Formative Assessment with Snapfolio

[00:01] SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to Principal Center Radio, bringing you the best in professional practice.

[00:06] Announcer:

Here's your host, director of the Principal Center and champion of high performance instructional leadership, Justin Bader. Welcome everyone to Principal Center Radio.

[00:15] SPEAKER_02:

I'm your host, Justin Bader, and I'm thrilled to be joined today by my friend David Lowe. David is the founder and CEO of Snapfolio, a mobile app development company focused on formative assessment tools for teachers.

[00:30] Announcer:

And now, our feature presentation.

[00:32] SPEAKER_02:

David, welcome to Principal Center Radio.

[00:34] SPEAKER_01:

Hi, thanks for having me.

[00:35] SPEAKER_02:

So, David, we had the opportunity to work together for, I guess, not long enough in Seattle Public Schools. And when I was an elementary principal and you... came on board in our administrative team and really helped move our school forward in the areas of readers and writers workshop and PBIS and climate and culture and all sorts of different things. And you have, over the last couple of years, developed an app called Confer that's really achieved a lot of traction and has enabled you to focus on app development full time.

[01:10]

I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about why you chose to make that, you know, that career transition to focus on apps and, you know, and just kind of what got you to this point.

[01:21] SPEAKER_01:

It started when I was a classroom teacher at Olympic Hills Elementary in Seattle. We were piloting Readers and Writers Workshop at the elementary school level in Seattle. It was an amazing school, an amazing environment. We were just really diving into the workshop instruction model. One of the things that we really quickly hit was that You're working really hard to collect all this information on individuals and small groups so that you can differentiate what you're doing, but it's really hard to manage that process. I went through several iterations of a paper, conferring notebook, trying to keep track of all this stuff.

[01:58]

And then I had a programming background, so just decided to get back into programming and build what was essentially a digital version of my conferring notebook, so that I could capture stuff electronically and then be able to sort and act on it just a lot quicker, because it was a pain point in my own classroom. So at the same time I was doing my national boards, I also decided to do this as like a side project, which I stood on.

[02:21] SPEAKER_02:

In your spare time.

[02:22] SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, exactly. I'm not sure what the logic was in that, but anyways. So I built Confer just for my classroom, but because we were working with the Teachers College, they started talking about it and the word kind of spread from there. But basically it was the passion that drove it was this desire to really to take the information I was getting from students and actually use it to inform my next rounds of instruction. Because we were collecting all this data, but I wasn't able to sort it or get to it and actually use it to inform what I was teaching. And I think that desire has driven a lot of what I'm doing.

[03:00]

both for myself and for other teachers, to be able to get a handle on all the student data we encounter, but then in a way that we can actually use it to change what we teach and how we teach so that it actually impacts the instruction that we deliver to kids. that I think is really powerful. So that's what was behind Confer. And then as it continued to grow, it's kind of providing the opportunity to work on Snapfolio, which is sort of the bigger vision of what I've wanted to do in terms of creating a formative assessment tool that teachers can use in the classroom.

[03:30] SPEAKER_02:

And I think one reason Confer caught on like wildfire is that you took a very well-established instructional practice, you know, this practice of conferring with students about their writing and their reading and helping them develop their skills, set goals, move to the next level. Mm-hmm. That practice among schools that follow the writer's workshop model is very well entrenched, but it's also really, really tough to manage, as you said. And you've got this paper notebook, and you're able to take your skills in a variety of different domains and put them together into this app that's now reached thousands and thousands of teachers. As you looked back on the past couple of years of having people work with Confer, and as you were thinking about making some design choices for Snapfolio, what did you want to accomplish instructionally that just wasn't possible or wasn't feasible with paper-based tools, with traditional tools and grade books and things like that, or even Confer?

[04:28] SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. So one of the biggest things that I found was that... The really good data in a classroom, the stuff that's really informative about where students are at, happens, it's found in the intersection between teachers and students, like in those interactions, like when you're sitting with a reader or a student's kind of talking you through their writing process, or it's in the interactions between teachers and student work. So the teacher is actually reading through a draft of their writing, or they're looking over reflections from their reading.

[05:00]

Like, that's where the really powerful insights come from. But it's, but those are also the hardest to capture, and then the hardest to analyze, right? So if you, you know, I can give, I can, turn something into a multiple choice test, put it in a scanner and get like a spreadsheet of, you know, how kids did. And that data is really actionable, but the nature of how I got it means that it's really thin. Like it doesn't actually tell me that much. So I felt this tension between there's this really rich and powerful data of sitting with students and their student work.

[05:30]

And then there's this really thin data that's super actionable. How do we take the really powerful data that we should be like making all our decisions from and make that just as actionable?

