This edited information was graciously provided by the UCF Faculty Center for Teaching and Learning.
Course Design: Assessment Strategies
Ideally, you should create a plan for assessment at the same time that you craft the initial course design. A well-designed course will include assessment strategies that are fully-integrated into the course’s goals, so that you are certain that you are measuring exactly those learning outcomes you identified as important goals from the outset.
Definitions
ASSESSMENT: A systematic and ongoing method of gathering, analyzing and utilizing information from measured outcomes for the purpose of improving student performance.
Formative: When assessment is used to monitor progress and provide corrective feedback toward meeting an objective, it is formative in nature. Faculty interventions are non-threatening, provided throughout the learning process to indicate how well students are doing and include providing alternative learning methods as needed prior to final evaluation.
Summative: When assessment is used to validate or certify an objective has or has not been met by using a final evaluation instrument, it is summative in nature.
9 Principles of Good Practice for Assessing Student Learning
(American Association of Higher Education)
1. The assessment of student learning begins with educational values.
2. Assessment is most effective when it reflects an understanding of learning as multidimensional, integrated, and revealed in performance over time.
3. Assessment works best when the programs it seeks to improve have clear, explicitly stated purposes.
4. Assessment requires attention to outcomes but also and equally to the experiences that lead to those outcomes.
5. Assessment works best when it is ongoing not episodic.
6. Assessment fosters wider improvement when representatives from across the educational community are involved.
7. Assessment makes a difference when it begins with issues of use and illuminates questions that people really care about.
8. Assessment is most likely to lead to improvement when it is part of a larger set of conditions that promote change.
9. Through assessment, educators meet responsibilities to students and to the public.
Why Assess? We assess to answer questions...
Institution
How does our University compare with other similar institutions? Does it meet the needs of the communities it serves? How can it improve? Does it meet or exceed standards for SACS and other accrediting agencies?
Program
What content, skills and values do students learn through program activities? Is the program design effective? Does the program meet the needs of potential employers?
Course
Do the courses and prescribed experiences in the program address all the competencies students need to be successful in their lives and careers?
Classroom
What content, skills, and values do students learn through class activities?
What are my students learning and how well are they learning it?
Course Design: Assessment Matrix
Write down all the assessments you plan to use in your course (exam, paper, etc). Not all assessments might be graded. You do not need exactly eight of these:
#1
#2
#3
#4
#5
#6
#7
#8
Place one-word reminders of these assessments into the shaded boxes along the left side of the chart below.
The top row of shaded boxes represents the Course Objectives you developed in earlier worksheets; place one-word reminders of each objective into these boxes.
| 1 | ||||||||
| 2 | ||||||||
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| 5 | ||||||||
| 6 | ||||||||
| 7 | ||||||||
| 8 |
Place a checkmark in the white box whenever an assessment meets one of the Course Objectives. In this fashion, you can judge whether all the objectives are being met equally.
Are there some assessments which aren’t doing much to meet objectives? If so, do they still belong? Are there some objectives which aren’t being adequately assessed? Use this tool to bring balance to your course, and to make sure you are assessing your objectives.
A healthy matrix will have some checkmarks in every row, and some in every column, but will not be completely filled in. Over-reliance can be as large a problem as under-representation.
Course Design: Meeting Objectives Matrix
Break down your course into “sections” or “modules” that seem like natural divisions in your content. You do not need exactly eight of these:
#1
#2
#3
#4
#5
#6
#7
#8
Place one-word reminders of these sections into the shaded boxes along the left side of the chart below.
The top row of shaded boxes represents the Course Objectives you developed in earlier worksheets; place one-word reminders of each objective into these boxes.
| 1 | ||||||||
| 2 | ||||||||
| 3 | ||||||||
| 4 | ||||||||
| 5 | ||||||||
| 6 | ||||||||
| 7 | ||||||||
| 8 |
Place checkmarks in the white boxes whenever a section of your course meets one of the Course Objectives. In this fashion, you can judge whether all the objectives are being met equally.
Are there some sections of the course which aren’t doing much to meet objectives? If so, do they still belong? Use this tool to bring balance to your course, and to make sure you are meeting your objectives.
A healthy matrix will have some checkmarks in every row, and some in every column, but will not be completely filled in. Over-reliance can be as large a problem as under-representation