The Formative Mountain

"Climb every mountain....ford every stream...." Yes, The Sound of Music still rings inside my head a week after the all-school musical closed its doors. Its "man up and tackle the obstacles" advice worked for Maria, but as I sit in front of The Formative Mountain: 80 notebooks, and think how I have to climb that mountain to give feedback on the reading and writing process to each student, I feel myself quaking.

Yes, I believe in formative feedback. Yes, I believe in reading and writing notebooks as an authentic process that makes thinking visible. Yes, I believe in individualizing and adjusting instruction based on formative feedback. And yes, I believe that formative feedback helps learners know how to improve before they are summatively assessed.

HOWEVER! Formative assessment takes time, and I wonder how I can manage The Formative Mountain better so it is just a Formative Foothill or a Formative Mound (Formative Speedbump?). Our school is generous with shared planning time, department meeting time, and professional development time in the school day. I believe I probably have the best of all possible worlds when it comes to planning and prep time. And still I spent eight hours this weekend evaluating and giving feedback on notebooks. Sigh.

To put things in perspective, students turned their Writer's Notebooks in three times this quarter for evaluation. Two of those times (about once a month) they received a sticky-note comment on a self-selected "best entry" which gave a "Wow" about the entry as a validation of their thoughts and/or use of strategy, a formative grade on volume, variety, frequency, depth, and taking care of the notebook, and a general  "Wow" and "Next step" feedback comment. The third, in-between time they got an accountability score-- you kept up with all the entries, you did some of the entries, or you didn't do the entries. The Readers Notebook got one thorough review (as above) and an accountability score, because they also did two Discussion Thread postings in between which also received a formative grade (see previous post).

Am I over-assessing?

I have gotten good feedback from students and parents about my comments (I call them my "love notes", as in "Please read the love note I gave you in your notebook"). I have seen students make specific changes in their entries because of what I wrote to them. I have also seen students stay motivated and interested because they are getting positive feedback, especially the reluctant writers who need the practice the most and yet feel so discouraged when they have to write their thoughts on paper. That makes the "Wow" comment so much more important than the "Next Step".

So my eyes turn to The Formidable Formative Mountain of Notebooks, and trust that it will be worth it to "climb every mountain". But if anyone has any suggestions, I'm ready to put my alpine gear in the closet!