Student assessment, an integral component of the teaching process, ranges from informal questioning to IOWA Standardized Testing. St.

Ignatius teachers use a variety of methods to determine previous knowledge, formative understanding, and summative formationno matter the subject area. Teachers at St. Ignatius recognize that quality assessment comes in a variety of methods. Informal questioning during daily lessons helps teachers to check understanding of previous teaching and current concepts. Other methods used to perform this same function include: small group brainstorms, math problem completion, class discussions, running records, partner share, and writing sample test questions. Daily tasks and assignments give St. Ignatius teachers a valuable opportunity to check for understanding of material or targeted skills in formative assessment. A record of daily and weekly work helps to form a snapshot of student progress in a particular content area. Daily tasks and assignments also provide a valuable tool for teachers to glean information from each student about various skills which may go far beyond academic capability. For example: organization, problem solving, expressing ideas with confidence, setting appropriate goals and working toward them. All of these skills are addressed in the SLEs and clearly of utmost importance in assessing as well. Using weekly, section, or unit tests and quizzes provide teachers with a more summative assessment of materials. St. Ignatius teachers use testsboth teacher-designed and teacher-sourced to check student knowledge on a regular basis. Re-teaching is used as needed to clarify understanding for all students. Additionally, projects give teachers throughout grade levels an additional opportunity to meet educational needs of students while assessing knowledge, writing, and speaking skills. An additional form of assessment is the Iowa Standardized Test given each October in accordance with Archdiocesan guidelines. This test, given to third through eighth grade students gives teachers and administrators a tool to looking at student progress and trends in comparison to national scores and the scores of other students within the Archdiocese of Portland. This yearly assessment gives parents, students, and teachers the opportunity to learn about strengths and weaknesses of particular students. This is of utmost importance, especially when thinking about possible areas in which students may need additional resources and attention to support the high achievement of all students. Beyond the fact that St. Ignatius staff uses a variety of assessment, assessment is matched to the learning style of particular students. Teachers know the learning styles of students and provide opportunities to assess students in ways that work for themwhether oral, written, demonstration, or written test. Fewer problems may mean success for a student while still demonstrating a particular skill or task being assessed. Students are asked to not only repeat memorized information, but to justify ideas, opinions, and facts. St. Ignatius students are asked to use higher level thinking throughout the curriculum.