Assessment

During the time of my visit to my observation at the school site, I went into the classroom and was told my Mrs. Teacher that I would not be able to talk and interact with the students but only sit down and observe them through their assessment. I was a little bummed out because I was so used to interacting with the students and helping them as much as I could. Class had not yet started, I got to school just about fifteen minutes before the class and noticed that Mrs. Teacher seemed to be stressed out and was really tense and walking all over the place moving her classroom around. She began telling me that the kids would be taking an assessment for social studies and that she need to separate all the students from group to individual seats. She mentioned that her students didn't know this was going to happen because it was last minute by the staff members of the social students group. I helped her and she was pretty content that I was there for that part of the class to help her move. Although she began to tell me not to interact with the students because she would get in trouble if I was talking with them.

Soon after we moved the classroom around, here came the students one by one. They seemed to be really energetic and happy to be in the class. That was because they had been working on a project and were eager to get back to working on it. Little did they know they needed to take an assessment for social studies for what they have learned so far. It was based off of New Mexico history and what they had been learning all along form when I had been there. I was waiting for the moment the would be told that an assessment was going to take place, the last of the bunch was coming in when Mrs. Teacher told the students that were already there to not have anything but a pencil on their desks with them. They were concerned and began to ask questions like "Why Mrs.?" "What are we going to do?" "What about our projects from yesterday?". Mrs. Teacher began to talk to them and just hold on until all of the students got in the classroom. The class clown of the classroom began to yell and shout "I WANT TO DO OUR PROJECTS, who ever wants to do them raise your hands and we will take a vote!" Of course all of the class raised their hands except for me and Mrs. Teacher. 

Now that everyone was in the classroom, attendance was taken first and all of the students attention was gathered. Mrs. Teacher began to say "We are going to take an assessment today class" The whole vibe of the class changed immediately from happy and excited to bummed out. I looked at each of their faces and they looked really mad. I kind of laughed at the class and saw how odd it was that just by taking an assessment would get the students really mad and sad. Mrs. Teacher mentioned to the class that it was not anything that they haven't already gone over and they should be able to answer the questions easily because it was already covered by the class. 

The kids began to take the test, and as I watched them and when they actually began to look at what the test was you could see a sign of relief to the class, and even Mrs. Teacher told me they would see how easy it was if they really paid attention to what was happening. It didn't take more than 45 minutes for the students to finish the assessment. It was only 8 questions about New Mexico History. 

I began to hear things like "Ahh Mrs. that test was too easy!" and the class agreed just as they were going to let out to go to their next class period. Mrs. Teacher began to lecture to the class that even though they needed to take an assessment they shouldn't be worried if they already knew the material that was on it. She mentioned to the class to always be prepared for tests and assessment because you never know when things like that would happen. My personal outtake from the class was to perhaps always be prepared for anything and to not really stress about the little things if you already know what is going on.