ABSTRACT
Schools are surrounded by mountains of student data with a jaw-dropping number of ways to process everything. The reality is that data represent numbers, which by themselves have little effect on instruction. It is how educators analyze data, hypothesize about what the numbers reveal about student learning, and the instructional adjustments put in place that empower school improvement. Teachers appreciate having access to student data yet often voice a concern about how to interpret the results, investigate the implications for learning, or craft instructional strategies in response to the results. Demographic data often change the coaching move made with teachers. Student learning data should be conceptualized as a range of interdependent assessments encompassing formative classroom assessments, teacher observations, work samples, summative classroom assessments, and standardized testing. While behavioral data typically inform on a more individualized basis, some classrooms have entire groups of children misbehaving in such a concerted manner that learning is diminished for all students.
