First published in Teaching Drama Magazine in May 2012.
Writing 400 summative targets for other people can be a fruitless and mind numbing process. By the time you get down to the end of the forth year 9 group the will to live is seeping from you: ‘Trevor, your target is to stop chewing the curtains while your group is attempting some prolonged rehash of last nights Hollyoaks'. Suddenly covering a PE lesson seems like a thoroughly worthwhile job.
Meaningful assessment involves students, takes place at the task level and results in negotiated targets. It should be meaningful for students, teachers, managers, parents and inspectors. It should even be meaningful for Trevor.
The Negotiated Assessment Grid, firmly based in educational theories and successful classroom practice, has far reaching possibilities. It's not rocket engineering it's more a synthesis of what we all do already but brought in to a clear and usable conceptual framework and method. In the words of Jonathon Neelands, Negotiated Assessment "makes what we have to do, human".
A Negotiated Assessment Grid (NAG) is a grid of task specific criteria. The criteria are agreed on by the teacher and students together, and written on the grid using the students' language as much as possible. The grid is used for self, teacher and peer assessment with room for targets to be recorded and ideas developed.
At the start of the lesson the grid is negotiated with the students. Simply tell the students the task they are going to engage with. Then ask the question "To do this task well, what do you have to do? What skills/processes would create a successful outcome?" Let the students agree in groups and then have the whole class feed back. List all the ideas coming from the students and add some of your own. To use a grid with a whole class, agree the same criteria for everyone. To differentiate with ease allow each group to choose their criteria. In either case as the teacher you can add in one or two criteria of your own and suggest alternatives to groups who have not pitched criteria at the right level.
Through this process you have successfully clarified the key vocabulary and learning objectives while differentiating for all abilities. In the corner of the room you see a broad smile from the OFSTED inspector who lurks with a I'm-not-really-a-Drama-specialist-but-I-understand-that look on her face.
Literacy, ownership and motivation
By eliciting ideas from the students themselves you are giving them the opportunity to find their own language to explain their ideas. There is a direct link here with emergent literacy as the students have their own language on the grid they can understand much more clearly. They also have increased motivation because there is tangible proof in front of them that they have intelligent ideas. This is particularly pertinent for those students with poor writing skills or your year 8 boys who would rather wriggle than write. Use the grid as a vehicle for praising oral contributions which are often high level ideas without the specific language.
‘Whose ideas are these? Yes they are yours. Now you know that I am an experienced actor (Holby, Bill, DIY SOS) and when I was preparing this lesson I missed a few of the criteria you have set. You are very good. You might also like to know that the GCSE board has a number of the criteria you have set.'
This student language use can then be extended by the teacher supplying some examples of subject specific words. Not replacing the students' explanation, but rather writing the subject specific wording alongside. For example a student may have said "We will have to think about how they are feeling" so the teacher can then confirm that that is an excellent idea and let them know that "empathising with the character" is another way of saying it. It is important here however to make sure that the student knows we are not putting down their ideas. The idea is the same; it's the language that is different.
So, with their minds clear and jam packed with ideas about how they can succeed in this lesson, the students rush off to their task. Is the NAG now dead? Not in the least. Both you and the students can use it further.
Staying ‘on task' with the NAG
During the task students can be keeping their own and their groups' work focused by referring to the NAG to gauge their successes and target areas for improvement. Leave the grid by the side of the working area and they will naturally use it as an aide memoir for the task and the language they are practicing. During rehearsal the grids act like an oral writing frame leading students towards autonomous speaking and learning. As time goes on and the students get used to this working process they take more and more control and ownership. They may add points to their NAG, aiding teacher/student and student/student conversation or begin to develop the detailed language on the grid in preparation for a written task. Less confident groups enjoy the structure, challenging groups are reminded of their responsibilities and more able groups relish the independence. Eventually all students will be able to enter the room, find out what the task is and start to create their own grid.
With the grids on the floor demarcating each group's working area, the teacher can watch work in progress and then lead the group reflection using the students' ideas. Often during these conversations between student and teacher, other students will clamour for your attention. Simply refer to the NAG, ask the students to see if the answer to their query is on there, and let them know that you will be with them soon.. We are all keenly aware when we interrupt a group that at times it would have been better not to. By using the NAG your interventions can be less intrusive, more subtle. As you move between groups recording your thoughts and feedback on the grids the group can choose when they want to stop and read your feedback. Your role in the room changes. Rather than leading the assessment from the front you are a roving expert, delivering guidance when and where it is needed.
During this phase both students and teachers have been using the NAG as a vehicle to praise success and progress, and to set targets for future successes. As the grid fills up ideas and reflections from the oral process are held. You have deftly created a written record of the process of drama without the, ‘Do we have to do written work?' argument.
Assessments - informal, formal, teacher/student, self, peer.
So it is time for performance/presentation of and response to the students' work. The NAG provides the structure for the performer and perhaps more unusually for the audience. Instead of waiting for their turn or sitting back in the warm glow of satisfaction after their performance, the audience has the criteria by which each group needs to be assessed. Post performance discussion and reflection has a clear direction and language framework.
Using the NAGs with a challenging year 9 group I was aware that rehearsals were more productive, but they were bored by the evaluative process. Using the grids to focus the audience gave them a motivation to engage in the performances. They now had a structure for responding and a responsibility to the performers. Students treated this with some gravitas. The attitude towards responding to drama was changing. They settled down to watch performances a lot quicker and the atmosphere in the room changed from enforced silence to a focused stillness. Some chose to note down marks during the performance and post performance discussion was on comparative assessments and not on whose turn it would be to go next or if Abdul's mum really was a hamster. The discussion between performer/audience and teacher was prepared for by all and everyone had a framework for their criticism.
Responding to performances becomes as structured as the warm up or rehearsal. As tired teachers reach the end of a long day there is no need to search for the language or attempt to improvise a whole class discussion to convince students that their work was genuinely valued by the audience.
Perhaps most successful evaluative structure is paired peer assessment with groups performing to one another and time allocated after all performances for students to fill in individual NAGs. Students can agree targets discretely between themselves that they would never speak aloud in public. Public criticism is replaced with private reflection and during the discussion there is self-assessment and self reflection at a surprisingly advanced level of understanding. Students who rarely look at one another outside the drama classroom engage in a meaningful, positive assessment of work.