God Strand Assessment Results

God Assessment

As I have stated previously in 2014 we decided as a staff on four concepts that we would like our children to gain through our God strand teaching.

Main Concepts: 

1. God loves us

2. We know about God through the Bible, through His Creation and through our personal relationship through prayer. 

3. What God is like- Father, Creator, everywhere, all powerful etc. 

4. God is the creator
We wanted the children to be confident in answering these four questions

1. God loves people. How has God shown us his love?

2. How can we know about God?

3. What do we know about what God is like?

4. What do you know about God and creation? 

Self-Assessment Rubric using SOLO Taxonomy Describing God
Prestructural	Unistructural	Multistructural	Relational	Extended Abstract
I don’t know anything about God	I can tell one thing about God	I can describe a few things about God	I can give more explanation of how these descriptions are like God.	My description helps me to think about God in a new way.

These four concepts will be the context of the God strand teaching throughout the whole school. We do continue to teach the learning outcomes for the Religious Education curriculum at each year level in context of these four concepts.

Key Concepts For God Strand	Key Concepts For God Strand
Year 1: God is the creator of all that is and keeps it in being Each person is God’s unique creation made in love for love We praise God for all the good gifts of creation, both seen and unseen	Year 5: Scripture stories of God’s call to people and their responses The meaning of covenant and God’s faithfulness God calls people to be reconciled in relationships The call to believe in God and build up Te Rangatiratanga – the Reign of God on earth
Year 2: God’s gifts to people are a sign of God’s love God’s greatest gift is Jesus who showed us God is a loving and forgiving Father People are called to appreciate God’s gifts and be grateful for them	Year 6: Images of God reveal something of what God is like Christians come to know God through Jesus and respond in worship and action Catholic beliefs within the Creed
Year 3: God is everywhere in the world through creation God works through people who accept God’s gift of grace God speaks to people through the Scriptures God works in the world through every culture	Year 7: People are created to grow through grace to become like Jesus and turn away from sin Using talents for the work of the Church and the Reign of Tika, Rangimarie and Aroha on earth God’s desire for humanity Although affected by sin, all creation is redeemed by God and has been given its own tapu and mana
Year 4: God is the mystery of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit Giving respect to the gift of God’s creation because it is tapu God’s love expressed through the ten commandments	Year 8: God is mystery – personal and distant (immanent and transcendent) God revealed as a Trinity of three persons – creating, redeeming and sanctifying

Here is a link to the test with possible answers the children can give

God strand test with Possible AnswersWe agreed:
 This will be entered on the assessment gathering file and the children will be marked out of 4  for concept 1. (1= uni-structural, 2=multi-structural, 3=relational, 4=extended abstract) Teachers new to our school are supported by a tagged teacher and Overall Teacher Judgments (OTJs) are formed in Hubs (Team Teaching Groups).

 We would expect achievement to be shown mainly in the context of their year strand. For children to show mastery it should be clear that their understanding of their year level work is linked to some of the main concepts we want them to understand (above).

These are our second comparative results for the God strand. As we are tracking over three years we are tracking the year 1-6 cohorts of 2014.


Our results at this stage it shows that all groups have exceeded their two year projection in most concepts.
We also look together as a staff at the children who need to be targeted following our assessment of the strand. These children are looked at by the whole staff at the beginning of strand meetings so we are aware of the children who have gaps and can support them in their learning.
Targeted children following God Strand Assessment 2014, 2015
TEACHERS
Have a look at the results for your individual classes and children by looking at the following links below:
Three year comparison- tracking the 2014 children
2014 RE Overall Assessment

RE Assessment Overall 2015

Communion of Saints Strand

ST DOMINIC GUZMAN, ST CATHERINE of SIENA, ST ROSE of LIMA, ST JOSEPH

In term 4 from weeks 2 to 6 we will be teaching the Communion of Saints strand. As this is one of the last strands of this year when we come together to celebrate our learning (during Whanau group time) we want to have a dress up as your saint day. This will be near to the feast days for All Saints and All Souls and children can share why they are inspired by their saint and what they have learnt about and from them.

I have also created a Pinterest Communion of Saints folder to share between staff to access resources and ideas.
Communion of Saints- Pinterest board

We have started to track children who may require extra teaching in this unit based on assessment information from 2014's teaching of Communion of Saints.
Teachers can access this private link below:
Targeted Children

Each Strand we meet as a staff to prepare for teaching the Communion of Saints strand we look at church theology and the requirements of the curriculum and in 2014 we agreed on three key concepts of church teaching we want children to develop as they move through the school:

1. Mary is our first and most important saint because of her special relationship with Jesus.
2. The Communion of Saints means all the members of the Church - living now, in purgatory and in heaven.
3. The choices we make on earth affect what happens when we die, we will be judged on our choices.

-Teachers also receive Posters displaying this main concepts with possible answers the children could say and illustrations that link to the messages. These are displayed in each Hub (classroom) area. 

Break Down of Main Concepts Taught at each year level

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1khj2m6f4PWV-jzmv5yQ8itSjvIovMHEHC1nt2ZQspr4/edit 

SOLO rubric for Communion of Saints

https://docs.google.com/a/stjoseph.school.nz/file/d/0B5kVPCsXjRbYd0JfUk9XYWZzNWM/edit

Test - Teacher's Marking Guide 

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Jpx3RVwaUTfWyTlSgwcnGZrvOF9s4QY91mOAl6Q54Ec/edit

Communion of Saints Test (year 3+)

https://docs.google.com/a/stjoseph.school.nz/document/d/1IdperFaIvFaxcOEpL33D7VUhQFBAzH_rm9wlzbXxH7Q/edit

Data entry for Communion of Saints

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/17k3Vp9IZw9d0P-SGVDiVkd9U7KUSlkThQ4yCOlAHrXw/edit#gid=2

Sacrament Assessment

As I have stated previously in 2014 we decided as a staff on four concepts that we would like our children to gain through our Sacrament strand teaching.
1. Grace is God's love and strength working with us and the world.
2. Sacraments bring grace.
3. Know the seven sacraments.
4. Know the signs and symbols of the sacraments.

These four concepts will be the context of the Sacrament strand teaching throughout the whole school. We do continue to teach the learning outcomes for the Religious Education curriculum at each year level in context of these four concepts.

We agreed:
For the Junior Hubs the class teacher will decide the content of the assessment to make their overall teacher judgement. This will be entered on the assessment gathering file and the children will be marked out of 4  for concept 1. (1= uni-structural, 2=multi-structural, 3=relational, 4=extended abstract) for all the other concepts out of 7. Teachers new to our school are supported by a tagged teacher and Overall Teacher Judgments (OTJs) are formed in hubs. Our next step is to look at forming OTJs across the school.

For years 4-8 we will take the same test but leave it open for the children's answers. We would expect achievement to be shown mainly in the context of their year strand. For children to show mastery it should be clear that their understanding of their year level work is linked to some of the main concepts we want them to understand (above).

These are our second comparative results for the Sacrament strand. As we are tracking over three years we are tracking the year 1-6 cohorts of 2014.

Our results at this stage show that all groups have exceeded their two year projection, over one year.
We also look together as a staff at the children who need to be targeted following our assessment of the strand. These children are looked at by the whole staff at the beginning of strand meetings so we are aware of the children who have gaps and can support them in their learning.
As teachers we are all live long learners and this term and 5 of our teaching staff are studying towards a diploma in RE (Through the Catholic Institute of New Zealand). Our current paper is on Understanding Sacraments with Father Patrick Bridgman. We are gaining a deeper understanding of the Sacraments and can implement our new learning into our teaching.