2624B - CONFIRMATION TASKS

Whitmore Lake Public Schools

Administrative Guidelines

2624B - CONFIRMATION TASKS
Description

A "Confirmation Task" is an assessment task which one or more students are asked to perform periodically (during and after instruction) in order to provide evidence of their current level of achievement of the District's exit outcomes, based on what they have learned thus far from the core curriculum.

A Confirmation Task differs from tests or other measures of achievement in a number of ways:

	A.	It is a *life-related* task rather than a collection of subject-related or task-related items (criterion-referenced or otherwise) designed to measure core-curriculum learnings.
	B.	It requires the student to *integrate and apply* certain knowledge, attitudes, and skills learned in one or more components of the core curriculum. The students do this in the context of fulfilling a life-related responsibility which requires them to make use of particular core learnings. It, therefore, tests *application, not the acquisition*, of knowledge, attitudes, and/or skills.
	C.	It calls for examination not only of the Confirmation Task *results* (what the student(s) produced by doing the task) but also the *procedures* and *attitude-related behaviors* displayed while producing those results.
	D.	Rather than calling for single answers or actions, as test items often do, the Confirmation Task requires the student to:

		1.	do *"situations-related"* thinking and planning;
		2.	gather, retrieve, and organize needed information;
		3.	take appropriate actions;
		4.	critique results and procedures and attempt to improve weaknesses while maintaining strengths.

Confirmation Tasks are more appropriate than collections of test items for assessing outcomes-based achievement because the Task result represents the whole finished product, with all of the "parts" integrated and operating interactively. Tests which measure achievement of individual learnings can be appropriate for determining whether or not students have developed certain knowledge, attitude, and skill prerequisites for achieving exit outcomes.

They do not provide evidence as to how well students can and will integrate and apply those learnings in life situations. Confirmation Tasks results are particularly appropriate for student portfolios to communicate applied learning to parents, educators, and ultimately to employers.

Preparation

Students should be required to perform Confirmation Tasks periodically throughout their school career. At a minimum, such assessment tasks should be designed to assess progress toward exit outcomes at the end of elementary school, at the end of middle, intermediate, or junior high school, and at the end of the student's junior year.

Staff members responsible for particular components of the core curriculum should work together to:

	A.	select the life-related tasks which are appropriate for students at a given level to demonstrate their current ability to integrate and apply particular learnings (outcomes) from one or more components of the core curriculum in which they have participated;
	B.	identify the core-curriculum learnings (outcomes) that are being applied in performing each Confirmation Task;
	C.	establish the conditions under which students will perform each Confirmation Task;
	D.	determine the criteria by which the students' results and the procedures used will be judged;
	E.	establish the standards for determining the level of quality of the students' performance.

Staff members teaching different subject areas may wish to share ideas and explore the possibility of creating Confirmation Tasks in which students consolidate and apply learnings from their respective areas. This may save time and provide a more realistic assessment of students’ ability to deal with life situations.