Self-Reflection re: Assessment

This module will begin by having students identify their perceptions about Canada’s offenders.  My hope is that after a unit of study, students will bridge the gap between perception and reality and attain a much more accurate understanding of Canada’s Correctional system and offender population.

As I explained in post-exam feedback, almost 10 % of Canadians have a criminal record (CBC News, 2004).  There are tens of thousands of Canadians who have been through Canada’s provincial and federal prisons. At some point, the vast majority of these men and women re-integrate into our communities.  They become our neighbours, and some are our friends – we see them in the places we visit and shop.

Since this is a pressing real-life issue, I expect students to develop a high degree of competency with materials that we study in the Corrections unit.  I set the Grade Boundary function in Moodle to 80%.   To move onto the next module of Law 12, each student must score in excess of 80% on this module exam.  To facilitate review, the exam will not re-open for a period of at least 24 hours after each attempt.  During that time, I have advised students who do not score 80% or higher to review the video resources and archived Elluminate session that will be loaded into the Moodle modules.

I was impressed with considerable flexibility and functionality that Moodle provides educators.  The exam I developed is a summative evaluation, but it can also be viewed as formative since students are given two chances to attain a grade of 80% on it.

For each exam attempt, I unclicked the setting in Moodle that automatically provides the correct answer once a student has completed the test.  Rather, I have typed clues about where to look when reviewing for a subsequent exam in the feedback.

Moodle allows for teachers to provide both general and response-based feedback.  In my case, I want students to review, and use the response-based feedback to guide their studying.

In many instances, I linked response-specific feedback to authoritative websites that will be used in the upcoming Corrections modules using the HTML editor.  In some cases, the websites are programmed to appear as Javascript popups so that students do not need to leave the quiz page to view them. Unfortunately, Moodle started acting up and deleted a number of the popups.  I’m now left wondering if the URL’s for all websites need to be uploaded onto Moodle server using Add a Resource before they can be used.   All of the website links are currently set to open on a new page and some of the Javascript popups remain working.  I hope that they continue to work when this exam is reviewed.

I spent a lot of time this week thinking about our course readings when designing the quiz.  Jenkins (2004) cites Brown & Glasner (1999) to remind us that “assessment is recognized as probably the most influential factor related to how students learn” (p. 67).   Likewise, Gibbs and Simpson (2005) reference Hattie (1987) who reports that feedback is the most powerful single influence in making a difference for student achievement (p. 9).  On the basis of such comments, it may appear the inordinate amount of time that I spent typing feedback for quiz responses in Moodle was time well spent.

It turns out it’s not quite that simple.  Research on assessment for learning has revealed that in the absence of marks, students are much more likely to read feedback (Black & William, 1998 as cited in Gibbs & Simpson, 2005, p. 11).  This issue was a hurdle for me when thinking of ways to design the quiz in a manner so that students would look beyond the marks for each question and read my feedback.  I considered making the quiz pass/fail so that there would be less emphasis on marks.  I also considered developing an ungraded practice quiz that students would take before attempting the module exam.  In the end, I decided that a quiz based on the concept of 80% mastery would encourage students develop a solid understanding of content prior to taking the exam.  The modules will be designed to provide sufficient ungraded feedback so that students can use assessment in a non-threatening manner to fuel their learning.  Those who score below 80% on the summative Moodle quiz will be encouraged to read the feedback carefully to help them achieve mastery level.

Charman (1999) identified the following advantages of using Computer-Aided Assessment (CAA) for formative assessment:

• repeatability
• immediacy of response to the student — providing a close connection between the activity and the feedback
• reliability and equitability
• increasing the diversity of assessment
• markers are not influenced by presentation
• timeliness — potential for assessments to be used at the most appropriate time, for example weekly tests
• flexibility of access, especially using the web
• student interest and motivation

I’ll be using these criteria to help shape my use of formative assessment with the Moodle modules, and some of these affordances of CAA appear to be applicable to the summative assessment that I developed as well.

Jenkins (2004) references the use of case studies as a valuable means of testing knowledge against real-life tasks.  The activities for the Moodle modules will be designed to be authentic. When I taught these lessons in the face-to-face classroom, I developed much of the materials with the assistance of a New Westminster Parole supervisor, Ramtin Sadafi.  When I was developing the Moodle Quiz, I decided that it would be useful to include video of two well-known advocates for offenders’ rights: Greg Simmons and Howard Sapers.  During the modules, students will be learning about the ordeal of my childhood friend Barry who went to prison twice. By having students compare the information that Barry provides with the testimony of Simmons and Sapers, it should help them to walk away with a realistic understanding of some of the key issues that impact Canadian offenders.

Overall, I’m excited about the upcoming Moodle project, although this quiz task seemed out of place at first.  I felt that we should probably design assessments once the modules had been developed.  By working on the assessment framework first, it forced me to be much more precise about my intentions for the module.  I hope that I can now carry out that vision in an acceptable manner.

Devinder

References

CBC News (January 24, 2004).  Pardon Me.  Retrieved from: http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/crime/fed-pardon-program.html

Charman, D. (1999) Issues and impacts of using computer-based assessments (CBAs) for formative assessment, in S. Brown, P. Race & J. Bull (eds) Computer-assisted Assessment of Students, London: Kogan Page.

Gibbs, G. and Simpson, C. (2005).  “Conditions under which assessment supports students’ learning.” Learning and Teaching in Higher Education.  Retrieved from http://www.open.ac.uk/fast/pdfs/Gibbs%20and%20Simpson%202004-05.pdf

Jenkins, M. (2004).  “Unfulfilled Promise: formative assessment using computer-aided assessment.” Learning and Teaching in Higher Education , i, 67-80. Retrieved from http://www.glos.ac.uk/shareddata/dms/2B72C8E5BCD42A03907A9E170D68CE25.pdf