Analyzing Student Work Activities
The following four activities were adapted from the National Board General Portfolio Directions 2016, starting on p. 39.
Analyzing student work and your teaching practice is essential in Component 2. The following four activities take you through steps
to complete a thorough analysis of student work samples. It is suggested that Activity #1 is completed in Session #2, and Activities
#2, #3, and #4 be completed in Session #3. However, this is a process that can be completed, as a candidate feels ready. Candidates
should pay close attention to the demands of each of these activities and the type of writing required to answer the questions.
Activity #1 – Assignment Analysis / Analysis of Student Response
This activity requires 2 different tasks. First (1A), it asks you to analyze the task in relation to the goal/s so you can unpack the
task demands more completely. Ultimately, this will allow you to specifically delineate which skills, dispositions, vocabulary,
and subject specific concepts students must demonstrate or use to master the goals. This may also help you consider
foundational skills, dispositions, and vocabulary and subject specific concepts needed for the learning sequence.
Then (1B), it asks you to make careful observations in regards to 3 student responses from that assignment. You will describe
your observations through the answering of questions, thus providing specific evidence of what you have observed.
Activity #2 – Interpretation: What Does Each Student’s Response Tell You?
This activity asks for your interpretation or your analysis of what you learned about your students, through the observations
and analysis of the student work samples.
Activity #3 – How Does Each Student’s Response Illuminate Your Practice?
In this activity, use what you have observed of each student’s work—and how you have interpreted those
observations—to illuminate your goals and your strategies for reaching those goals. The focus of this analysis is the
degree to which the student’s work shows that your goals for the assignment, and for your instruction prior to the
assignment were met.
Activity #4 – Reflection
This activity asks for you to examine the connection between your practice and the evidence in student learning for you to
make future instructional decisions. What went well that you would do again, and/or what could you change to have a greater
impact on student learning and what do you think that impact would be?
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Analyzing Student Work Activities
Activity #1A – Assignment Analysis
Choose one of your class assignments that you thought elicited considerable information about your students’ understandings. Choose three student
responses to the assignment. Be sure to choose students who each pose a different instructional challenge to you as a teacher. Select student responses
that are substantial enough to support the level of analysis required in the Written Commentary. Unless otherwise specified in the certificate-specific
Portfolio Instructions and Scoring Rubric for the component, these are to be each student’s individual response, not a response completed as part of a
group activity.
Look carefully at the assignment that elicited 3 the student responses. Answer the following questions with specific details about the assignment. (The
word assignment is used here generically to mean an occasion, a prompt, or another device for eliciting substantive student responses.)
Considerations
Description / Analysis
What was the goal of this
assignment?
Why is this an important
goal for student learning
of the subject?
How was this assignment
connected to other
activities, in or out of
class?
What subject-specific
concepts did students
need to know to complete
this assignment
successfully?
What misconceptions
would you predict might
appear in student
responses to this
assignment? In what ways did
you intend for this
assignment to extend
students’ thinking about
the topic?
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Analyzing Student Work Activities
Activity #1B – Analysis of Student Responses
For each of the students you have chosen, jot down brief descriptions of the following features of the response to your assignment.
Activity 1 Continued
Ask Yourself:
Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
What did each student do
correctly and/or
incorrectly?
What was the most
striking feature of each
response?
What were the patterns in
each response?
What misconceptions does
each response reveal?
What insights (if any)
does each response
reveal?
What feedback did you
give each student?
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Analyzing Student Work Activities
Activity #2: Interpretation: What Does Each Student’s Response Tell You?
Using the same student responses from Activity 1, jot down the following answers for each student. Here the emphasis is on describing your observations.
Ask Yourself:
Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
How can you interpret the
response from each
student?
What frame of
reference is available to
you to aid in that
interpretation?
What are the cues the
student and the work give
you? Using what you know
about the connections
that need to be made to
understand ideas in
particular domains
appropriate to the content
area, what does each
student’s response tell
you?
How can your colleagues
assist you in your
interpretive work?
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Analyzing Student Work Activities
Activity 2 Continued
Ask Yourself:
Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
What is each student’s
most essential
misunderstanding or
difficulty?
How does each student’s
response fit into what you
already know about this
student’s understandings
and performance? Be
specific.
In two sentences for each
student, describe what
each learned from this
assignment, judging from
the responses.
What does each student
need to do next to move
his or her understandings
forward?
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Analyzing Student Work Activities
Activity #3: How Can I Connect my Goals and Strategies with the Students’ Responses? In this activity, use what you have observed of each student’s work—and how you have interpreted those observations—to illuminate your goals and your strategies for
reaching those goals. The focus of this analysis is the degree to which the student’s work shows that your goals for the assignment, and for your instruction prior to the
assignment were met.
Ask Yourself:
Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
For each of the three
students, write a brief but
very specific diagnosis of
the degree to which this
student work shows that
your goals for the
assignment were met.
Explain briefly how
your instruction prior to
the assignment was
designed to prepare these
students to complete this
assignment successfully.
For each of the three
students, give your best
diagnosis of the
performance they have
exhibited on this
assignment.
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Analyzing Student Work Activities
Activity #3 Continued
Ask Yourself:
Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
Given each student’s
performance on this
assignment, what goals
should you set for each of
these students in the
immediate future and,
also, in the more distant
future?
What was your feedback
strategy for each of these
students?
Why did you choose that
strategy for these
particular students?
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Analyzing Student Work Activities
Activity #4 – Reflection
The final stage in analyzing student responses is to reflect on your practice. It is in this final stage that you ask yourself this: considering what the student
responses have told you about the students’ understandings, difficulties, misconceptions, and gaps, what might you do next (and/or differently or
additionally) for these students? It is the habit of reflecting on decisions made during the teaching day that distinguishes the analytical teacher. And it is
reflective practice that moves accomplished practitioners constantly forward; as you become your own observer and coach, you can recognize your
accomplishments in making choices that advance student learning in effective ways. You can also encourage yourself to try yet another strategy when
you are not satisfied with students’ progress. The following questions are designed to help you reflect on your practice with the three students who have
been the focus of these activities. However, these questions could be asked at the end of every teaching day about each class you teach. Once you begin to
think in these terms, you need not write down the answers. You will find that the habit of reflection generates so many new ideas and strategies that you
are hardly able to find the time to try them all.
Look back at the three student responses to your assignment. Briefly answer each of these questions about these students, their responses, and your own
sense of your practice:
Ask Yourself:
Student 1
Student 2
Student 3
What did each student learn
from this assignment and
the instruction that
preceded it? Be specific.
What did you learn from
each student’s response?
What would you do
differently considering the
student responses to this
assignment?
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C2 Resource 3.3 (C2-2.4)
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Analyzing Student Work Activities
Reviewing Your Work As you work on completing your portfolio entries, you should reflect on ways to improve your responses by asking
yourself these questions: Considering your analysis,
reevaluate your feedback strategies.
Would you alter them in any way? If
so, how and why? If not, why not?
Would you give the same
assignment again? If so, would you
prepare students for it differently? If
so, how? If not, what assignment
would you give in its place and why?
Does the portfolio entry, taken as a
whole, accurately represent my
teaching?
Are there important aspects of my
teaching that the portfolio entry
does not capture?
Could I select student work samples
that would better fit the guidelines
given in the Portfolio Instructions
and Scoring Rubric?
Do I address each of the questions
listed in the Written Commentary
instructions?
In what ways could I improve my
responses to the questions in the
Portfolio Instructions and Scoring
Rubric?
In what ways might my responses
be incomplete or unclear to someone
who understands my teaching only
by the work I am submitting in this
portfolio entry?
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