1. Performance Descriptors
State of Kuwait
Ministry of Education
KUWAIT NATIONAL CURRICULUM Primary Education
Performance Descriptors
What would success look like?
ELT Supervisor
Fatma Ameen

2. Rationale
Facing some challenges in implementing competence based assessments.
Ensuring that all educators are using the same assessment vocabulary, have the same understanding of assessment terminology and are able to develop appropriate activities related to the competencies and curriculum standards.

3. Planning for assessment
FFT Activity
Planning for assessment

5. Think of what each of these components represent in Assessments :
Mountain climb
Reaching the top
Rocks / cliffs
The climbers
maps/ropes/compass
The mountain’s paths
Reaching different spots
The assessment process
Attainment of standards
S. Competences
The learners
Assessment tools
Rubrics & Descriptors
Levels of performance
Fatma Amin
7/15/2019

6. Take a breath, enjoy the view and then keep moving on
Take a breath, enjoy the view and then keep moving on. Once you reach the top, the sheer joy you would experience would just be phenomenal.

7. What is Classroom assessment ?
It is any form of assessment, undertaken by the teacher with the students, related to any teaching/learning situation.
It is undertaken by engaging the students in providing evidence of learning by:
Visual (writing, drawing, typing, video)
oral (verbal interactions)
Actions which the teacher observes
Or a combination of these

8. When should the teacher carry out classroom assessment?
All the time!
There is no specific time.
It depends on purpose.
Its purpose may be to determine actual attainment of a specific curriculum standard.
Or it may be to determine student progress towards the standards and hence their achievements, or different levels of achievements, at that point in time.
At the end of each lesson. This acts as a lesson summary.
Discussion question - when should teachers carry our classroom assessment (both formative and summative)?

9. How to develop a new vision of assessment?
Relate the evaluation to standards of achievement
Begin with what students can do, and consider their learning needs
Give students the support needed to progress
Use reports to describe students’ learning
Encourage students to take a more active role in evaluating their own progress

10. Assessments in the new curriculum
Assessment is a process to obtain a measure of attainment through which teachers seek descriptors that tell them to what extent students are attaining the standards.
Assessments show us – based on evidence - how much and how well students have achieved the specific competences stated in the prescribed KNC for a particular grade level and in a particular subject area.
What kind of descriptors needed ?

11. Why undertake assessment?
Assessment is undertaken to determine student achievement against the standards indicated in the curriculum .
Students are expected to attain the curriculum standards associated with each learning unit in the curriculum.
These represent the target for the teaching and learning process.
The teacher (& students) need to be aware of the learning progress.
Two key factors are now indicated:
1.Assessment is needed to indicate how the student is progressing.
2.Assessment is needed to determine whether CS are attained.

12. Three assessment components related to learning
Achievement –progress - Attainment -
Achievement is the improvement made by a student in acquiring new skills that are reflected in grades or in examinations.
Progress is the gain made by students from one assessment descriptor to another.
• Attainment is reaching a certain skill level that has been set as a standard.
Discussion question - are these 3 components interrelated? If so, how?

14. Assessment rubrics
What is an assessment rubric?
A rubric is a scoring tool that explicitly describes student’s performance levels expectations for some learning activity .
It helps teachers to use assessments based on a range of criteria (Standard).
A rubric lists the criteria, or characteristics of student work, which are aligned to a standard and using descriptors to describe the specific quality levels for those criteria.

15. What is a rubric? A rubric is a lesson in quality
A public declaration of expectations
A communication tool
A self-assessment tool for learners
A self-fulfilling prophecy
Being a public declaration of expectations makes it not hidden, and especially not dependent on teacher mood swings.

16. What is a rubric? Quality Continuum Excellent 4 Good 3 Satisfactory 2
PERFORMANCE LEVEL
POINTS
grades
Excellent 4
90-100
Good 3
80-89
Satisfactory 2
70-79
Needs Improvement 1
60-69
Clearly unsatisfactory
<60

17. How is a rubric structured?
A rubric is a matrix of criteria and their descriptors of performance level.
A rubric is more than just a rating scale, because a rubric will describe the differences between performance at each level. A rubric is composed of four main components:
Component 1. Standard/Criteria (aspects of performance)
Component 2. Rating scale (performance levels)
Component 3. Component 4. Descriptors for criterion by scale (at each level of performance)

18. Why use rubrics?
Rubrics are operational definitions for the standards used to evaluate performance which enable multiple evaluators to assess student work consistently and reliably.
Rubrics engage students in the learning process through providing them with descriptions of what is expected of them.
As a result, students may be more motivated to work to meet these.  

