Christen Ryall

Hey, I’m Christen. I’m a high school science teacher living in the beautiful Fraser Valley in British Columbia.

I have a Bachelor of Science Degree in Biology and Chemistry and I have been teaching high school for nearly 18 years now. I currently teach Life Sciences 11, Anatomy & Physiology 12 and Advanced Placement Biology. I also teach one block of Dance Performance 10-12 which is a lovely break from my science-heavy course load!

As a senior science teacher, I feel that a large part of my job is preparing my students for post-secondary science courses and programs. Sometimes it feels as though this target impedes my ability to implement varied modes of assessment as so much of their university experience will require them to write traditional exams. I love finding new methods of teaching curriculum and promoting inquiry within the classroom but I have never felt particularly confident in how to implement varied assessments tools within my classroom. I use labs, weekly quizzes and unit tests as the framework for my assessment.

I have often felt that since my own education, and teacher training, was centered on a very narrow scope of assessment formats, I have been conditioned to think of a particular type of assessment as “the gold standard”.

Assessment guidelines and practices in BC are shifting, I am hopeful that within this course I will learn more about creative and varied methods of assessment and begin to develop a repertoire of tools and strategies that will better inform my teaching practice while continuing to prepare my students for their post-secondary experience.