Assessment And Evaluation In The Online Classroom

Assessment and Evaluation in the Online Classroom – EDU 762 Final Project Sherry Simmons Introduction When teaching any course it is essential when assessing students that we make sure that we are not only evaluating the course goals and objectives but that our assessments are authentic. By authentic I mean assessment that demonstrates students’ ability to apply knowledge and skills to the real world and make it meaningful and applicable. Although I understand the importance of authentic learning and have always tried to make my evaluations authentic – in the past I have not made the time and effort to explore new technology to use in my online course evaluations. This course has not only introduced me to a variety of technology available for instructors to use but it has forced me to develop assessments that are useful and authentic using this technology. For this project I have chosen for my assessments a Wiki page, a survey, a discussion forum and for a comprehensive course assessment an electronic portfolio. The course that I have developed assessments for is one that I am currently teaching – Developmental Psychology. Description of Course and Student Population Developmental Psychology is generally a second year course with Intro to Psychology as a prerequisite. It is a comprehensive course which covers the development in three broad domains – the biological, cognitive and psychological across the lifespan or from “the womb to the tomb.” I currently teach Developmental Psychology both face-to-face and online. I am also in the process of developing a “blended course” for this course to be offered next fall. The official description of this course is that it provides the opportunity for the learner to develop the knowledge, skills, processes and understanding of human development throughout the life span. It explores developmental theory and research with an emphasis on the interactive nature of the biological, cognitive, and psychosocial changes that affect the individual from conception to death. The students who normally take the course include nursing and health students, child development students, and general studies transfer degree students. A large majority of students enrolled in the two year technical college are nontraditional students with an average age of 28. Many of the students have lost their jobs and are returning to school to be trained in a new field. Minority students represent 15 to 20 percent of the student population. Course Learning Objectives Covered in Project I will be selecting only a few of the objectives from this course to use in this project. Some of the objectives are specific to a certain topic for a learning plans and some are comprehensive because they are for the final course evaluation.

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• • • • • • •

Explore student attitudes and preconceived ideas in regards to child discipline prior to introduction of course topic and research. Students will compare and assess their attitudes in regards to child discipline after research and discussion. Explore student attitudes in regards to child discipline after research and discussion. To encourage students to apply critical thinking skills to the area of child discipline. Students will apply various theoretical frameworks to development issues. Students will analyze and connect developmental issues related physical/biological, cognitive and psychological changes across the lifespan. Students will evaluate the integration of genetics and environmental influences on development.

Assessment Tool # 1 – Zoomerang Survey Online surveys can be excellent to gather information on attitudes, opinions, experiences, expectations, needs, demographics and descriptive data. (Using Surveys for Assessment) Online surveys can easily be adapted for online student assessment. A survey is a great way to collect quantitative data about a group of people. “Surveys are usually standardized in such a way as to eliminate bias. For example, the response to one survey question should not alter a response to another question.” (Center for Instructional Technology & Training) A survey can be used in a variety of ways. You may give a survey to gather specific data from a particular group of people or you may give the same survey twice during different periods of time to discover differences or variations in responses. (Center for Instructional Technology & Training) One of the main reasons to use a survey in a general studies course is to determine if students and faculty believe that the goals and objectives of the course are being met. Benefits of an Online Survey Zoomerang’s surveys are easy to design, easy to use, offers free templates which minimizes design time and there is nothing to install. You are able to see the results of the respondents immediately. Most people who use the survey report that they are pleased. With online surveys teachers have the ability to select questions types and many tools have the capability to upload “support material, such as video and images.” (Bouct) “Online surveys can calculate the percentages of student who answered questions correctly, allowing teachers to get a sense of class data as a whole, while also allowing educators to look at individual student responses to the assessment.” (Bouct) The interface is easy to use and allows you to either add names and addresses by hand or

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import them from a text file. You can also track an individual’s identity through the survey. You can design a survey and store it and edit and reuse it for different surveys. Challenges of an Online Survey Students may enter false information, or information that they believe the instructor wants and so the survey may be inaccurate. Although online surveys can be adapted to be used for assessment they do not offer shared “content area assessments form which teachers can select, nor do they allow teachers to enter responses for the online program to correct” and so they are not well suited to provide immediate feedback to the students and teachers” (Bouct) Some of the problems with this type of assessment is that students may only answer some of the questions or none of the questions. Plagiarism Although the likelihood of plagiarism in a survey is not great however students may falsify their responses for a number of reasons as stated above in the challenges of an online survey; Learning Objectives: 1. Explore student attitudes and preconceived ideas in regards to child discipline prior to introduction of course topic and research. 2. Students will compare and assess their attitudes in regards to child discipline after research and discussion. Bloom’s Taxonomy: Knowledge and Evaluation Activity: Before the introduction of the topic of child discipline and the researching of the topic students will take a pre-survey in regards to child discipline. This survey will be used as a “springboard” to not only introduce the topic but to allow the students to compare their results with that of surveys taken in the general public. The results of the survey will be discussed in class and compared to what the research shows in regards to discipline and ideas and backgrounds of people who use various types of discipline It also allows the instructor to have an understanding of the student’s prior knowledge of the subject. After they have researched the topic and written a paper discussing their findings and entered a discussion board they will complete a post survey to allow them to reflect on how their attitudes may or may not have changed as a result of research and discussion. The purpose is to help students understand that many of their ideas are determined by their past experiences, culture, and preconceptions of what type of discipline works and why.

