Effectively Using
Online Assessments
Assessments
are a powerful educational tool for both teaching and learning.
Assessments can determine what learning students still need to
master and provide useful feedback to both instructors and students.
In one form or another, assessments form the basis of how students
"make the grade" and can provide feedback to faculty
on how to improve or revise a course.
Assessments
can be classified as summative and formative. Summative assessments
are evaluative in nature — usually manifested as written
exams and associated with a "high stakes" event such
as the student's grade. Summative assessments test the student's
knowledge against a known standard (a.k.a. the correct answer).
Formative
assessments provide the student with feedback on his or her learning.
These types of assessments are not necessarily attached to a score
or grade. Formative assessments often focus on how to improve
learning. For instance, when returning a written assignment, instead
of providing a score (a summative assessment), you could provide
input to the student on how he or she could improve the score.
The student could then re-work the assignment within a given time
period, and hand in the improved assignment for a summative assessment.
Other
terminology exists defining assessments as well. Process Education
defines summative assessments as evaluations and formative assessments
as simply assessments. Whatever terminology you choose to adopt,
online assessments can be a valuable resource for both faculty
and students.
Using
Technology for Assessment
As
with any technology, before choosing to use online assessments,
the tool and type of assessment used should match a specific teaching
strategy or learning outcome for the course, i.e. the pedagogy
should drive the technology. The following table provides some
examples of how technology might tie into assessment needs.
| Problem/Issue |
Assessment |
Technology
Tie-ins |
Comments |
| Student's
aren't prepared for the course. |
Pre-test
student knowledge (summative) |
- Deliver
the assessment online as an assignment to be completed
the first week of the course.
- Make
a pre-test available before students enroll in the course.
- Provide
online resources related to prerequisite content.
|
Online
assessments can provide immediate feedback to the student
about their understanding of past subject material required
to succeed in a course.
Students
vastly ill-prepared for the course would have the option
of dropping early (1) or not enrolling in the course until
they are better prepared (2). |
| Student's
don't come prepared for class. |
Frequent
quizzes (summative) |
- Online
quizzes.
- Require
print- out of study outlines and/or reading of class materials
posted online.
|
Students
can have access to online quizzes right up to the beginning
of class. Students must read material and take the quiz
before coming to class. (1)
Start
the class session with a 5-minute quiz covering reading
material (2) |
| Students
show poor understanding of necessary concepts in hand-in assignments. |
Self-tests
(formative) |
- Provide
self-test assessments online.
- Provide
online resources related to the assignment.
- Give
pop quizzes online.
|
Online
assessments can provide immediate feedback to the student
about his or her understanding of the subject material required
complete the assignment successfully (1).
Feedback
can include suggestions for further study as appropriate
(2).
Pop
quizzes can determine how well your students "get it."
Cover muddy points in the next class period (3). |
| Standard
course evaluations don't provide useful information to improve
course. |
Mid-term
and end-of-term assessments (formative) |
- Web
comment form.
- Online
survey.
|
Web
forms allow you to solicit input from students about how
to improve the course. Input is submitted anonymously via
e-mail (1).
Web
course tools allow you to create surveys. Tracking abilities
allow you to see which students have responded, but not
individual student responses (2). |
Advantages
of online assessments
Online
assessments help facilitate several important teaching and learning
strategies
described by Barbara E. Walvoord, Ph.D., Director, Kaneb Center
for Teaching Excellence.
-
Learning requires frequent faculty-student contact
-
Learning requires frequent and prompt feedback
-
Students learn what they care about and remember what they understand
Instructors
can access the progress of their students more frequently. The
computer stores data for easy access.
Students
can monitor their own progress.
Feedback
is provided to students immediately. Immediate feedback enables
the learner to monitor their own understanding of the material.
It also encourages students to keep working on problems that are
giving them trouble. In addition to overall feedback (e.g. a test
score), online quizzing tools provide means to provide feedback
on whether the question was correct and why or why not.
You
can include multimedia. Online quizzing tools support graphics,
video, and audio, making assessments media rich.
Easily
generated reports. Statistics are available for individual students
or the course. Simple item analysis can also be available.
Out-of-classroom
time is used. This opens up classroom time for other activities.
Disadvantages
of online assessments.
Equipment
must be reliable.
The
network must be reliable.
Online
test development is time consuming. Allow for the necessary time
to develop materials.
Academic
honesty can be a problem. If you require students to take exams
online, there is no way, short of retinal scans, to ensure it
is really Jane or John taking the exam.
Assessments
are essentially open-book. There is no way to ensure Jane or John
don't have course notes next to the keyboard.
Other
tips
Because
of some of the disadvantages noted above, online tests may better
suited to formative assessments. However, here are some tips on
using online summative assessments.
Use
large banks of test questions so that tests can be randomly generated.
This way if Jane and John are sitting next to each other, they
see different tests.
Include
slightly more questions on the test than an average student can
answer during the time period allotted to take it. This will help
curtail note-checking.
Make
online testing a smaller percentage of the total grade.
Make
online testing a weekly or biweekly occurrence.
|