[05:39] SPEAKER_02:

Let me stop you there, because I think you've said something that is profound, that's really easy to miss. And we've been thinking a lot about teacher evaluation here at the Principal Center, and we do work with principals on that topic. And I have to say, I think what you said about the relationship between teachers and student work as being such a rich source of information for planning instruction, for planning classes, What's next? How am I going to help my students master this content, master these skills and move on? But way too often, that's a difficult thing for us to measure as administrators or to observe as administrators. And if you look at a lot of evaluation frameworks, evaluation systems, which is something that we do as administrators, they don't even talk about that.

[06:27]

Which is astounding to me that looking at student work, such a core practice, this core part of understanding where your students are isn't even acknowledged. And we want to make sure that our teachers are doing, you know, the sage on the stage, you know, kind of performance moves to, you know, to quote unquote teach effectively. But that's one of those behind the scenes things that because it's hard to observe, because it's hard to measure, and because frankly it's hard to do, it just does not get the attention it deserves. Right.

[06:55] SPEAKER_01:

For me, that's a part of a huge piece of what makes teaching a profession. I can give a piece of student writing to anybody and they can look at it, but it's only a really well-trained teacher that can look at it and say, oh, this student is struggling with structure, or this student understands these elements of craft but doesn't get these pieces. It's the professional insight from a teacher interacting with that piece of student work that enables them to even plan out, like, oh, this is what we should be teaching next to that student. And so that's where I feel like the missing piece is giving teachers tools to capture those insights and turn them into actionable data. But you can't get those insights unless you have an experienced professional teacher interacting with authentic student work. And you're right, it's huge.

[07:46]

I mean, that's a critical part of using formative assessment and having it drive instruction.

[07:51] SPEAKER_02:

Absolutely. And that's, I think, that reliance on professional judgment and, you know, the centrality of professional judgment is why I think, honestly, you know, Confer caught on as well as it did, whereas other apps and other, you know, there are lots of educational apps and a lot of them are not very good. But a lot of them make the mistake of saying, well, you're the teacher and teachers do, you know, this very simple thing and we can make it slightly easier or faster. Right. And your perspective in, I think, in developing your apps has been, you know, teaching is hard. You know, there are complex things that we need to do.

[08:21]

And there are things that are not even really all that doable without kind of next generation technology. So, yeah, talk to us about the next step, the next level with Snapfolio.

[08:29] SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so what I wanted to do with Snapfolio was let teachers, give teachers a way to capture all those insights that they have really quickly. So two things. One, capture it really quickly in a way that's faster than even paper and pencil. And then two, have that data organized in a way that they can get to it any way they needed to. So as I talk with teachers, really amazing teachers who are using data in incredible ways, who are really close to their students, and I'd ask them, like, so show me the data that you have on their students. every single one of them would begin to rummage through piles and they would pull out incredible stuff, but it was written on stickies, it was on literally half sheets of paper tucked in a binder.

[09:09]

These really powerful insights that they're getting from students and student work, but it's all over the place in terms of data collection. And then they could only ever use sort of one thing at a time, right? They grabbed one stack of exit slips, they sorted through it, and they have one sort of conclusion from those exit slips, and they can make decisions from that, but that data never gets integrated with their other conferring notes or the pre-assessment they did, right? What I wanted to do is find a way that teachers, as they're having all these insights through their interactions with students and student works, they can capture them with Snapfolio, and then they can come back and look at it. If they want to see, show me this student and their portfolio of assessment data, all that information is connected to that student. Or they can say, show me this skill that I've been tracking in a bunch of different ways, and they can see progress on that.

[09:58]

So the core of Snapfolio is that teachers would enter skills that they're teaching and that they want to collect data on, sort of on the fly as they make observations, or even as they create assessments and sort of link those skills to them. But those skills that the teacher creates are the through line between all the different pieces of data they're collecting. So they could sit down in a conference with a student, note that they're doing well on this skill, grab that skill, mark it as a three. And then a couple weeks later, they're in a small group with a group of students that are wrestling with that. So they use that same skill in that small group, mark it as a two. And then they do a kind of a mid-unit assessment.

[10:34]

They create that assessment in Snapfolio. They use that same skill. And then they're able to score an assessment in Snapfolio, one, two, three, or four on that skill. So it's that same skill that they're looking at, but the data is being captured in all these different ways. But then because it's being captured in Snapfolio, like, with that skill, then that data is still really accessible. So they can look at individual assessments or they could say, show me how my entire class is doing on this skill.

[11:00]

And all those pieces of data they collected will inform that view.

