CLASS ACTIVITY 10:

Assessment Types and Procedures

Educational assessment is the process of documenting, usually in measurable terms, knowledge, skills, attitudes and beliefs. Assessment can focus on the individual learner, the learning community (class, workshop, or other organized group of learners), the institution, or the educational system as a whole. 

Setting and Managing Learning Goals

The first step in conducting assessment is setting the learning goals. Once the learning goals are formulated and agreed upon, multiple forms of assessment may follow. These assessment procedures are: tests, compositions, presentations, projects, portfolios, observations, interviews, questionnaires, and learning logs and journals (Johnson, Johnson, & Holubec, 1998).

Tests and Examinations

Two kinds of tests can be used to assess students’ learning: standardized and teacher-made. Tests and quizzes are given to assess how much each student knows and what students still need to learn. The procedure for giving tests is as follows:

• Students learn for the test in cooperative groups

• Students take the test individually and make two sets of answers. One is to be graded by the teacher and the other is kept for group discussions

• Students retake the test in their cooperative learning group

When the students meet and retake the test in cooperative groups the task is to answer each question correctly and the goal is to make sure that everybody in the group understands the materials and procedures covered by the test (Johnson, Johnson, & Holubec, 1998).

Compositions and Presentations

Two of the most common performances assessed are compositions and presentations. The use of cooperative groups to assess students’ performances meets the following goals: allows students to engage in the performance frequently, provide immediate and detailed feedback, lets students observe closely the work of others and see the strengths and drawbacks, and provide the labor needed for engaging in performances. (Johnson, Johnson, & Holubec)

When working in pairs, for instance, the students follow these procedures: discuss and outline each others’ composition in pairs, research the topic individually, write the first paragraph of each composition in pairs, write the composition alone, edit each other’s composition, rewrite the composition alone, re-edit each other’s compositions, sign-off on partner’s composition verifying that it is ready to be handed in, and process the quality of the pair work.

Individual and Group Projects

As an assessment procedure projects allow students to use multiple learning styles and strategies. Using these with cooperative learning enhances the complexity and elaboration of the projects as more students bring more ideas to the process. 

Portfolios

A portfolio as an assessment procedure is a collection of a student’s work in an area, showing growth, self-reflection, and achievement. Portfolios can also show a cooperative group’s progress (see Cooperative Group Portfolio box).

Observing

While tests, compositions, projects, and portfolios show whether or not students can reach a correct answer, they do not show the quality of the reasoning strategies the students use and the effective use of social skills in cooperative groups.  Consequently, observation becomes one of the most important assessment procedures. There are three stages in observing students’ actions: prepare for observation by deciding who the observers are and what actions they are to observe, observe formal and/or informal, and summarize the results for students’ use (Johnson, Johnso, & Holubec, 1998).

   

      Interviewing

When observing students at work, the teacher can interview them to find out about their reasoning process and strategies. The personal nature of the interviews allows the teacher to build a positive relationship with the student. An interview can be used for assessment and teaching purposes.

Attitude Questionnaires

Attitude questionnaires have been developed to show the attitudes students have towards a subject area. Obtaining good grades doesn’t mean that the students really like the subject matter. 

Logs and Journals

Learning logs and journals help students keep track and reflect on their learning experiences. Logs refer to short entries related to the subject matter being studied. Journals entries are more related to personal observations and feelings. The teachers can assign point values to both logs and journals entries (Johnson, Johnson, & Holubec).

Teams and Assessment

Educators need to start their instruction, assessment, and reporting actions by forming a collegial teaching team. The team constructs the assessment and reporting process by making rubrics, implementing the rubrics effectively, and reporting the data to interested audiences (Johnson, Johnson, & Holubec 1998).

CLASS ACTIVITY 9:

Assessment Principles

Evaluation is a process to determine the extent to which the instructional objectives  have been achieve by students. There are principles which provide direction to the process of evaluation and also serve as the criteria for adopting a particular technique of evaluation. 

Here are some principles:

1. Determining and clarifying what is to be evaluated
2. Selecting evaluation techniques in terms of the purpose to be served
3. Combining a variety of evaluation techniques for comprehensive evaluation.
4. Knowing the strengths and limitations of various evaluation techniques to be able to use a particular evaluation device meaningfully and effectively.
5. Evaluation is a means to and end, not and end in itself.

Group discussion:

We think that 1, 3 and 5 are very important principles to develop.But, number 1 is the most relevant than all principles above. 

Determining and clarifying what is to be evaluated (1) gave us a guide of which objectives will be accomplish by students. This principle provide us a direction to the process of evaluation and to know what techniques we are going to use.