19. Benefits to teachers
Rubrics help teachers to: clarify the expectations for student performance by providing detailed descriptions of those expectations.
improve the clarity of the feedback provided to students – students get a clear description of their strengths and weaknesses.
provide timely formative feedback.
reduce the time spent for assessment referring to a description without writing long comments.
reduce the uncertainty which can accompany marking (grading). discourage complaints about marks (grades).

20. Rubrics help students to:
Benefits to students.
Rubrics help students to:
Understand teachers’ expectations and standards in advance (or explain how their work or demonstration of learning outcomes will be assessed).
Use teacher feedback to improve their performance.
Recognize their strengths and weaknesses and direct their efforts accordingly.
Develop competence in reflection and self-evaluation: students can use a rubric to assess their own work.

21. Rubrics are expressed as matrices - like so:
Standards/
criteria /strands
Level1
(1-2marks)
Level2
(3-4marks)
Level3
(5-7marks)
Level4
(8-10marks)
1.1
1.2
1.3
1.4

22. Phrase your level descriptors in terms of
what the student can do, not what they can’t do
Standards/
criteria /strands
Level1
(1-2marks)
Level2
(3-4marks)
Level3
(5-7marks)
Level4
(8-10marks)
1.1
1.2
1.3
1.4

23. Sample Rubric
Levels of Performance
PerformanceCriteria
Descriptors

24. Identify Scale Labels
#SCHOOLOGYNEXT

25. Guide to understanding and developing performance descriptors

26. Purpose of descriptors
Descriptors recognise that a student has achieved a curriculum standard at a specific level.
These descriptors will be primarily to help teachers understand the standard of performance expected at specific points. So far as possible, these descriptions will describe the key characteristics and levels of achievement we might expect.

27. For developing performance descriptors:
Specify the numbers and names of the levels. Usually four levels are found to be needed. In Kuwait these four levels are described as level 1, level 2, level 3, and level 4. These levels enable meaningful differences to be described.
Define (label) the levels. This will determine how challenging the standards are for the assessments. These levels are linked to the curriculum standards. Describe the different levels of achievement or standards.
Ensure that these descriptions are consistent , inclusive and help ensure a similar level of challenge is implied by the performance level for each assessment.

28. Characteristics of grade descriptors at four levels
Grade descriptors should have information regarding:
Quantity – how many times eg. two sets/two sentences/two paragraphs/ all /some /few
Quality - achieved the standard at a basic/high/outstanding level
Support required – with minimal/some/little support
Frequency- always/frequently/sometimes/rarely

29. Proficiency defined by “can do” descriptors
It is fundamental to the cefr’s action- oriented approach that we use language to do things
Thus the successive proficiency levels are defined in terms of what learners can do in the foreign language they know or are learning

30. Characteristics of good “can do” descriptors (1)
Positiveness: descriptors should be formulated using positive descriptions of what learners are able to do; negatively worded descriptions tend to be demotivating and are more difficult to scale
Definiteness: descriptors should describe concrete tasks and/or concrete degrees of skill in performing tasks

31. Characteristics of good “can do” descriptors (2)
Clarity: descriptors should be transparent and non- technical – written in simple syntax, comprehensible without explanation, usable without training
Brevity: descriptors should be short
Independence: descriptors should stand on their own, their interpretation should not depend on other descriptors.

32. Check your descriptors:
Are they written in simple language? Clear and understandable?
Are they positively stated?
Are the differences in descriptions observable? Clearly stated expectations?
Is there a progression of differences among the descriptions?

33. Standard: 1.1.Recognize words, phrases, instructions heard from natural sources
LEVELS
Descriptors 4
Fully Achived the standard
recognize almost all targeted words / phrases and always follow instructions attentively with no support. 3
Mostly Achieved the standard
recognize most targeted words /phrases and usually follow instructions properly with minimal support. 2
Medium level of the standard
Exert effort to recognize few targeted words / phrases and sometimes follow instructions with support. 1
Minimally achieved teh standard
With difficulty recognize very few targeted words /phrases and rarely follow instructions with full support
-----
NOT ASSESSED

35. task
Using your understanding of the curriculum standards, and the requirements for descriptors for achievement, use the curriculum scope and sequence information:
Identify a CS in your subject
Write achievement descriptors at four levels in similar manner to the given example
Identify an activity you would give students to assess the attainment of a standard(s) along with the expected answer.

36. Descriptor Activity
Think about one Curriculum Standard in your subject and develop descriptors at four different levels. Use the table below:
Minimally achieved teh standard
Medium level of the standard
Mostly Achieved the standard
Fully Achived the standard