Student Ownership of STAR Data: Sarah Knutson, UMS Teacher

STAR data in the hands of our students? Absolutely! I have always let students know their scores, as soon as they finish their tests, but this year I, along with my ELA colleagues at Unidos, have made a big shift in having students “own their data.” Earlier in the fall, students received a print out of their annual growth report and set reading goals and next steps, using Canva. After several weeks of intentional Lexia PowerUp use, students retook the STAR Reading Test and received a similar report. With their data in front of them, students reflected on their growth and how or why they reached their reading goals.

Students had wonderful takeaways, including the following from one seventh grader, “My score from September changed because I started reading the questions on the STAR test last time and never read them. Now that I read them I got 80 points on my STAR test and I was proud of myself. I told myself that I’m going to start reading and it worked.” Another seventh grader, whose score increased 65 points, reflected on her experience studying Greek & Latin Roots in 6th and 7th grades, “What I will do to continue to grow is by learning more about the words and how I can improve by just learning more details about how they can be used in sentences or information.”

I told myself that I’m going to start reading and it worked.

When we put student data into the hands of learners, they can take ownership of their own academic experiences. Our students also begin to clearly see the connections between their school work and their own development as readers and learners. I, and my colleagues, are eager to see how students continue to progress, owning their data and their learning.