Fit for purpose:
diversifying assessment to meet
the needs of a 21st century
university education & 21st
century students
Prof. Sue Bloxham
S.bloxham@cumbria.ac.uk
Workshop outcomes
Develop participants skills and knowledge to:
-
enhance the alignment between what you intend
students to learn from your courses and the
assessment methods you use to test that learning
-
diversify assessment methods to:
•
•
•
•
engage students
involve students in their own assessment and learning
Promote assessment for learning and employability
Provide formative feedback
reasons to diversify assessment
methods
• Meeting the different purposes of
assessment
• Valid assessment – alignment with
learning outcomes/ aims
• Tasks that assess a 21st Century curriculum
• Student involvement in assessment
• Inclusivity
• Student perceptions and motivation
• Practicability / marking load
Certification
to identify and discriminate
between different levels of
achievement, and
between students;
providing a license to
practice in the case of
professional programmes;
enabling selection of
students for further study
and employment.
This is assessment of learning.
Quality assurance
to provide evidence for relevant
stakeholders (for example, external
examiners, QAA, professional bodies);
to enable them to judge the
appropriateness of standards on the
programme.
This is assessment of learning.
Student Learning
to promote effective learning;
formative and diagnostic;
steering students’ approach to studying;
giving the tutor useful information to inform
changes in teaching strategies.
This is assessment for learning.
Lifelong learning: sustainable assessment
to achieve an understanding of standards;
to learn how to make judgments;
to be able to use criteria;
to be able to tell when you really
understand something.
This is assessment
as learning.
The unbalanced purposes
of assessment
Assessment for
and as learning
Certification & QA
Assessment for and as
learning can:
Be immediate;
Regular;
In-class;
On-line;
Involve students in their
own assessment ;
Uses peer assessment.
Quick, cheap & low stakes
Assessment for
certification & QA
involves:
Formal feedback;
2nd marking;
Moderation;
External examiners;
Assessment boards.
Slow, costly & high
stakes
Constructive Alignment
Teaching/learning
activities
Designed to achieve
intended learning
outcomes
May be:
teacher-controlled
peer-controlled
self-controlled
as best suits context
Learning outcomes
-----------Expressed using verbs
that the students have to
enact
Verbs chosen to reflect
level of achievement
(for example lower level
learning signalled by
verbs such as describe,
identify; higher level
signalled by verbs such
as evaluate, reflect,
analyse)
From Biggs,J & Tang, C (2011)
Assessment of
learning
Assessment tasks
designed to
evaluate how well
outcomes are
demonstrated
Valid assessment – (QAA)
• the range and types of assessments used measure
appropriately students‘ achievement of the knowledge, skills
and understanding identified as intended learning outcomes.
It is important that each assessment enables students to
demonstrate the extent to which they meet the intended
learning outcomes in respect of both the subject and any
generic skills.*
• Is your assessment FIT FOR PURPOSE?
* QAA Quality Code (2012)
Assessing today?
How will we know
if these intentions
have been met?
What tool or task could we use?
Intended Learning outcomes
Develop participants skills and
knowledge to:
- enhance the alignment
between what you
intend students to learn
from their courses and
the assessment
methods you use to test
that learning
A 21st Century education?:
The USEM account of employability
S
E
Personal
qualities,
including
selftheories
and
efficacy
beliefs
Skills
including
key skills
Employability,
citizenship, life, etc
Subject
understanding
U
Metacognition
M
Yorke & Knight 2004
21st Century higher education
• Skills for the ‘knowledge economy’*
– Critical thinking and problem-solving
– Collaboration across networks and leading by
influence
– Agility and adaptability
– Initiative and entrepreneurialism
– Effective oral and written communication
– Accessing and analyzing information
– Curiosity and imagination
Do these attributes figure in
Programme/ unit outcomes and do
assessment tasks foster and test
these broader skills and capacities?
* ‘Must have’
skills for the
future to tackle
the ‘Global
achievement
gap’ (Wagner,
2008)
Characteristics of learning-oriented
assessment
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Formative
Demands higher order learning
Learning and assessment are integrated
Students are involved in assessment
It promotes thinking about the learning process;
Assessment expectations should be made clear;
Involves active engagement of students, developing
independent learning;
Tasks should be authentic and involve choice ;
Tasks align with important learning outcomes
Assessment should be used to evaluate teaching.
