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These “artifacts” provide evidence of student learning. Portfolios can be used as either


summative or formative measures of student’s skills, knowledge, and understanding. If a summative portfolio were the desired outcome, then students would select and include only their best work. This “best evidence” portfolio reflects a student’s accomplishments after completing a course of study. A formative portfolio would include a sampling of items collected over a period of time. This portfolio would provide a snapshot of the student’s progress over time.


Appropriate artifacts for choral


students to use in a portfolio include: audio or videotapes of solo singing and sight reading; rubrics or ratings of specific skills; journal entries documenting vocal progress; written assignments, worksheets or tests; and judges comments from solo & ensemble or other festivals. While individual portfolios allow for a more authentic assessment of individual growth, the size of most choral programs prohibits extensive use of this tool. Nonetheless, it can be an effective way of charting student learning, especially if used in situations where ensemble numbers are low.


Competition and Festival Scores as Measures of Group Performance Schools participating in state or


regional competitions and festivals, or other formal venues for group adjudication may choose to use these scores or ratings as evidence of group achievement. However, there are several caveats associated with these types of ratings. First, these events are not intended to serve as a measure of growth, and second, there are numerous variables with the potential to influence results either negatively or positively. These two reasons alone indicate the inability of festivals or competitions to meet the four criteria deemed essential for measures of teacher effectiveness. The Michigan Society for Music


Teacher Education (2012) addresses the use of festival ratings as a measure of teacher effectiveness citing the following concerns: reliability of ratings, curricular limitations, score inflation, and rating effectiveness. Teachers who choose to use these measures as part of their evidence should be aware of these issues and prepared to address them if there are concerns from their administration. Most importantly festival scores, if used, must be balanced with multiple measures of both individual and group growth in achievement.


Conclusion Part 1 of this article included very


broad suggestions for planning, implementing, and interpreting assessments that could be used as indicators of student growth. In this installment, Part 2, I explored ideas for assessing students’ skills, knowledge and understanding. Combining information from both articles, Part 3 will explain how choral teachers might devise an assessment plan that reflects local initiatives, balances the task with local resources including time, and meets guidelines for evaluating teacher effectiveness according to current practice.


References


Garcia, A. N. & Stephan, J. L. (2011). Measures of Teacher Effectiveness


Michigan Society for Music Teacher Education (2012). Music Teacher Evaluation: Clarification and Recommendations. Michigan Music Educator, 49, 10-13.


Ormrod, J. E. (1999). Human learning. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill Prentice-Hall.


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in Teacher Evaluation Systems (Re- gional Educational Laboratory Midwest, ED-06-CO-0019). Re- trieved October 17, 2012, from http://michigan.gov/mde/0,4615, 7-140-37818---S,00.html


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