Engaging, Data-Driven Teaching with Pear Assessment

Sarah Clark, a 9th-grade math teacher in Pasadena, Texas, faced significant challenges in captivating her students’ attention before incorporating Pear Assessment (formerly Edulastic) and Pear Deck into her teaching toolkit. Here, she shares her experiences, highlighting the problems she encountered and the transformative solutions provided by Pear Deck Learning.

Making math fun

Sarah initially struggled with making lessons that enabled her students to experience the wonders of math hands-on. As the teacher of strategic learning math (a tier three intervention class), she aims to preview concepts to her students before they enter their Algebra class the period after hers. The challenge is finding resources that allow for interactive lessons, warm-ups, assignments, and quizzes while keeping students excited about their learning.

“Pear” it up

Pear Assessment proves to be exactly what Sarah is looking for. With Pear Assessment’s item and test bank, Sarah can significantly reduce the time spent on lesson and assessment creation. To increase classroom engagement, Sarah also includes Pear Deck in her lessons, providing interactive presentations that allow for more hands-on and engaging lessons.

Sarah went on to explain that Pear Deck allows her students to draw on the screen or participate in draggable activities, making the learning experience more immersive and enjoyable. This is particularly crucial in a tier three intervention class, where learners need additional support to grasp foundational concepts before moving on to their next class.

Data-driven teaching

Sarah mentioned how Pear Assessment fits into the Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MTSS) framework, and shared her success in using Pear Assessment’s Live Class Board for data monitoring.

"The live class board is like a data lover's dream,” she mentioned. 

Live Class Board provides insights into individual student performance, class scores, and proficiency in different question types while allowing teachers to share real-time progress with their students. 

Sarah explained how the data helps her adjust instruction, stating, "I review the data, and then adjust my lesson plan. If they're struggling with a certain Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS), that will be our new warm-up."

Test prep like never before

Beyond helping with instruction, Sarah also explained how Pear Assessment is helping prepare her students for benchmark assessments, such as the STAAR test.  

With Pear Assessment, she can mimic the testing environment through test skins that imitate the look of the actual exam and the different question types, such as graphing and drag-and-drop. This has led to an increase in student achievement on these benchmark assessments. 

"Two years ago, in algebra, my partner teacher and I practiced using some of the new types of questions, and our students’ scores went up,” she noted. 

One less thing to worry about

The easy-to-understand nature of Pear Assessment is another feature Sarah raved about.

"I like how it's so user-friendly. Sometimes, teachers can get overwhelmed with all of this technology. The team at Pear Assessment has created great tutorials and even a YouTube channel. There are a lot of resources that make an educator feel comfortable using the product. Even the free versions of Pear Assessment and Pear Deck are great."

Sarah’s story exemplifies the positive impact of thoughtful edtech integration in the classroom, making learning more interactive, enjoyable, and effective.