[11:03] SPEAKER_02:

Traditionally, when we think about using technology to kind of efficiently collect information about what students know and are able to do, we think about things like old school clicker systems where you've got like a briefcase full of clickers. And you can project a multiple choice question on the screen and students can push a button. And that technology has gotten vastly better. And, you know, the folks over at Exit Ticket in Kirkland with the Ed Start are doing some great work around helping schools that have one-to-one programs or bring your own device programs. I think especially at the secondary level, you know, use formative assessment in that way where either you want students to type in an answer or you want students to select an answer and just very quickly kind of build in a check for understanding, which at the secondary level is a great way to, you know, you have pretty structured content. You have a pretty good sense of where students are going to get hung up and you just want to make sure they're keeping up with you.

[11:56]

But David, I know your background is at the elementary level and we don't have that same kind of interaction with content and with students where they can just simply select an answer or type into a little box and it gets saved. So what's the input format so that when we have five and six year olds who are giving us their earliest writing, we're able to mine that for insights and actually kind of store that in a useful way. That's not just kind of a score in a grade book that doesn't tell the whole story.

[12:28] SPEAKER_01:

So one of the things when I was talking to some of the teachers and they were saying that a big, as they're looking, so it's student writing, especially right. As you're moving through a unit, they may have like two or three sort of core skills that they're focusing on during that, that stretch of the unit. And so as they're looking at student writing, you know, they have their entire teacher filter on, but, but at this point they're really looking at, you know, like two or three key things. So in Snapfolio, you might create an assessment that's just like writing check-in and then you add those three skills to it. And then you can go around the room, and as you're meeting with students, you can take a picture of their writing really quickly and link it to that assessment of the writing check-in that has those three skills tied to it. So you're really quickly capturing images of student work, and it's getting saved according to the student and the assignment that you've connected it to.

[13:18]

And then the teacher can go back on their device, bring up that student's writing, and then just give it a score for those, say, those three skills, right? Like three on this one, three on this one, one on that skill. So they have the piece of evidence, they have the student writing there, but then they also have the snapshot of how they're doing on those different skills. And those skills are exactly what it is, you know, like they're teacher created skills, right? So it's what the teacher is trying to work on with the students. So then from there, then you can step back.

[13:46]

Then I can say, I can go back and look at a student's piece of writing and see which skills they're struggling with, which skills they need more work on. Or I can step back and look at the whole class and say, show me how the whole class is doing on these three skills. Drill down and say, who are my kids who are at a one on this skill? Let me look at their writing that I have here and then let me pull them and do some instruction on that skill.

[14:05] SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. So there's the rich qualitative data in the form of like the actual photograph of students work. And you can score that according to the skills that you've put in.

[14:13] SPEAKER_01:

I mean, there's no there's no easy way to capture all the teacher insights that you have as you're looking at a piece of work. But I feel like when you're in the trenches, especially at the elementary level, right, like you're. You're teaching at the skill level. When you're meeting with kids, what you want to cover are specific skills and strategies. For myself, those are the insights that I was having. If I'm working on fluency and three and four word phrases with a reader, that's what I would teach them in a small group.

[14:43]

That's also what's coming to mind as I'm listening to them read. And so that's the skill that I want to be able to capture. So that was a thought with Snapvolio is just let teachers put those skills in that's their language, it's what they're using to teach, and then let them just capture a quick quantitative score, one through four, on that skill. And that enables the information to suddenly be actionable by kind of grouping kids and seeing progress on skills.

[15:05] SPEAKER_02:

So let's say in a language arts classroom, you have students writing in writing journals. So let's say you've got a composition book. And I was a rookie enough science teacher to have my students do composition books, you know, to organize their work and then turn them in. And then I realized I have 120 students. I got to take these things home this weekend. Totally.

[15:28]

So you're saying you would actually go around and photograph whatever they're working on, whether it's in a notebook, whether it's on a loose sheet of paper, whether it's some other type of binding format. Or even, I mean, I know we have a lot of people who in math classrooms love that idea paint where the kids actually just get a marker and they can write straight on the table. So any of those would work?

[15:48] SPEAKER_01:

The thing with any data collection system, you only collect what you're actually going to review and then use. If you're taking home an entire student notebook because you wanted to see the one page that they wrote, that's That's an excessive and that system is going to get overwhelming. Let's say, for example, you have students. They're in your science class. They're doing some reflections on their writing notebook. You want to catch, at the end of this lesson today, I want to see where their reflections are at and if they're processing this or that correctly.

[16:19]

You have them do that writing. Then you say, leave your writing notebooks open to that page on your desk while we transition to the next activity or you line up to move to another class. And then you go, and Snapfolio has a setup where it's one touch per student. So I just tap a student and I can capture an image of their work and I don't have to flip back and forth between students and screens. So you can literally move from desk to desk and with one touch capture each student's picture, a picture of their writing. And you've now collected all of their writing, probably faster than it would have taken to pull all those binders together, stuff them in a tote bag and take them home.