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Assessment Tool # 2 – Discussion Forum Since I already use Blackboard discussion forums for my online course - I will continue to use Blackboard for the discussions - however I will now have a clearer, more directive idea of how to design authentic assessment for this tool. “Discussion Boards are reflective in nature. They force students to read other perspectives and carefully consider a response. As students reflect upon what they want to write in a discussion board posting, they often integrate research or class readings with which they are familiar. This occurs more frequently in discussion board postings than in face-to-face discussion, largely because of the extra time a student has to think about their response.” (Academic Technology Center) Benefits Some of the benefits include the following: • • • •

Students are more likely to interact with each other Students are more likely to share their research findings and include their views. Students are more likely to answer each others questions freeing up time for the instructor. And finally “In discussion bards the bias often exhibited towards non-whites and women in face-to-face classes is reduced, resulting in a more instructionally agreeable environment” (Academic Technology Center)

Challenges: • Lack of student participation • Managing large number of posts • Students feel overwhelmed with posts that they feel they may have to read and respond to • Repetition of information in the posts. Learning Objective: 1. Explore student attitudes in regards to child discipline after research and discussion. 2. To encourage students to apply critical thinking skills to the area of child discipline. Bloom’s Taxonomy: Knowledge and Analyze Plagiarism: Because this assignment requires students to reflect on their research and to describe how it has influenced their thinking that plagiarism is not likely.

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Activity: Prior to this activity students will have completed a pre-topic survey and will have completed research in the area of child discipline. They will also have had been previously introduced to critical thinking skills and role of assimilation and accommodation in processing new information. The students will be required to discuss their research and their thoughts and ideas regarding discipline now as a result of their research. Have their views stayed the same or have they changed? Why or why not? They are required to reply to at least four other students on four separate occasions. I will use a rubric which they will have access to prior to the activity.

Assessment Tool # 3 – Wiki Page A Wiki page is a page that can all users can add to or edit. “It seeks to involve the visitor in an ongoing process of creation and collaboration that constantly changes…” (Wikipedia) A Wiki can be thought of as a combination of a Web site and a Word document. At its simplest, it can be read just like any other web site, with no access privileges necessary, but its real power lies in the fact that groups can collaboratively work on the content of the site using nothing but a standard web browser. Beyond this ease of editing, the second powerful element of a wiki is its ability to keep track of the history of a document as it is revised. Since users come to one place to edit, the need to keep track of Word files and compile edits is eliminated. Each time a person makes changes to a wiki page, that revision of the content becomes the current version, and an older version is stored. Versions of the document can be compared side-by-side, and edits can be "rolled back" if necessary. (Science of Spectroscopy) The Wiki is gaining traction in education, as an ideal tool for the increasing amount of collaborative work done by both students and teachers. Students might use a wiki to collaborate on a group report, compile data or share the results of their research, Benefits • Wikis are simple to use • They are dynamic • They are convenient for group work Challenges • Many wikis are open to everyone without requiring users to register. • Changes that are made are immediately made and appear instantly which can fascilitate abuse of the system. (Wikipedia)

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Learning Objective: 3. To encourage students to apply critical thinking skills to the area of child discipline by creating and developing alternate methods of discipline. 4. To apply and integrate research to develop and create alternative methods of discipline. Bloom’s Taxonomy: Application and synthesis Plagiarism: There could be the potential of plagiarism with this assignment. Although students are asked to include links that propose alternative methods of discipline they still may include ideas into the Wiki page that they credit as their own. Activity: Students will be asked to consider, describe, and list alternative methods of discipline, other than corporal punishment, and to include links that are relevant. Prior to this assignment the students will be asked to consider or actually try different methods of discipline that would be an alternative to traditional methods of spanking. The Wiki page should list various types of alternative methods of discipline and to describe steps used to increase results of these methods.