Exams
• They come at the end
of a course
• They are not integrated
into the learning,
• The criteria are oblique,
• They rarely result in useful feedback,
• When students do badly we tend to blame the
students rather than use the results to diagnose
problems with our teaching.
Essays
have the potential to meet
many characteristics but:
• Often no formative element
• Questions may ask students to ‘evaluate’ or
‘critically assess’ a topic but if students can pass
adequately by regurgitating others’ evaluation or
criticism (from lectures or reading), they may avoid
higher order learning.
• Students not involved in assessment or thinking
about learning
• Rarely authentic
• Criteria often oblique
Task
In small groups, discuss the assessment methods in the module
outlines that you brought along and try to allocate them to a box on
this grid.
Likely to promote
learning &
employability
Well aligned with the
learning outcomes (or
aims) of the course
Not very well aligned
with the learning
outcomes of the
course
Less likely to promote
learning and
employability
Teacher education: embedding
formative assessment in a portfolio
• First year students, assessment 4000 word portfolio;
• Professional Development Activity (PDA) after each taught session;
• the PDAs were used in various ways:
– peer reviewing;
– collating
– applying research to a case or problem
– sharing of work.
• Summative assignment 1500 words
• eight PDAs as appendices referenced in the text.
• Favourable student evaluation
• Higher marks, better engagment
Georgia Prescott, Cumbria
Psychology Redesign
e.g.’Assess the strengths and weaknesses of Freud’s and Eysenck’s theories of personality.
Are the theories incompatible?
• Guidance provided for tackling the question and
working in a group;
• Best definitions & essays posted on VLE as feedback;
• Students used familiar language to discuss academic
concepts – Dialogue and explanation.
Nicol 2009
20
• 560 students in groups of 6-7;
• 3 week cycle culminating in 700-800 word essay
Peer assessment in lab reports
• Formative
• Students develop understanding of quality in analysing and
reporting science
• Higher order learning, focus on the science rather than a
description of the process
• Students involved in assessment, developing skills of
evaluation
Field-based enquiry: childhood studies
Introduced to lecturer’s research
Exploring signs of childhood
Photos posted on line – annotated by self and others
2 visits to museum, gallery, library to collect other images
Round table conference facilitated by more experienced
students
6. Submit summative research report
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Sambell, (2010).
Some other assessment methods
• Writing tasks: newspaper articles, press releases, executive
summaries, information sheets.
• Video about a specific topic – Youtube?
• Research Grant applications
• Lay commentary on specialist material, e.g. journal article
• Poster – presenting information clearly & concisely
• Presentation – oral communication
• Problems and case study analysis
• Reflective Journals, Diaries & learning logs
• Wikipedia entry
Opportunities and threats
Task:
On your tables, have a discussion about the
ideas and examples so far.
Make two lists:
Ideas I can take away
-
Barriers to changing my
assessment
-
Engaging students in formative
assessment – key requirements
• It clearly feeds into summative assessment
tasks;
• The students must submit it in some way
(bring to class, post on line, hand it in) and
action is taken if they don’t;
• Students receive useful feedback
on it;
• It is not contaminated by
summative purposes.
Selling peer assessment
Evidence shows students find their peers a useful and
more approachable source of help with assignments but
we need to stress the main value in peer assessment is
standing in the shoes of the assessor – not being
assessed – because:
• learning about standards – absolutely crucial to
making progress and understanding feedback
• Seeing other ways of going about the task – develops
strategies for taking action
• Key employability skill – being able to judge own
performance and assessing and giving feedback to
others
• More opportunity for dialogue
• Chance for more formative feedback
Peer assessment needs to become a regular feature of programmes so that it is
taken seriously and taken for granted as part of learning at this level.
Staff work load
A heavy staff workload in assessment is
not necessarily helpful to student
learning. Improving assessment needs
to be accompanied by a shift in effort
from tutors to students:
• more student activity and engagement
(doing tasks, reviewing progress, selfregulation) and less staff activity
(marking)
• Formative assessment has the
potential to achieve both of these and
is most likely to increase achievement.
Tutor friendly formative feedback
• Tutor posts good examples or model answers on VLE;
• Students peer assess tasks using assessment criteria;
• Tutors give feedback on posters, presentations in
class;
• Oral/ on-line feedback to group after marking a
sample
• Tasks done on-line (e.g EMQs, MCQs), auto marked
and give immediate feedback;
• Tutors put main effort into marking drafts (agreed
with examiner), just checking for change and putting
mark on final piece.
