Don't get me wrong, this is not a normal occurrence in my life, but this quiz was different. The main reason for my nervousness was that I have really been trying to teach the integer operations unit in pre-algebra differently. Instead of doing a lot of direct instruction in class, I have been making use of websites like Brainpop and Khan Academy to do the direct skill instruction and then using class time to have students explore models to explain integer operations and then create their own models in groups and produce a podcast to demonstrate their conceptual understanding. As a result of this shift (perhaps a "flip"), students were not doing the traditional math work of plowing through numerous questions to practice adding and subtracting integers.
While they were doing this, I was assessing students by using entrance cards, informal interviews, and reviewing their work on Khan Academy, so I felt pretty confident that they were developing the necessary operational skills, but the quiz would be the first real confirmation of this as it is a common assessment that I use with my other math colleagues and have been using for a couple of years.
After grading the quizzes and comparing with previous years and my colleagues I was finally able to give a sigh of relief, my students had done just as well as the other class and my students in past years. Now to be fair, is it possible that they already had this knowledge and just recreated it for me? Yes. Is it possible that they learned this skill in spite of my potential misdirections? Yes. Only time will tell if either of these factored heavily into their success. For the time being though, I am happy with the knowledge that it appears that I am not leading my students into a dark abyss.
