Quiz 0.1 to 0.4

We give two quizzes in a unit in order to give students an opportunity to see how they’re doing with the material before they get to the end-of-unit summative test. Quizzes represent the middle ground between low-stake practice opportunities in homework and a rigorous end-of-unit assessment. A quiz helps focus students on the most important ideas of the lessons. Imagine a funnel. At the top of the funnel are all the ideas from a unit. At the bottom of the funnel are the most important ideas of the unit, or biggest take-aways, that appear on the test. The quiz is somewhere in the middle of the funnel. The quiz may not assess every concept or skill that was taught, but it should assess the more important ideas that will also appear on the test.

When we write a quiz, we look at each lesson and ask ourselves, “What are the 2-3 most important skills or ideas from this lesson?” Then we write quiz questions to assess those things. Due to time and space constraints, when we write a test, we try to identify the ONE most important skill or idea from each lesson. The quizzes help communicate to students what the most important ideas are and provide them with feedback on how they’re doing with them.