• males were underperforming in ELA because our novels were focused on female protagonist
• so the overwhelming factors contributing to failures were zeroes, with attendance coming a close second
• males were stronger in math and science
• females were demonstrating greater strength in ELA and social studies.

* Smerging Data: Grading... More Than Just Number Crunching is a handbook for professional development published by the AAC that

• promotes further thinking and discussion about grading practices and encourages the use of fair, reliable and valid grading and reporting practices;
• encourages teachers to explore the difficult task of reducing a term's work to a single phrase, letter or number that goes beyond simple number crunching;
• enables teachers to reflect on their current grading practices, examine issues using real-life vignettes, consider possible solutions, and make the decision either to continue with current grading practice or initiate changes. By the way, there is no 'answer key'! ; and
• provides a model for how teachers, schools and jurisdictions can review and revise grading and reporting practices. Marzano (2000) advises that proposed changes be communicated to all interested parties (students, parents, district leaders) and that changes need to be well thought out and tested on a wide scale prior to implementation.

Building Learning Roads in Our Brain

AAC Assessment specialists meet regularly throughout the year to share strategies and questions about assessment. We are usually provided with a reading that gives us an opportunity to expand our thinking and that can also be shared with our colleagues at school. Our fall meeting provided us with an article by Carol Dweck, (http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational_leadership/oct07/vol65/num02/The_Perils_and_Promises_of_Praise.aspx) about how students with a growth mind-set believe that learning is possible with effort, as opposed to a fixed mind-set where students believe that the amount of "smarts" that you start with determines your success, and that amount cannot be changed. She believes that we can teach children how their brain learns, so that they can develop this growth mind-set. This includes helping them understand that repeated effort has more impact on success than just being "smart".

I also read Pat Wolfe's (http://www.ascd.org/publications/books/101004.aspx) book before she came to speak at the AAC conference in October. Pat Wolfe has studied how the brain learns from a physiological perspective. As an assessment specialist I had several opportunities to work through these ideas with my colleagues, but I wanted to come up with a way to help my students understand these ideas. As a music specialist, I have the advantage of teaching all the students in our school, so I shared this metaphor with the grade 2 to 5 children specifically and the younger students in a more general way. This is how the metaphor goes:

Learning is like being the first person to walk through our school yard after it has snowed all weekend. It is hard to walk and you have to take big high steps (which I demonstrate with exaggerated steps). It is hard work at first. As you travel home later in the day, you follow along your path, stepping in your old footprints. The snow gets packed down a bit so the walk is a little easier. Usually others have been walking along the same path so their efforts combine with yours to make the journey smoother.

At this point in the story I draw some dendrites on the board and show them how ideas travel from one dendrite to another and the more often an idea travels along that dendrite, the easier it is to remember. I then ask them to answer the question 2+2=4. The quick response of 4 shows them that the ease of that answer indicates a well traveled dendrite pathway.

We return to the path in the snow story and I explain that only the learner can make the path through the snow. The teacher's job is to provide tools that help with the construction of the path. The shovels, picks and occasional bobcat might look like strategies, examples, and assignments, but the actual learning or path construction has to be done by the learner.

It was at this point that a grade 3 student put up his hand and commented, "So if someone is talking when I'm listening to the teacher, it's like someone is kicking snow back into my path." That comment led to the extension of this metaphor of learning as road building in our brains. Hard concepts are just rocks and boulders that need to be moved out of the way. Concepts that aren't completely mastered are just gravel roads that need more practice to make them into smooth freeways. Not knowing something is not a measure of ability to learn. Sometimes answers are incorrect because the learner went down the wrong road to find the answer or needed a better map or signage along the way. Students who are not engaged can be invited to finish their coffee break, get out of the parking lot and get back to road building.

I have shared this story with my staff to use in their classes as well. In my music classes, where the subject is a foreign language for most, the children are much more open-minded about learning new skills and concepts. They are willing to admit that they don't know how to do things because they haven't had enough practice yet. Their brain might only have a gravel or a bumpy road so far. They are developing a growth mind-set. This metaphor provides us with lots of opportunities to talk about what learning is and how it happens, in a way that elementary children can certainly understand.

Wendy Davies, Music Teacher Lochearn School Wild Rose Public Schools

Voice of a Learning Leader

The following is an introduction to an assessment leadership workshop held near Whitecourt, Alberta on September 18, 2008. Robert Hogg and Dale Armstrong were invited to participate and provide assistance.

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