A Measurment of Learning Experiences

Excel Data Dashboard

CASE DESCRIPTION


Prior to collecting data, a teacher was interviewed to determine how they plan to ensure that students were truly learning and internalizing the material. The class was an honors math class and primarily white students. The goal was to determine whether students were able to critically think about material, and whether students were provided with opportunities to discuss a difference in opinion.


Data was collected using automatic timestamps to track engagement over time. Data validation was used to categorize collaboration and level of learning experiences. These levels were based off of Charlotte Danielson’s Framework for Teaching. After collecting the data, I cleaned the data then utilized pivot tables to sort and analyze the data in Excel. The interactive dashboard was presented to the teacher along with a detailed script to further discuss outcomes.

KEY FINDINGS


  • The stack bar graph is segmented to show the breakdown of talk time and activities for each minute. The class is noticably fast paced, with a variety of voices and activities within each minute.
  • Students were given the opportunity to dialogue for 10 out of the 30 minutes, about 33% of the observation. As noted in the stacked bar graph, student talk time was fairly evenly distributed throughout the class. The longest students went without an opportunity to talk was during one of the longer clips of the video.
  • Students were primarily engaged in critical and higher level thinking and the questions that were asked allowed them to personalize the information by allowing for multiple approaches to answering or solving a problem.
  • The majority of the class was spent dialoguing as a whole group. Students engaged in small group discussion but did not have an opportunity to share with a partner before sharing with the small or whole group.
  • Despite many transitions, as noted on the stacked bar graph, less than 3 minutes were spent transitioning total.

RECOMMENDATIONS


  • The teacher might consider how they can ensure that students have more opportunities to share with a partner. Additionally, data could be collected on the future to track student engagement to determine what percent of students are actively engaged in whole group discussions.
  • Due to the high level of critical thinking and higher level questions asked, this teacher would be a good candidate for providing support for other staff. A learning walk or co-observation could be considered to model how dialogue can be utilized in math class.
  • Data should be collected using the same template on the teacher’s non-honors level class to determine whether students are receiving the same opportunities for rigor.
  • Since the majority of this class is white, the teacher should work to ensure that students of color are given the opportunity to enroll in this class in the future and that they are given equitable opportunites to experience rigorous learning.