Important steps In Designing Units

Step 1: Determine & Unpack Standards
Step 2: Group Standards into Units
Step 3: Identify Enduring Understandings tied to
                  standards
Step 4: Decide Themes to frame the unit
Step 5: Design Essential Questions within the
                 Unit Theme
​Step 6: Create Unit Performance Assessment to
                 Assess Priority Standards
                   - Performance Based Assessment &
                       Authentic Art Assessments
                  - Rubrics & Scoring Guides
Step 7:  Write Lessons that Build Skills to the
​                 Assessment

Performance BAsed Assessment

from Edutopia by  Patricia Hilliard, PhD
 Performance-based assessments have recently experienced a reemergence in education literature and curricula. In the 1990's, performance-based assessments became a valid alternative to traditional multiple-choice tests. In the years that followed, legislative requirements shifted the emphasis to standardized testing, which caused a decline in nontraditional testing methods (Darling-Hammond & Adamson, 2013). Currently, more school districts and universities are seeking authentic measures of student learning, and performance-based assessments have become increasingly relevant.

​What is a performance-based assessment?The definition of performance-based assessments varies greatly depending on author, disciple, publication, and intended audience (Palm, 2008). In general, a performance-based assessment measures students' ability to apply the skills and knowledge learned from a unit or units of study. Typically, the task challenges students to use their higher-order thinking skills to create a product or complete a process (Chun, 2010). Tasks can range from a simple constructed response (e.g., short answer) to a complex design proposal of a sustainable neighborhood. Arguably, the most genuine assessments require students to complete a task that closely mirrors the responsibilities of a professional, e.g., artist, engineer, laboratory technician, financial analyst, or consumer advocate.

What are the essential components of a performance-based assessment?Although performance-based assessments vary, the majority of them share key characteristics. First and foremost, the assessment accurately measures one or more specific course standards. Additionally, it is:
  1. Complex
  2. Authentic
  3. Process/product-oriented
  4. Open-ended
  5. Time-bound

​Normally, students are presented with an open-ended question that may produce several different correct answers (Chun, 2010; McTighe, 2015). In the higher-level tasks, there is a sense of urgency for the product to be developed or the process to be determined, as in most real-world situations.

Authentic Art Assessments

Our curriculum writing revolved around determining authentic artistic practices that would also allow for the development of artistic habits and skills. This meant that our assessments were based on authentic products and tools that are a part of an artist's practice. We determined that four pieces of evidence would help students demonstrate what they had learned: the sketchbook, the work of art, the portfolio, and an artist statement. 

Each piece would allow for open-ended demonstration of learning,  that would be complex, authentic and process/product oriented as well as be able to be tiered for various grade levels. 

Assessment Example

For example, a fifth-grade assessment description could be: 

​Using knowledge gained during activities and learning experiences throughout the unit, students will complete a unit sketchbook/portfolio that has documented their development, experiments and growth within the quarter’s objectives. Students will document their process while creating an artwork by using a plan sheet that contains preliminary planning sketches, planned media, revisions, and an artist’s statement that includes a description of the artwork and reflection about what the student is proud of in their work. The students will explore the big idea of De/Construction and address the questions: “How can I combine ideas to develop an innovative idea to make art?”;  “How can I experiment and develop my different art skills?”; and  “How can I interpret my art by analyzing different features to identify the ideas and mood communicated?”
  • Students will practice and document their artistic process by keeping a sketchbook or record of the development of their ideas as they work, documenting the process from early stages to fully completed. The finished work should then be preserved as part of their sketchbook/portfolio (actual or electronic).
  • Students will practice and document their artistic process by filling out plan sheets and responding to reflective prompts (artist’s statement).  
    Another option to document their artistic process, a student could choose to keep a video diary instead of a sketchbook.  The student could share his/her idea, record progress and changes made to the artwork, share his/her final work, and answer the reflective questions. 
  • Students will create artwork while developing art-making techniques and approaches (in one work or over the course of many artworks).

​The teacher can use any of this unit’s artworks to assess, was the student able to:
  1. Combine ideas to generate an innovative idea for art-making? (Cr1.1.5a)
  2. Experiment and develop art-making techniques and approaches? (Cr2.1.5a)
  3. Interpret art by analyzing characteristics of form and structure, contextual information, subject matter, visual elements, and use of media to identify ideas and mood conveyed? (Re8.1.5a)

    Students will show that they really understand when they…
  • Combine ideas to generate an innovative idea to create an artwork, or design (in one work or over the course of many artworks).
    as evidenced in their sketchbook, artwork, or described in the artist statement
  • Experiment and develop art-making techniques and skills while creating artwork (in one work or over the course of many artworks).
    as evidenced in their sketchbook, artwork, or described in the artist statement
  • Interpret his/her art by analyzing characteristics of form and structure, contextual information, subject matter, visual elements, and use of media to identify ideas and mood conveyed.
    ​    as evidenced in their sketchbook, artwork, or described in the artist statement