EE Certification -
Application Assessment
According to Kay Burke in The Mindful School: How to Assess
Authentic Learning, educators have traditionally used classroom
tests, quizzes, assignments, and standardized tests to evaluate
what students learn. These traditional assessment tools focus
on knowledge, curriculum and skills as fragments without application
to real life. The learning evaluated with these tools is not
meaningful. Additionally, current brain research shows that “meaningful
learning does not just ‘happen’ when students
receive information through direct instruction.”1 Learners
have to interpret information and relate it to their own prior
knowledge, and then they must know how to perform and when
to apply what they learned. Traditional assessments that only
evaluate a learner’s ability to recall factual information
is not sufficient for determining how that learner uses the
knowledge and skills gained in meaningful learning.
Authentic assessment of student learning is preferred to
traditional assessments in evaluating meaningful learning.
Authentic assessment has been described as:
- Methods emphasize learning and thinking, especially
higher order thinking skills like problem-solving (Collins)
- Tasks focus on students’ ability to produce a
quality product or performance (Wiggins)
- Disciplined
inquiry that integrates and produces knowledge, rather
than reproduces fragments of information others
discovered (Newmann)
Authentic assessment of what a learner (whether that learner
is a public school student or an environmental educator applying
for professional certification) knows and is able to do requires
a more balanced approach. A balanced assessment includes portfolio
and performance tools as well as traditional assessments.
Portfolios focus on process, products and individual growth
and include features such as reflection, goal setting and
self-evaluation. Performance tools focus on standards, application
and transfer of knowledge. Features of performance tools may
include collaboration, specific tasks, rubrics and criteria.
In the development of the environmental educator certification
program, TEEP has decided to require a variety of assessment
pieces: tests to measure environmental content knowledge and
skills related to education theory, portfolio pieces to measure
individual growth and development, and performance tasks to
measure application of knowledge and skills. The pieces submitted
by the applicant will be evaluated as a whole by a panel of
reviewers to determine if the competencies reflected are sufficient
for certification as a Professional Environmental Educator
in Texas.
Application Components that will be Reviewed
- Resume
- Video of Instruction
- Computer-generated Product
- Two Letters of Reference
- Environmental Literacy Test
- Competencies Worksheets – includes
brief essays, reflections, reporting of information
- Lesson
Plan or Instructional Program Outline
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