Building Thinking Classrooms 2025 Annual Conference

“Students are spending so much of their class time learning in groups that individual tests may be beginning to feel disingenuous” (Liljedahl, 2021 p.253). Join us for an in-depth exploration of team assessment strategies and what they mean for your teaching practice and your students. Gain a new outlook and walk away with strategies you can use in your classroom to make team assessments work for your students.

A brief overview of why the BTC assessment model is important, how you can use it to differentiate for students with accommodations and extend it for advanced students. We will do a deep dive in creating the navigation instrument with our own curriculum, what to look for, and how to implement it at various grade levels. Ideas for frequent formative assessment will be provided.

Grades shape student's perception of their abilities & future prospects, yet outdated practices, proven inaccurate by decades of research, continue to distort students' self-identities and undermine their potential for success.  In this session, participants will critically examine the reliability & effectiveness of traditional grading through research-backed discussions, reflective activities, & case studies. Building on insights from Building Thinking Classrooms, participants will explore practical, data-driven grading strategies, hear inspiring stories from educators who have successfully transformed their practices, & gain resources and support for shifting toward grading practices that foster student growth & accurate self-reflection.

Join us as we participate in a task and then work on our own together to reflect on how to help students know where they are instead of who they are.  We will think about assessment throughout the launch, body and focus on research-based improvements on assessment during the closing part of the lesson as well as navigating the paradigm shift of letting go of early not knowing when reporting out based on data (not points).

How do we assess the competencies and mathematical practices that matter in mathematics classrooms? Chapter 12 of Building Thinking Classrooms in Mathematics, K-12 (BTC) challenges us to rethink assessment by focusing on what we value. This session explores how co-constructed rubrics, as described in BTC, help foster cultural competencies—such as empathy, perspective-taking, and collaboration—alongside key mathematical practices. These competencies, though difficult to quantify, are essential for making expectations and learning accessible to all students. Join us to share strategies, experiences, and discussion to enhance this practice.

In this session you will learn some strategies for “evaluating what we value.” You will learn how to take established norms for board work and create a daily grade.