Assessing Math Concepts (AMC) is a continuum of assessments, developed by Kathy Richardson, that are both formative and diagnostic that, along with professional development, deepen teachers' understanding of the Critical Learning Phases and their understanding of the mathematics they teach.
These short interview assessments are a cohesive look at the development of students’ understanding of core math concepts. They are not a random collection of questions focused on a child’s ability to get correct answers. The information gathered from the assessments helps teachers pinpoint what each child knows and still needs to learn. They are not about “helping children be right,” but about uncovering their instructional needs.
AMC helps teachers determine where children are in the development of core concepts in number. These concepts develop over many weeks and months and even years as children deepen their understanding of these concepts and recognize the connections between them. The concepts assessed are the basic underpinnings for all work with number. Generally, the concepts develop in a particular order, but every concept continues to develop even while new ones are being learned. So, for example, children must know how to count before they can add; but they can begin to learn to add before they can count by 2s. They can learn that ten is a unit before they know all the parts of numbers to ten.
Children need to work with number concepts all year in some form even while they are working with other math concepts like geometry or measurement.
The development of number concepts can be organized into the following core topics:
• Counting
• Number Relationships
• Number Composition and Decomposition to 20
• Place Value: Number Composition and Decomposition of Numbers to 100
The assessments are conducted in short, one-on-one student/teacher interviews. This format is critical since “we learn most about how our students think and what they can do when we sit beside them and observe their mathematical work”. Because of the ages and capabilities of these young students, mathematics assessment should rely more on observation and conversations and less on writing. What students write on paper offers only a glimpse of what they know and think” (Richardson, Assessing Math Concepts). Each assessment can take as little as five minutes, and no more than 15 minutes.
Student responses to the assessment questions indicate what Critical Learning Phase they have reached and reveal their level of understanding ,thus identifying their instructional needs.
Assessing Math Concepts Assessments include:
• Counting Objects
• Changing Numbers
• More/Less Trains
• Number Arrangements
• Combination Trains
• Hiding Assessment
• Ten Frames
• Grouping Tens
• Two Digit Addition and Subtraction
The AMC assessments help teachers and administrators monitor student progress throughout the school year, providing critical information about what the student understands and when to target remediation and instruction. With this data, classroom teachers can target instruction and both teachers and administrators gain a complete picture of each student's progress.
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