New this Fall
AAC Virtual Sessions - Open to all educators!
AAC understands that in the upcoming school year teachers will need professional learning opportunities that are:
- based on the emerging issues facing teachers in the current Alberta context
- accessible at a time when teachers are ready for learning
- affordable, hassle-free, and of the highest quality
AAC is offering open sessions designed to support busy teachers as they navigate teaching and assessing during a pandemic. Most sessions allow for asynchronous learning. For a period of 2 weeks after the session date, registrants will be able to access materials such as –
- session recordings,
- presentations, and
- handout materials.
Make sure you revisit this page often as new sessions will be posted as soon as they are designed. If you know of a topic that would immediately meet your teaching needs in the assessment area, don’t hesitate to email info@aac.ab.ca
Available sessions are listed below in order of their start dates.
Keep in mind our AAC member jurisdictions have funded these open sessions; therefore, there is a slight difference in pricing for members and non-members. Want to know if your school authority is a member? Check out the membership list here.
NEW! Pandemic Professional Learning Series
In response to the current context of teaching in Alberta, AAC has designed these five short, fast-paced learning opportunities.
Each 1-hour session is offered online in the AAC Zoom room.
Quarantine Pricing! 50% off
- $10/session for AAC Members
- $15/session for Non-members
Formative Assessment Tech Tool Sprint
In this fast-paced session, the AAC facilitator will model formative assessment tools. Participants (who are somewhat tech-savvy) will complete simple tasks throughout the session to demonstrate what these tools look like from their students’ eyes. Participants will need a good internet connection, a second screen or device (like a cell phone or tablet) so they can use the tools while still viewing the zoom meeting.
Dates to choose from:
- Thursday, December 10; Noon – 1:00pm or 4:00 – 5:00pm
- Tuesday, December 15; Noon – 1:00pm or 4:00 – 5:00pm
- Wednesday, January 6; Noon – 1:00pm
Overhauling Online Assessments!
Someone once said, “If your students can google it, look it up in a textbook or memorize it, then the question is not suitable for an (online) summative assessment.” This session is a deeper dive into how teachers can create engaging and authentic assessments that challenge students to critically think, to problem-solve, and create innovative solutions or products.
Dates to choose from:
- Wednesday, December 9; 4:00 – 5:00pm
- Monday, January 4; Noon – 1:00pm
Baby Steps To Creating Authentic Online Assessments
This session is for educators that need to build the plane while they fly it. It’s hard to start creating authentic online assessments from scratch in the middle of the school year. This session will introduce small, easy steps we can all take to turn our face-to-face assessments into authentic online.
Dates to choose from:
- Tuesday, December 8; Noon – 1:00pm
- Tuesday, January 5; Noon – 1:00pm
A Possible Cure For Ghosting in the Online Environment
GHOSTING -A term used during the COVID 19 School closure that refers to students’ lack of attendance or engagement in “At Home Learning.” In this session, we will explore engaging online strategies for assessments that provide you with assessment data and create an exciting and meaningful learning environment for your students.
Dates to choose from:
- Wednesday, December 16; Noon – 1:00pm
Stop Summatively Assessing Everything!
Yes, that’s right – AAC is giving you permission to STOP summatively assessing everything. This session will present you with research-based but rarely followed strategies for moving student learning forward. HINT**Because we’re talking about improving student learning, we won’t be spending much time talking about summative assessments!
Dates to choose from:
- Monday, December 7; Noon – 1:00pm or 4:00 – 5:00pm
- Thursday, January 7; Noon – 1:00pm
Formative Assessment Series featuring Dylan Wiliam (January 8, 11 & 25, 2021)
Assessment, motivation and learning: An online course
Research over the last fifty years has shown that, used well, assessment can be a powerful positive influence on learning, but we also know that assessment can be highly detrimental, causing some students to give up, and resulting in others focusing only on how to get the best score or grade possible, irrespective of what they have learned.
In this course of three online sessions, Dylan Wiliam will provide an overview of the relevant research on motivation, self-regulated learning, and assessment, and will describe a number of practical techniques that teachers can use to get their students to become owners of their own learning.
Session 1: Feedback, motivation and learning (January 11 @ 4 – 5pm)
This first session will outline what we know, and—just as importantly—what we don’t know about the ways that feedback, especially that in the form of marks and grades, affect student motivation, and, ultimately, learning. This session will also cover the importance of seeing growth mindset as a means to an end, rather than an end in itself, and discuss strategies for getting students ready to receive, and act upon, feedback.
Session 2: Assessment, recording, and reporting (January 18 @ 4 – 5pm)
The second session will cover ways in which classroom assessment can support learning while also providing useful and relevant evidence for reporting student achievement at the end of key phases of learning, and will discuss a number of different ways that evidence of student achievement can be aggregated to provide meaningful reports on student achievement while at the same time encouraging good learning habits in students
Session 3: Using formative assessment to develop independent learners (January 25 @ 4 – 5pm)
The final session will draw together threads from the first two sessions and explore the relationship between formative assessment and self-regulated learning, and show how, used effectively, formative assessment is one of the most powerful ways of promoting student independence in learning.11
Thinking Routines as Worthwhile Assessment - Stories from the Thinking Classroom with Misty Paterson (February 2, 9, & 23, 2021)
This experiential workshop series turns assessment into a playful gateway for deep learning.
Join Misty Paterson for a three-part series that gets us working as:
- teachers supporting teachers,
- thinking coaches that put learning first, and
- deep learning advocates.
Expect a participatory experience where we will:
- share classroom experiences,
- enact Project Zero, and Thinking Routines
- reflect on our practice.
This series is for K-7 classroom teachers, instructional leaders, or anyone who wants to make assessment for learning enjoyable and worthwhile in the Thinking Classroom.
Session 1 – Feb 2, 2021 How to Use Thinking Routines as Formative Assessment
Session 2 – Feb 9, 2021 Sequencing Thinking Routines from Formative to Summative Assessment
Session 3 – Feb 23, 2021 How to Nudge Thinking Towards Deeper Understanding with Coaching Conversations
Location: AAC Zoom Room
Fee: Members $75.00, Non-Members $100.00
AAC & CAfLN Fall Virtual Conference
The first date of this conference was a huge success!
Did you miss out? You can still join us for the remaining conference dates. When you register, you gain access to all recordings and sessions materials for a period of two weeks after each conference date. This includes materials and recordings from conference dates that have already passed.
We hope you can fit this asynchronous learning opportunity into your busy schedule!