Anthony Armstrong is an eighth-grade social studies teacher at Del Mar Middle School in Tiburon, Calif. I’ve asked him to check in regularly about all the ways in which he uses the benefits of technology in his classroom.
By Anthony Armstrong
For the past few years, I've been using Quia ($49.99/year) for online learning activities and summative student assessments in my classroom. I’ve enjoyed the service because it's helped me to get the students their results faster, and has saved our school money it would have otherwise spent on paper and copy machine costs.
I particularly like the “Reports” function, which generates a detailed summary of the students results. It's been great in informing and improving my instruction, but it had little to no impact on how students see themselves as learners. At least not now in the current way I use it my classroom. But could it?
After each assessment or learning activity the students do, Quia generates a summary report of data that can further help me improve my effectiveness as an instructor. For example, the “Trouble Spots” feature provides me with a report that tells me which students and what questions scored below a certain specified percentage on the assessment. As a result, I am able to better target my remedial instruction, as well as get insight to where there may be areas of weakness within my curriculum instruction or just within the design of the assessment itself.