Developing the Plan

My new class presented with its own challenges.  With 28 students, 8 on Individual Education Plans (IEPs), and 2 with behaviour plans, it was a challenge that required new tools.  Leading all my students to jump over a certain learning goal and on to the next was not going to work.  Some students could easily clear the bar without any instruction, while others struggled and could not meet these learning goals even with extra help.  What I was doing was clearly not working.
I had always taught with rubrics, performance standards, and in Bella Bella I learned about Layered Curriculum from Judy Rourke.  Layered curriculum seemed like part of the answer I needed; it helped challenged more of my learners (especially the higher academic students), but I still did not like the problem that higher marks was just a lot more work.  Something about that just did not seem quite right to me.  So one professional development day in 2014 while doing some online research, I stumbled upon the Tiered Teaching model.  This was a differentiated instructional model that seemed to fit my teaching quite well. 
After watching a few videos from Dr. Kathie Nunley, I realized that my assessment was wrong.  All my beautiful tests did not really tel me what I wanted to know, or help my students see what they had learned and what they needed to know.  What kind of questions were on my tests?  Did I ask a lot of easier questions? Harder?  In what order? If a student got a 16/20 then what did they know?  On what concepts did they need to improve?  Did they get another chance to show their knowledge?
I swore a bit at my classroom laptop (in an empty room) and then got to work.  Step one was just trying to limit my tests to assessing only one concept at a time.  If the student got 15/20, but there were multiple concepts on the test were they a 15/20 on both or did they know one but were unsure of the other?  Step two was making the questions go in a logical order from easy to hard, that way any student looking at the test sees questions that they know they can be immediately successful with.
I tried the first tests out in Math, and immediately loved them' they were by no means perfect, but they told me what I needed to know.  I could look at a test and immediately see what level the student was at and what I needed to help them with.  The students liked them as well because they could just work until they got stuck and that was okay.  After marking these tests (which was way faster), the students got to take them home to study for the retest a few days later.  The tests showed exactly what they knew and the next steps that they needed to learn and need help with.  Parents liked how it showed what they need to work on with their child, but were a bit confused because they no longer included a numerical grade like 15/20 but instead a "meeting expectations".   I remember one conversation with a parent where they expressed how they thought that numbers and percent were better and easier to understand.  I explained that numbers don't give a great picture of learning or ability level.
"For example, if you were given a percent score for your job performance each day, or for your performance as a parent each day, would that help you to improve?  Would it describe your abilities and outline your strengths and areas for growth?  We give kids numbers or percents, but as adults do not like the idea of being ranked or evaluated in the same way?  Obviously in school we need to change to something that empowers students and allows them to take control over their learning."