In-class activity
Out of class activity
Example of module-level approaches:
the use of exemplars annotated with feedback to
encourage dialogue about assessment criteria
Students
write and
submit
individual
assignments
Tutor leads
discussion of
exemplars
previously
marked and
annotated
with
feedback
Module timeline
From Oxford Brookes
FDTL project on
feedback
Tutor
assesses
assignments and
prepares
feedback
Tutor hands
back
assignments
and leads
discussion on
feedback
Submission point
29
From Oxford Brookes
FDTL project on
feedback
1.
Students
draft &
submit
individual
assignments
In-class activity
Out of class activity
Example of module-level approaches:
Generic (non-personalised) feedback on drafts
plus reflective commentary
2. Tutor marks
sample of
assignments
and prepares
generic
feedback
4. Students rewrite
and submit
assignments with
reflective
commentary on
how they have
incorporated the
generic feedback
5. Tutor
assesses
assignments
6. Tutor
hands back
assignments
with minimal
formative
feedback
3. In-class
discussion of
generic
feedback
Module timeline
Submission point
30
Changing student learning through
assessment design
• Higher order skills may be encouraged by asking students to
act on something which requires them to apply, analyse, and
evaluate.
– E.g. Analysis of a current news item, a piece of
scientific research, a lesson, an ethical dilemma.
• With such tasks, they can’t regurgitate – they have to use
higher order skills because the answers are not in the public
domain (plagiarism?)
• The level of guidance offered, and the level of complexity
demanded, should change as they move up the levels.
• Such assignments are more likely to address a range of
learning outcomes rather than one or two specific topic areas.
08/04/2015
Caution
• Multiple methods have been associated with
negative learning outcomes for students
• You may make malpractice easier
• Extra workload for students
Benefits to students of moving to in-class,
on-line, ongoing assessment and feedback
• Immediate feedback
• More feedback
• Assessment & teaching/learning are
integrated
• Students involved in assessment – gaining
better understanding of standards and own
performance
• Potential for greater student engagement
throughout modules
• More independent study
• integration with work
experience
• Raise expectations regarding
study workload
Quicker, cheaper and low stakes
Task
Working in groups
• Briefly discuss the module outlines that you have
brought along and select one to work on as a group.
• Design a new assessment plan for the module.
• Particularly think about assessment tasks which might
encompass several of the outcomes and how
formative work can be embedded in the process.
Be prepared to present
your assessment plan to
the group
What are the unanswered
questions?
Conclusion
Diversifying assessment can help:
- Balance the different purposes of assessment;
- Make assessment more valid for a 21st century
curriculum;
- Encourage and reward student engagement;
- Ensure that students’ study efforts are directed
towards meaningful learning;
- Use tutor time most effectively for learning and
limit the time absorbed by marking and QA to
essential summative items;
References
Bloxham, S (2014) Assessing assessment (case study by Georgia Prescott), in H. Fry et al (Eds) A
handbook for teaching and learning in higher education (4th Edn) London: Routledge.
Nicol, D (2009) Assessment for learner self-regulation: enhancing achievement in the first year
using learning technologies Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, Vol. 34, No. 3,
June 2009, 335–352
Sambell, K (2010) Enquiry-based learning and formative assessment environments: student
perspectives, Practitioner Research in Higher Education, Vol 4, No 1 (2010), p52-61
Wagner, T. (2008) The Global Achievement Gap: Why Even Our Best Schools Don’t Teach The
New Survival Skills Our Children Need—And What We Can We Do About It Basic Books.
Yorke, M. & Knight, P. (2004) Embedding employability into the curriculum. Higher Education
Academy
General texts on assessment design
• Bloxham, S & Boyd, P (2007) Developing assessment in Higher Education: a practical guide,
Maidenhead, Open University Press (course reader)..
• Bryan, C. & Clegg, K (2006) Innovative assessment in Higher Education. London: Routledge.
• Merry, S., Price, M., Carless, D & Tara, M. (2013) Reconceptualising Feedback in Higher
Education. London: Routledge.
• Price, M., Rust, C., O’Donovan, B & Handley, K (2012) Asssessment Literacy: The foundation
for improving student learning. Oxford: ASKE.
• Sambell, K., McDowell, L & Montgomery, C (2013) Assessment for Learning in Higher
Education, London: Routledge