Do you know what your students’ strengths and weaknesses are? If not, you should take some time to assess them and identify knowledge gaps. By identifying knowledge gaps, you can help your students overcome deficiencies and become better learners. This blog post will outline a few methods for assessing your students’ knowledge and skills. We will also provide tips on how to address the gaps. Let’s get started.
Knowledge and skill gaps are the #1 reason teachers decide to change or create lessons. If your students don’t have what they need to succeed, then their “failure” is your fault.
Top 5 ways to Identify Knowledge Gaps in Students
How do you identify knowledge and skill gaps in your students? Here are five ways:
1. The first way to identify knowledge and skill gaps in your students is by observing them closely over time. This works especially well if the class has had the same teacher for more than one year (or even better – for many years). By watching how they make mistakes, what confuses them most often, and struggle with tasks, you can tell what they know and don’t know.
2. Give your students an example of a concept, task, or assignment. Ask them how they would show what you just showed them. This is a great way to identify gaps in knowledge and skill quickly.
3. Use rubrics, checklists, and other types of assessments to get an even more detailed picture of your student’s knowledge and skills.
4. Ask questions from the book, from the workbook from any resource you use with your class. If a student can’t answer a question that was answered correctly just one lesson before, then there’s a very good chance that this student didn’t learn what he/she should have learned to succeed on this assessment.
5. Discuss the content among yourselves – share it over lunch at home with friends or family members. If a question or a concept comes up repeatedly, then there’s a very good chance that your students don’t have what they need to understand.
Knowledge and skill gaps are inevitable, but they need to be identified so that students can take action. Here’s how to do it.
The importance of recognizing knowledge and skill gaps in your students cannot be understated. How you identify these gaps will determine how well your students perform in class. If you skip this step, the student may not know where to begin when developing an effective study strategy for tackling their academic challenges. The following two methods should help you pinpoint deficiencies in your student’s learning profile:
Method 1: Ask Your Students
One common method is asking each of your students what they know about a particular subject or concept (e.g., Shakespeare). However, I wouldn’t recommend using this approach because it doesn’t provide you with an objective measure of what your students do and don’t know. You can then determine their strengths and weaknesses by asking how confident they feel about their knowledge and skills.
Method 2: Observer Behavior & Assessments
A better way to identify knowledge gaps is through observations made during class activities and assessments. A student’s behavior (e.g., tentative, rushing, lack of eye contact) provides a wealth of information on what they know—and how much you can challenge them in the next lesson without overwhelming them. In addition to knowing the content being covered, it’s equally important to understand your students’ abilities so that you can adapt instruction accordingly if some are struggling. In contrast, others are ready for more complex material.
Conventional wisdom suggests that teachers base their curriculum on the average student’s ability. However, this strategy is often not well-received by students who are frustrated with being ignored or underestimated. These students may become disengaged and achieve poorer grades as a result of receiving instruction based solely on what they could do instead of what they were capable of learning.
What’s important about assessment is knowing your limits so you can provide an appropriate challenge for each student (e.g., working 2-grade levels above). Suppose assessments show that students need more work before transitioning up to the next level. In that case, you’ll need to continue placing them at the lower level until they’re ready for advancement—even if it takes longer than expected.
Several ways can be used both individually and collaboratively to help you develop an understanding of where your students’ strengths and weaknesses lie while also taking into account their proficiency levels:
Observing one’s classes (self-observation) – While observing one’s class, instructors can quickly identify common misconceptions or errors made by students, allowing them to target lessons accordingly. Sometimes identifying areas for improvement can be as simple as listening to student questions or comments throughout the class.
Particularly during interactive activities, instructors should pay close attention to what types of problems students are having, the way they are approaching them, and whether similar issues have come up in past courses. If so, instructors should consider making changes before repeating the same errors.
Asking students about themselves – Instructors can begin to identify areas where their students may need more help if they ask for feedback on how well they think they’ve done in a course, at least following midterm exams. This also allows the instructor to get an idea about what information is particularly relevant or interesting to specific students, which can then be incorporated into future lessons.
Reading student work – Instructors should always pay attention to what types of questions they ask and students’ methods for arriving at correct answers. If many different students make the same mistake, or if a common misconception is consistently corrected in assignments and exams, instructors will want to ensure that material is presented correctly in class.
Collaborative dialogue between colleagues (peer observation) – Instructors can engage other colleagues from their department or beyond into helping build an understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of their students by engaging in peer observations.
Conclusion
The best way to identify knowledge and skill gaps in your students is through formative assessment. Formative assessments give you the information you need to provide targeted instruction that helps your students learn and grow. They also help you track student progress so you can ensure all students are meeting learning goals; what strategies do you use to assess your students’ knowledge and skills?