CLASS ACTIVITY 8:

TYPES OF ASSESSMENT

according to type:    

• test
• observation
• report

according to moment:

• initial
• formative
• summative

according to agent:

• heteroevaluation
• coevaluation
• selfevaluation

SUMMARY/REFLECTION

Selfevaluation is the kind of evaluation in which each individual or actor involved in the educational process makes their own judgements and draws their own conclusions about the experience they have had. 

Heteroevaluation happens when more than one individual actor involved in the educational process shares and discusses their judgements and conclusions. Often this kind of evaluation takes place in a small group setting. While individual judgments may change as a result interpersonal evaluation, arriving to a consensus is not the aim. The purpose is simply to share and discuss those individual evaluations.

Coevaluation has an added dimension. It is not simply an interpersonal evaluation in which the number of actors involved is bigger. Since the group as such is part of the context and very often an important source of learning in non-formal education, group evaluation specifically at aspects and dimensions of the learning process that can be observed and judged from a group point of view, including for example the atmosphere, the co-operation among participants, the contribution of the group to the learning and the group process. It should be noted however that this is not its exclusive function.

Initial evaluation is the evaluation done at the very beginning. Before we start our project, whether it is a youth exchange or a training course, it is a good idea to take some time out to check our aims, objectives and methodologies. Some questions you might want to ask yourself at this stage could be:

• Are the objectives of the lesson plan in line with the general objective?
• Do the methods chosen serve the fulfilment of this aim?
• Does the programme cover everything we want to address? Is it realistic?
• Do the stucents have the necessary expertise and capacity to run this programme ?
• Do we need to call in some support?

The formative evaluation is our chance to check how things are going. As the name  implies, it takes place during your project. It may be an “ongoing evaluation”, such as daily reviews at the end of each day, or a whole set of methods that take place at the mid-point of the programme. 

Formative evaluation may prove to be extremely useful for the class, as it gives them the possibility of identifying potential problems or shortcomings as the programme progresses. Students may decide to make necessary changes in the syllabus, to tackle these challenges, or meet additional needs that the students may raise.

Once we complete our lesson plan, it is time for the final evaluation. Using a variety of methods, the students  and the teacher evaluate the whole process in light of the outcomes (i.e. fulfilment of objectives, learning achievements, organisational implications and impact in a wider social context) with a certain distance and perspective.

CLASS ACTIVITY 7:

EVALUATION, ASSESSMENT, MEASUREMENT

Evaluation

a series of activities that are designed to measure the effectiveness of the teaching-learning system as a whole

Assessment

the processes and instruments that are designed to measure the learner's achievement

Measurement

scores, notes, grades as a result of assessment 

CLASS ACTIVITY 6:

A GOOD EVALUATION

Based on a grammar test from the second semester :

1. Do you think it`s a valid test? Why?

Yes, because it is coherent with the objectives ( to recognize and apply subordination clauses)

2. Do you think it`s a reliable test? Why?

Yes, becaus it contains what the teacher thouhgt in the last unit and students practiced a lot in classes

3. Do you think it`s a practical test?   Why?

Yes, because it is realistic, practical and efficient.

4. Do you think it`s a useful test? Why?

it is useful because it detects student's strengths and weaknesses

5. Do you think it is a fair test? Why?

Yes, because students knew how they would be evaluated, besides the topic has been practiced sufficiently in class and homework giving feedback by the teacher , the items in that test are almost simular to the practiced ones

SESSION 7 , APRIL 2ND 2012

A GOOD EVALUATION

SUMMARY

• Validity: A valid evaluation is one which actually tests what is sets out to test, one which measures the behavior described by the objective(s), under scrutiny.
• Reliability: The reability is a measure of the consistency with which the question, test or examination produces the same result under different but comparable conditions. A reliable evaluation item gives reproducible scores with similar populations of students.It is, independent of the characteristics of individual evaluators.
• Practicability: Evaluation procedure should be realistic, practical and efficient in term of their cost, time taken and ease of application.
• Fairness: Evaluation must be fair to all students. This can be possible by accurate reflecting of range of expected behaviors as desired by the course objectives. To keep fairness in evaluation, it is also desired that students should know they are to be evaluated.
• Usefulness:Evaluation should be useful for students. Feedback from evaluation must be made available to the students and help them to prove their current strengths and weaknesses. Evaluation should suggest all the needful requirements for their improvement. 

“Sería peligroso y contradictorio con el verdadero sentido de la acción formativa instalar en el sistema deformación unos mecanismos que generasen sometimiento, temor, injusticia, discriminación, arbitrariedad y desigualdad. La evaluación no es un fenómeno aséptico, que se puede realizar sin preguntarse por los valores, por el respeto a las personas, por el sentido de la justicia. La evaluación es también un fenómeno moral porque tiene repercusiones importantes para las personas, las instituciones y para la sociedad. En la evaluación existe un poder que debe ponerse al servicio de las personas y debe ser ética.”

S. Guerra