on the questions they ask, I will have better understanding of what subject matter I may need to go over in more detail.
The prior knowledge test is handy to see what skills the students come in with. Every teacher emphasizes different things and this allows me to understand what they do and do not know.
I use CATs to feel the pulse of my classes. Daily assessment of their dishes is a powerful one in our culinary arts program.It is an awesome feeling to see students progress and for them to know where they are.
Hi Patti - I really like the KLW idea - thanks for sharing! Susan
Hi Michael - You are right, we need to look carefully at test results to detect patterns that indicate we need to rework our classes. Best wishes - Susan
