I never realised that assessment was for learning

1
I never realised that assessment was for
learning

• Professor Brenda Smith
• Higher Education Academy

Plagiarism providing strategies to address the
issues Engineering Subject Centre University of
Sheffield 24 May 2006
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Students can escape bad teaching,they cant
escape bad assessment(Boud, 1995)
Assessment
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Why assess?
Quality Assurance To provide feedback to
lecturers on student learning To evaluate a
course To assess if course has achieved its
aims To judge effectiveness of learning
environment To monitor standards
Certification To pass, fail or grade Licence
to proceed and/or practice To select for future
courses or employment
Learning Feedback To motivate To diagnose
strengths and weaknesses To provide profile of
what a student has learnt
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Issues in Assessment

• 1.
• Criteria

• 2. Workload

Assessment

• 3.
• Feedback

• 4. Plagiarism

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The value of an assessment strategy
withassessment principles?

• Clear
• Integral part of course design
• Transparent
• Consistent
• Valid
• Free of bias

• Practicable
• Integral part of the QA process
• Wide range of methods
• Realistic workload
• Relevant criteria identified and used
• Provides feedback to support learning

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An Assessment Audit

• Assessment Audit and Tools
• http//www.heacademy.ac.uk/800.htm

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1. The importance of clear criteriaaligned to
the learning outcomes
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Do we try and trip our students up by not
giving clear criteria?
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Developing criteria for assessment

• How do we develop criteria?
• How can criteria be explicit without being over-
• directive?
• How can we ensure that co-tutors have a shared
• understanding of criteria?
• How should criteria be weighted?
• How can we develop criteria for process as well
  as
• product?
• How far can students be involved?

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How good are you at ensuring clear criteria?
Please watch the video and ask yourself are the
criteria that you give to students clearer than
those given to Man Friday?
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2. Workload
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Audit check on student workload

• Do you know
• The total workload for your students?
• How many hours work they would need to do to
  complete a piece of assessed work?
• If student work is bunched towards the end of a
  semester?
• If students have developed time management
  skills?

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Profile of student study time
Hours
20 18 16 14 12 10 8 6 4 2
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
9 10 11 12 Week
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3. Feedback
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National Student SurveyThe Assessment and
feedback scale is made up of five items
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Outcomes from the QAA Institutional Audit on
Assessment

• Major themes
• Development and use of consistent assessment
  policies
• Classification of undergraduate degrees
• Operation of assessment boards
• Security and reliability of assessments
• Use of assessment criteria
• Provision of feedback on students work

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Evaluation of tutor feedback
30
20
17
0
0
11.5
Encouragement
Feed forward
10.5
Ask for clarification
Use of English
Give clarification
3.1
omission
1.5
Praise
-ive
Error
OU/SHU Improving the Effectiveness of Formative
Assessment in Science
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Staff comments on feedback and marking

• They often dont even collect their essays..Some
  of them are more ready to argue about their mark
  than they are to collect their essay
• They came up to me afterwardsand they said well
  we didnt really understand what you meant by
  evaluate. And I kind of thought well isnt it
  obvious, but the more I think about it I wonder
  if it is actually obvious to students, what the
  word means

Refwww.assessmentplus.net
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Feedback can be confusing for students
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What do students think about feedback?
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The student voice - what they would like
For the assessment load to be spread out
More advice support
Reduced workload
I never realised that assessment was for
learning
Clear criteria
Relevant real-life topics
Choice of assessment topics
Feedback to help me learn
Variety of assessment methods
MESA Project
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Students views

• A study (Carless 2006) reported a substantial
  difference in the perceptions of tutors and their
  students on feedback on assessed work
• A study at the University of Sydney, ran focus
  groups with 5,000 students to gain an in-depth
  understanding of student perceptions of feedback
• 3 dimensions emerged
• Differing perceptions (most recognisable if
  written)
• Impact of feedback timeliness, significance
  1st year experience (difference between
  University and School)
• Credibility of feedback this was related to the
  students perceptions of the lecturers themselves

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Students comments

• They are not very specific when they mark. I got
  some good evaluation, what does that mean?
• You put so much effort into this work that you
  really want feedback and to know they have read
  it properly. If you just get a mark you think,
  Ive worked for days and thats it?
• I think it would be helpful as well if when we
  had our feedback we could relate it to the
  assessment criteria

Refwww.assessmentplus.net
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Do these comments aid learning?
A Excellent C- Fine C/C- Interesting C
Opening lousy - main part OK C- Your
writing is appalling D Terrible - didnt you
learn anything at school about essay writing!
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Comments difficult to understand

• This essay is not sufficiently analytical
• This report is not logically structured
• However we also need to focus our efforts on
  strengthening the skills of self-assessment
• Students need to be active in this process
• We need to use language that they can understand
• How might we use students in this process?

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Involve the students Feedback as a dialogue

• For Student Completion
• These are areas of my work that I think are good
  for the following reasons
• Please comment on the following areas of work
• What I want to improve or do differently next
  time
• The mark I think this piece of work deserves
  is

• For Staff Completion

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Seven principles of good feedback practice

• Facilitates the development of self-assessment
  (reflection) in learning
• Encourages teacher and peer dialogue around
  learning
• Helps clarify what good performance is (goals,
  criteria, standards expected)
• Provides opportunities to close the gap between
  current and desired performance

(SENLEF Project)
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Seven principles of good feedback practice

• Delivers high quality information to students
  about their learning
• Encourages positive motivational beliefs and
  self-esteem
• Provides information to teachers that can be used
  to help shape the teaching

Ref Juwah, Macfarlane-Dick, Matthew, Nicol, Ross
Smith (2004)
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• No 2. Encourages teacher and peer dialogue around
  learning
• Reviewing feedback in tutorials where students
  are asked to read the feedback comments they have
  been given and discuss these with peers
• Asking students to find one or two comments that
  they found useful and to explain how they helped
• Having students give each other descriptive
  feedback on their work in relation to published
  criteria before submission
• Using an MP3 player

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Formative feedback - a challenge

• Look at the feedback staff on your course team
  have given to students and ask yourselves...
• Is the feedback motivating and does it aid
  learning?
• Do students use feedback to improve future
  performance?
• Do you and the student track the changes?
• How can you enhance the feedback given?
• How can you improve the need for students to want
  feedback and use it as feed forward?
• Can you award marks for students who use their
  feedback?

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4. Plagiarism

• What do students think
• about plagiarism?

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Reflection Time - The one minute paper

• 1. What has been the most significant learning
  point for you?
• 2. What might you therefore do differently
• i) Individually
• ii) As a course team
• iii) As a university?

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As we reflect on assessment - remember to put the
student at the centre of learning
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Academy Resources

• 1. General Academy resources
• http//www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources.asp
• 2. Implementing an institutional Assessment
  Strategy
• http//www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources.asp?processf
  ull_recordsectiongenericid351
• 3. SENLEF Project 7 principles for effective
  feedback
• http//www.heacademy.ac.uk/senlef.htm
• 4. Managing Effective Student Assessment (MESA)
• http//www.heacademy.ac.uk/799.htm
• 5. Assessment Audit and Tools
• http//www.heacademy.ac.uk/800.htm
• A Briefing on Plagiarism
• www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources.asp?processfull_rec
  ordsectiongenericid10