[16:53]

But then because you've just collected that individual piece, you can assess what you're looking for with that piece.

[16:58] SPEAKER_02:

And then let me ask one other scenario, because I know we have people who maybe are in more of a secondary classroom and maybe they do collect work on little sheets of paper, mark it up. Like, let's say you're a Spanish teacher and you want to correct students' grammar in the sentences that they're writing. Would it be possible to, you know, grade traditionally on paper with your red pen or whatever, green pen, if you feel like that's a lot better, and then take pictures of the graded work? Yeah.

[17:24] SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, absolutely. And the thing is, if you have that student feedback system of you're marking up their paper and turning it back in, if you take the half second to take a picture of it before you do that, now it's part of their digital portfolio in Snapfolio. So they get their piece of work back and you get to have that teacher-student interaction. But you can also go back, whether it's at a student conference or a parent conference, and you can bring up their portfolio of work and then begin to go back through and say, this is what they were doing, this is the feedback that they got. Yeah. So yeah, so it's a way to really quickly capture and organize that stuff, even if you are turning it back into students.

[17:59] SPEAKER_02:

Well, I feel like we're just at the beginning of seeing as a profession what's possible with this. And I know the Teachers College folks, Lucy Calkins and Mary Aronworth and Chris Lehman and all those folks that have kind of spearheaded this work around the country, you know, in really thousands of schools, you know, I can't wait to see that same thing happen in other subjects beyond reading and writing and in grade levels beyond where Readers and Writers Workshop operates. Because I think the power of that formative assessment, and as you said, the relationship not only directly between the teacher and the student, but between the teacher and the student's work, boy, that really gets at what we're trying to accomplish instructionally in a way that nothing else does.

[18:41] SPEAKER_01:

Like you said, it's not tied to a certain content. Formative assessment or looking at student work, that's not tied to literacy or to any other one subject. To see the practice of being really close to students in their work and then managing that information in a way that actually lets us teach more directly to what students need, I'm excited to see that continue to progress as well.

[19:05] SPEAKER_02:

All right, so two quick questions. In terms of technology, what do people need to be able to do this? What are the tech requirements?

[19:12] SPEAKER_01:

So Snapfolio is going to be iPad only to start with, and then we'll move out from there as quickly as we can. Part of that comes from, because it's happening on the fly in the classroom, it's not the kind of thing that you sit down at the end of the day at your computer and then enter in all the data. It's about capturing data on the fly as you're moving around between students. It'll start out with an iPad, and then we'll branch out from there as soon as we possibly can. You'll be able to use Wi-Fi to sync up stuff later on, but as you're working, you won't need it.

[19:46] SPEAKER_02:

Well, if people want to watch your demo video or get on your mailing list to find out more about Snapfolio, where should they go?

[19:53] SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, so they can go to snapfolioapp.com and you can sign up for the newsletter there. So all the updates about and progress on Snapfolio will be coming out there. And then you can take a look at the video on the website as well.

[20:03] SPEAKER_02:

Well, David, I wish we could talk more. It has been a blast talking about formative assessment and instruction and what really gets at the heart of what we're trying to accomplish. And I look forward to seeing the impact that it has in the next couple of years. Thanks so much.

[20:17] SPEAKER_01:

Thank you. Me too.

[20:19] SPEAKER_00:

And now, Justin Bader on high-performance instructional leadership.

[20:23] SPEAKER_02:

So high-performance instructional leaders, what did you take away from my conversation with David Lowe? As you can probably tell, David and I had a lot of fun working together at Olympic View Elementary in Seattle. And I have a ton of respect for his work as a classroom teacher, for his work as an administrator in our school, and increasing even higher respect for his work as an app developer who understands... the work of educators like just about no one else.

[20:50]

So this is about the highest praise I can give for the app development that David is doing for the reason that it allows us to do things in the classroom that are not feasible or even not possible without that technology. And I think too often we use technology as kind of a poor substitute for the way we were doing things before. maybe with one advantage that we didn't have before. Maybe it's faster, maybe it's shinier, maybe it saves a step. But when we can actually transform the core of the teaching and learning process, when we can take individual, you know, raw student work on a sheet of paper and turn that into a digitized item that becomes a part of a portfolio, that becomes scored as part of a kind of a class record, and when it can inform future teaching as part of the skill progression that you're teaching, that's powerful.

[21:42]

So if I sounded excited in this interview, I am, because I think there's tremendous potential for our profession, whether you are an elementary teacher, a middle school teacher, a high school teacher, regardless of what you teach and what level you're at. I think the potential of formative assessment is enormous because nothing helps us get better than frequent feedback about our progress. And when it's our goal to help our students master essential content, knowledge, and skills, that's exactly the kind of feedback we need, the kind of feedback we get from focusing on student work.

[22:17] Announcer:

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