Effective assessment is
the only way to determine if students are learning the material being
taught. If an assessment shows that
students have not retained the information, the educator can analyze whether
some students were simply not giving the assignment their all, whether the
material should be reviewed again, or whether the lesson should be completely
revised. Assessment helps make an
educator and his or her lessons more effective, and this is vital to the
overall success of America’s students.
This paper will examine a past assignment on assessment and incorporate
ways that technology can be used to improve the assessment and evaluation
process.
Original
Assignment
The
original assignment involved the preparation of a rubric that would be used to
guide students in their studies and would be used by the educator to assess the
work that was completed. Students were
instructed to use an online resource (Rubistar.com, n.d.) for preparation of
the rubric.
Preparing
the rubric for my freedom of speech lesson plan was a terrific experience. It made me really think about what I wanted
to accomplish with this lesson. I had to
determine what I thought would determine if a student had understanding of the
topic and what would determine if the student had failed to understand the
topic. It made me think about what I
would need to do during the lesson to make sure each student had an opportunity
to succeed at this lesson. For example,
I have added into the lesson a section on research so that the students
understand what type of research sources I expect them to find (scholarly) and
understand where they can find the type of research they need. I should also incorporate a section of
effective debate technique so that the students feel prepared to argue their
positions in front of the class.
It is most important for a teacher to decide on what needs
to be taught and learned by the students before preparing a lesson. A teacher must also make sure what is being
taught reflects what her expectations are for learning so that the students
have the resources they need to succeed.
It is also supremely important that teachers communicate their
expectations or give out a copy of the grading rubric so that students know
what is expected of them so they can succeed.
New teachers need to have a good grasp on how to make sure a lesson
reflects their grading rubric in order to ensure that the students are
presented with the information they need to fulfill the expectations of the
teacher.
Revised
Assignment
The original assignment involved preparing a rubric through
rubistar.com and then following up with a thoughtful reflection about that
rubric. Unfortunately this assignment
did not focus on using technology to create other types of assessment besides a
rubric. Rubrics are helpful to educators;
however there are many different forms of evaluation that could be utilized
that continue to stimulate learning. As
explained in Bedard-Voorhess, Johnson, & Dobson (2011), traditional
assessments often have a face to face format where students and educators
engage in information checking and discussion to determine if the material
being taught has been learned. In addition, pen and paper tests and quizzes are
commonly used as assessments. But technology can also be used to allow
educators the opportunity to assess student learning in a virtual environment
as well.
The assignment requires students to perform scholarly
research to find material about their freedom of speech assignment. An assessment will be created that involves
students performing internet searches on the classroom SmartBoard. The educator will be able to observe the
students to assess if they have been able to establish the proper methods for
choosing sources. If the instructor
notices that student after student is still referring to casual sources rather
than scholarly sources, he or she will be able to redirect the students, get
feedback from other students, or directly show the student what mistakes are being
made.
The assignment also includes a debate section, and I
realized upon preparing the rubric that the students should be given some debate
preparation strategies and skills. In
order to do this, I incorporated a section in the lesson about debate
strategies. In order to assess whether
or not students have learned the material about debates, I can use bubbl.us to
have them brainstorm and organize their ideas about debates. They can develop different sections on the
mind map to show what skills they will need to use and how those skills are
connected. The educator can monitor the
students as they develop the mind maps and then review the mind maps when they
are completed to see if the students have retained the information necessary to
prepare an effective debate.
Reflection
The United States Government Accountability Office (2005)
explains that government offices need evaluative information to help them make
decisions about the programs they oversee.
The information will tell them whether a program is working well or
poorly. In the same way, evaluation in
classrooms will do the same thing. Educators
today will truly benefit from designing a rubric. Rubrics are outlines of the learning
objectives for a lesson and provide valuable information to the students about
what their educator is expecting of them.
Rubrics should be given to students before a lesson or assignment begins
so they understand exactly what goals they are expected to achieve. Students who understand lesson goals will be
better able to follow the lesson and will be more prepared to succeed (Reddy
& Andrade, 2010). Rubrics not only
help students achieve higher levels of success, but they also help teachers
prepare lessons. All teachers, especially new teachers should learn how to
utilize a rubric because it will help them to prepare their lessons by showing
them exactly what they are doing to meet standards and educational goals. Upon reviewing their rubrics, teachers can
determine if their lesson did in fact address the appropriate standards and
make revisions if necessary (Freiberg, 2002).
As effective as rubrics are, they are not always the most
effective means for assessment and evaluation.
Revising this assignment required the author to consider other ways that
students could be assessed on their accomplishment of course objectives. The goal was to meet Program Learning
Objectives 6 and 7 which are: “technology resources to facilitate
effective assessment and evaluation” and “Utilize technology to collect and
analyze data, interpret results, and communicate findings” (Ashford University,
n.d.). This was accomplished by
incorporating different assessment techniques that utilize technology. These new assessments are not only effective
but they are used to collect data, interpret results, and the findings could be
communicated to students, parents and administrators.
The
most challenging part of redesigning the assessment used during this lesson was
to think outside of the norm. I find
myself, like many educators doing what works, and rubrics work. It is easy to resort to them repeatedly for
assessment, but that does not mean they are the best or most effective form of
assessment in all situations. In
addition, there may be methods of assessment that would complement a rubric
while providing the educator with even more information and data about
learning. So forcing myself to consider
other options was the first major hurdle.
I then found it challenging to find the right technology to create an
assessment with because it can sometimes be difficult to match the correct
technology with the correct lesson.
Conclusion
Assessments
should be a part of every educator’s learning process. Technology can be used to implement
assessments that gather useful information.
Technology can also help educators to analyze the information they get
from their assessments and might even help an educator to see other ways of
presenting difficult material.
Incorporating the use of technology into the assessment process is a way
for an educator to create comprehensive assessments that will ultimately help
improve the overall educational experience.
References
Ashford
University (n.d.). EDU697
coursework. Retrieved from http://classroom.ashford.edu/. Login necessary.
Bedard-Voorhees,
A., Johnson, L.M., & Dobson, P. (2011). Letting them show what they know:
Digital assessment strategies [Book Submission Chapter Final Version]. In S.
Hirtz and K. Kelly (Eds.) Education for a
Digital World 2.0, Section F: eAssessment: Measuring in Ways that Matter.
British Columbia: Province of British Columbia.
Retrieved from your online course.
Freiberg,
H.J. (2002). Essential skills for new teachers. Educational
Leadership, 3, 54-59.
Reddy,
Y.M., & Andrade, H. (2010). A review of rubric use in higher
education. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 35(4), 435-448.
Rubistar.com
(n.d.). Retrieved from rubistar.com.
United
States Government Accountability Office. (2005). Performance measurement and
evaluation: Definitions and relationships. Washington, DC: Government Printing
Office. Retrieved from http://www.gao.gov/new.items/d05739sp.pdf
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