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Now there’s a way to blend balanced literacy and formative assessment. This book infuses research-based best practices of formative assessment through the lens of Common Core, with assessment support in these areas: read-alouds, guiding language into reading, language and literacy centers, and independent reading and writing. It also includes the "how" for novice and veteran K-8 teachers, administrators, and school literacy teams. Resources are included to help educators collect information and provide feedback to students.
"…puts formative assessment at its center, where it always has been for skilled teachers. The authors acknowledge the political reality of high-stakes testing while still pushing for the crucial role of formative assessment. They see formative assessment as preparing students as readers and writers. Prepared readers and writers, it follows, are prepared to demonstrate this in a variety of ways, standardized tests among them. . . .This is a readable text that is clearly drawn from the practice of real teachers in real schools. While external standards are not going away anytime soon, the authors of this text show that formative assessment can put the emphasis back on classroom learning day to day and moment to moment." - Illinois Reading Council Journal
December 1, 2016
"Policastro, McTague, and Mazeski bring the collective expertise of university professors and veteran teachers to bear in this thoroughly researched and well-documented book. . . .The authors have written a very understandable, manageable book that is predictable in its organization and specific in its message. It is a text that I would’ve liked to have when I was first starting to implement a balanced literacy classroom, as it truly does give step-by-step guidance to using formative assessment to inform instruction. This book would be an effective tool for elementary teachers since it has been my experience that middle school teachers do not usually include all balanced literacy classroom elements discussed in the book. However, I feel it would also be a worthwhile read for middle school teachers who want to learn more about formative assessment and how they would be able to implement it in what they do to guide their instruction." - Middle Web
November 30, 2015
"Policastro, McTague, and Mazeski build on their work on the new balanced literacy model by highlighting how formative assessments can be integrated in four key classroom components that are often overlooked as rich sources of data: the read-aloud, guiding language into reading, language and literacy centers, and independent reading and writing. They provide useful tools to guide individual teachers to more effectively use formative assessment—especially in new ways—in their classrooms. The authors’ techniques allow for the formative collection of data, a means to provide formative feedback to the student, and ways to encourage formative self-monitoring by the student. If as everyone says “assessment drives instruction,” then the two should operate in tandem. That is seen in the best forms of formative assessment—especially those tools and techniques that allow us to capture rich information from daily classroom routines. In Formative Assessment in the New Balanced Literacy Classroom, Policastro, McTague, and Mazeski provide a path toward a more purposeful way of operating in today’s classrooms." - Michael P. Ford, Professor of Reading Education, University of Wisconsin Oshkosh
April 17, 2015
"Infuse research-based best practices of formative assessment through the lens of Common Core. This book provides formative assessment techniques for read-alouds, guiding language into reading, language and literacy centers, and independent reading and writing." - Learning Magazine
January 1, 2017
"Many thanks to authors Policastro, McTague, and Mazeski for sharing their excellent collection of formative assessment tools along with clear examples of their use in today's classrooms. Formative Assessment in the New Balanced Literacy Classroom is a timely gift to teachers and administrators striving to develop formative assessment practices that support the learning of teachers as well as students. Teachers will be glad to have this book as an accessible guide to formative assessment in action." - Mary Massie, Senior Literacy Specialist
July 30, 2015
"Great thoughts on how to balance assessment with learning! . . .[The authors] put the K-8 student first and show with their checklists and principles how to effectively be a formative assessor and how to make findings count toward future learning. Great tips, examples, forms included. Recommended." - Teacher Librarian, "Resources for Teacher Librarians"
October 1, 2015
Dr. Margaret Mary Policastro is a professor of language and literacy at Roosevelt University in Chicago, Illinois, where she directs the language and literacy program and is the founding director of the Summer Reading Clinic for children. Dr. Policastro has more than 30 years of experience teaching both undergraduate and graduate students in language and literacy at Roosevelt University. She has worked more than 10 years on grant funded literacy projects in Chicago Public Schools and is currently the principal investigator of the Improving Teacher Quality (ITQ) grant from the Illinois Board of Higher Education (IBHE), funded by No Child Left Behind (NCLB). Dr. Policastro grew up in South Bend, Indiana, and attended Indiana University where she received her B.S. in art and elementary education and her M.S. in reading. After teaching art and reading in Indiana, she moved to Chicago, Illinois, and earned her Ph.D. at Northwestern University in reading and language. Dr. Policastro’s research interests currently focus on access to books for parents, children, and teachers and ongoing professional development for teachers and what effects these have on student learning. She has co-authored The New Balanced Literacy School: Implementing Common Core and Formative Assessment in the New Balanced Literacy School and authored Living Literacy at Home: A Parent’s Guide.
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