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Mastering Formative Assessment moves
                                                                                                                                                                                                        
 
 
BIOGRAPHY

Dr. Brent Duckor is an Associate Professor in the Lurie College of Education at San José State University. He teaches courses in classroom assessment and evaluation, educational psychology and supervises pre-service teachers in the Single Subject Credential Program in the Department of Teacher Education. He also serves as a core faculty member and dissertation advisor in the Ed.D. Leadership program at SJSU. 

Dr. Duckor is an appointed member of the CalTPA Design Team for California’s Commission on Teacher Credentialing and a member of the California Department of Education’s School Climate and Conditions working group charged with integrating multiple measures of success in the new accountability dashboard. Dr. Duckor is also an Advisory Board member of the College and Career Readiness Evaluation Consortium for the National Council for Community and Education Partnerships in Washington, D.C. 

He has co-edited several international journals including Psychological Test and Assessment Modeling and Pensamiento Educativo, both focused on new developments in Rasch IRT modeling. His most recent scholarship has appeared in Teachers College Record, Educational Leadership, Journal of Teacher Education, Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School, and Phi Delta Kappan. 

Dr. Duckor received his Ph.D. in Quantitative Methods and Evaluation at the University of California, Berkeley. He was a doctoral fellow with the Center for Assessment and Evaluation of Student Learning (CAESL), a National Science Foundation sponsored project that included preparation for next generation researchers in STEM curriculum and assessment topics in collaboration with UCB, Stanford, UCLA and WestEd. His post-doctoral work was at the Berkeley Evaluation Assessment and Research (BEAR) Center where he continues to consult as a Research Scientist. Dr. Duckor holds a Masters of International Affairs with a Business concentration from Columbia University and a B.A. degree in Politics with Honors from the University of California, Santa Cruz. 

His recent book Mastering Formative Assessment Moves: 7 High Leverage Practices to Advance Student Learning with co-author Dr. Carrie Holmberg is available with ASCD (2017). 


Dr. Carrie Holmberg is an adjunct faculty member in the Connie L. Lurie College of Education at San José State University where she lectures and supervises pre-service teachers in the Single Subject Credential Program of the Teacher Education Department. She has taught courses in Methods of Teaching English and Assessment and Evaluation. She currently serves on the board of the California Educational Research Association. 

Dr. Holmberg is also an Associate with Validity Partners, LLC. She specializes in creative, caring, and innovative solutions to teacher training and staff professional development. 

Dr. Holmberg taught at a Title I comprehensive high school in Silicon Valley for nearly a decade and has extensive experience mentoring new teachers. A member of one of the first cohorts of National Board Certified Teachers and a long-time Bay Area Writing Project teacher consultant, Carrie earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Stanford University and a Master of Arts in education from the Stanford Teacher Education Program. 

In addition to supervising teacher candidates, co-authoring articles and writing a book, she recently completed her doctorate at San José State University’s Ed.D. in Educational Leadership program. Her dissertation, “Formative Assessment for Middle School Mathematics Instruction: An Evidence-based Approach to Evaluating Teacher Posing, Pausing, and Probing Moves,” explores the empirical foundations for teacher learning progressions as a basis for providing feedback about teachers’ growth in classroom assessment. 

Her scholarship has appeared in California English, Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School, The Handbook of Research in Middle Level Education and The English Journal. Her first book, Mastering Formative Assessment Moves: 7 High Leverage Practices to Advance Student Learning, co-authored with Brent Duckor, Ph.D, is available with ASCD (2017). 

Dr. Holmberg is committed to researching, developing, and celebrating elementary and secondary educators’ knowledge, skills, and professionalism. She is an enthusiastic ambassador for teachers, instructional coaches, and staff charged with making schools and classrooms places for deeper learning that also inspire and spark passion for life-long learning.


INFORMATION ON THE SESSION

 

While research has shown for nearly two decades that teachers who engage in formative assessment practices may have the most powerful impact on student learning (Black & Wiliam, 1998; Hattie, 2012), less is known about the development of teachers’ knowledge use of formative assessment. Moreover, finding a common grammar of practice—that unites teachers, instructional coaches and administrators’ perspectives—on what counts as high quality assessment practices has been a barrier to successful implementation.

This session focuses on how teachers can take up seven moves--priming, posing, pausing, probing, bouncing, tagging, and binning--associated with instructional strategy and leverage them for struggling students (Duckor, 2014; Duckor & Holmberg, 2017).

Over the day, we will explore through case studies, video exemplars, and real-world “problems of practice” how teachers can become more powerful, in part, by learning to balance planned and improvised interactions “on the fly.” 

Participants will leave the session with research-supported strategies that work across all grade levels and subject areas to promote more equitable, interactive, learner-focused instruction in your school site.