Assessment Tool # 4 – Electronic Portfolio Electronic portfolios can be used for many types of assessment in education. It can be a tool that is used over long periods of time. It can be continuous and ongoing, providing both formative and summative opportunities to monitor students’ progress towards achieving course objectives. (Prince George’s County Public Schools) It can be used to not only document student progress but to display their achievements and to demonstrate their understanding and application of course objectives. “Research has found that students in classes that emphasize improvement, progress, effort and the process of learning rather than grades and normative performance are more likely to use a variety of learning strategies and have a more positive attitude toward learning. Yet in education we have shortchanged the process of learning in favor of the products of learning. Students are not regularly asked to examine how they succeeded or failed or improved on a task or to set goals for future work; the final product and evaluation of it receives the bulk of the attention in many classrooms. Consequently, students are not developing the metacognitive skills that will enable them to reflect upon and make adjustments in their learning in school and beyond.” (Jon Mueller)

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There are two types of portfolios – growth portfolio and the showcase portfolio. “The growth portfolio emphasizes the process of learning whereas the showcase portfolio emphasizes the products of learning.” Jon Mueller Benefits According to Dr. Helen C. Barrett two of the benefits of using electronic portfolios are: • •

Creating an electronic portfolio can develop teachers' as well as students' multimedia development skills Students can compare their reflections to the standards and performance indicators, and set learning goals for the future.

Challenges • Problematic for students who are not a technologically savvy • Instructors must make sure that students have clear criteria for including and demonstrating the various artifacts that they are displaying in their portfolio. • May not be a good assessment tool for students who are not very creative. Plagiarism The chance of plagiarism does exist with this assignment because students are asked to gather information from a variety of sources. Learning Objectives: 1. Students will apply various theoretical frameworks to development issues. 2. Students will analyze and connect developmental issues related physical/biological, cognitive and psychological changes across the lifespan. 3. Students will evaluate the integration of genetics and environmental influences on development. Bloom’s Taxonomy: Application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation Activity: Students will be asked to choose two developmental issues covered in course, such as child discipline, obesity, ADD/ADHD, bullying, divorce, ageism, etc.. Students will use a variety of artifacts to demonstrate their understanding of the causes, interrelationships and possible consequences associated with these issues. They will then be asked to apply theoretical perspectives to the issues, demonstrate how each of the issues influence all aspects of development (biological, cognitive and psychological), and discuss the integration of genetics and environmental influences on each of these issues. They will also be asked to include or develop ways in which one could intervene to minimize negative effects and to maximize positive development. Possible artifacts to be included could be pictures, video clips, quotations, blogs, advertisments, songs, movies, pamphlets from the community, real life examples, research articles, cartoons, and articles from the 7

web. They would also be required to include a description of why they chose the artifact and how it relates to the course objectives. The portfolio should also include ideas and ways to reduce or optimize the issue that they have chosen. A rubric will be provided to them. Summary/Conclusion This course has forced me to not only make the time to explore and try new methods of assessment but also to “get out of my comfort zone” and actually develop new assessments using technology! Even though this course has taken so much of my time I believe it was well worth the effort! When I first enrolled in this course I had no idea that I would have been exposed to and felt comfortable using all the technology that I have so far. The methods and type of assessment tools that I use for my online and future blended courses will certainly be different because of my exposure to all the information from this course! As I was working on the development of the different types of assessments I found myself thinking about all the different ways I could use each tool. I also want to try other tools such as embedding pod casting into my power points, developing power point quizzes and using Avatar as introductions to each of the activities. I have included an avatar in which I developed just this week! I would have never explored this technology had I not taken this class. References Academic Technology Center, Teaching with Technology Collaboratory, “Improving the Use of Discussion Boards” www.wpi.edu/Academics/ATC/Collaboratory/Idea/boards.html Barrett, Helen C. “Create Your Own Electronic Portfolio”, Learning and & Leading with Technology, April 2000 http://electronicportfolios.org/portfolios/iste2k.html Bouck, Emily C. Journal of Special Education Technology. Norman: Spring 2006. Vol.21, Iss 2; pg. 67, 7 pgs Center for Instructional TechnologyTraining http://www.citt.ufl.edu/toolbox/toolbox_survey.php Mueller, Jonathan, “What is Authentic Assessment?, Authentic Assessment Toolbox http://jonathan.mueller.faculty.noctrl.edu/toolbox/portfolios.htm Prince George’s County Public Schools, “What are the Characteristics of an Effective Portfolio?” http://www.pgcps.org/~elc/portfolio1.html Science of Spectroscopy, “Using Wiki in Education” http://www.scienceofspectroscopy.info/edit/index.php?title=Using_wiki_in_education

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Survey Galaxy, http://www.surveygalaxy.com/default.asp Using Surveys for Assessment, http://web.bsu.edu/IRAA/AA/WB/chapter3.htm Wiki page, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiki Zoomerang, http://app.zoomerang.com/Create/preview/preview.zgi?ID=L23KN7QR7UJM&bp=sm& p=WEB228CQU8HGQZ

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