What are the different types of assessments in Word of Life?

Assessments are used to check for student understanding. There are several forms of assessment available to teachers:

  • Activities in the Student Text, along with the optional and bonus activities, can be used throughout the chapter as formative assessments. Many of the bonus activities are large projects, such as research projects or presentations. To aid in assessing how well your students completed these activities, rubrics for the various types of activities (research papers, presentations, art projects, etc.) are available on the teacher portal.
  • Every chapter includes a test that assesses key vocabulary words and concepts from the lessons. Additionally, we provide unit tests that assess the most vital concepts and vocabulary words from that unit’s chapters. For longer units, we divide the unit tests into two sections. At the end of each grade, we provide a cumulative test that assesses the student’s knowledge of the vocabulary words and lesson concepts most pertinent to the particular grade’s focus. All content from the assessments is found in the Student Text lesson and each chapter review activity. 
  • Beginning in Grades 4 and 5, in addition to the cognitive testing, reflection questions for each chapter are provided along with the tests. Students should begin to be able to reason or reflect on these questions either independently, in groups, in class discussions, or by using an open book–type quiz. You may use these to best fit the abilities of your students. Reflection questions sometimes provide some of the answers to the assessment tests; therefore, reflection questions should be administered separately.
  • Tests for each chapter and unit are available digitally and as pdfs on the teacher portal.
    • School Teachers must send links to the students when it is time to take the digital chapter or unit test. Printable PDF versions of the tests and an answer key are available on the teacher portal if the teacher would prefer to use a print version of the test. Digital assessments can be taken only once. However, the teacher can give retakes using the printable PDF versions.
    • Students in a parish have access to the assessment at the end of each chapter in the student text without the need of the catechist to send it in a message. Parish students may retake the assessment one additional time.