Assessing The Complex Expectations for Student Learning

ByDr.Magdy M. Aly

Professor of Curriculum& EFL InstructionFACULTY OF EDUCATION ,AIN SHAMS

UNIVERSITY

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Identify the strategies you use to learn. Recall something you have recently learned…

1.

2.

3.

4.

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The Complexity of Learning

Learning is a complex process of interpretation-not a linear process

Learners create meaning as opposed to receive meaning

Knowledge is socially constructed (importance of peer-to-peer interaction)

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People learn differently—prefer certain ways of learning (learning inventories: personality, instructional preference, social preferences, visual, global,

verbal, sequential, for example)

Deep learning occurs over time—transference

Meta-cognitive processes are a significant means of reinforcing learning (thinking about one’s thinking)

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Learning involves creating relationships between short-term and long-term memory

Transfer of new knowledge into

different contexts is important to deepen understanding

Practice in various contexts creates expertise

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Integrated Learning….

Cognitive

Affective Psychomotor

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List Several GE Outcomes You Expect Students to Demonstrate:

___________________________________

___________________________________

___________________________________

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Assessment Foci

Pedagogy

Curricular design

Instructional design

Educational tools

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Assessment Foci

Educational experiences

Students’ learning histories/styles

Methods to capture learning--assessment

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Collaborative Questions of Curiosity that Prompt Assessment

Who Learns What? When? Where? Why? How?

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Specific Questions

What do you expect your students to know and be able to do by the end of their education at your institution?

What do the curricula and other educational experiences “add up to?”

What do you do in your classes or in your programs to promote the kinds of learning or development that the institution seeks?

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Questions (con’d)

Which learners benefit from various classroom teaching strategies or educational experiences?

What educational processes are responsible for the intended student outcomes the institution seeks?

How can you help students make connections between classroom learning and experiences outside of the classroom?

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Questions, con’d:

What pedagogies/educational experiences develop knowledge, abilities, habits of mind, ways of knowing/problem solving?

How are curricula and pedagogy designed to develop knowledge, abilities, habits of mind, ways of knowing?

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How do you intentionally build upon what each of you teaches or fosters to achieve programmatic and institutional objectives—contexts for learning?

What methods of assessment capture desired student learning--methods that align with pedagogy, content, curricular and instructional design?

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Collaboratively Designed Methods to Capture Learning

“Every assessment is also based on a set of beliefs about the kinds of tasks or situations that will prompt students to say, do, or create something that demonstrates important knowledge and skills. The tasks to which students are asked to respond on an assessment are not arbitrary.“

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Collaborative Processes:

Consensus about shared learning outcomes:

maps

inventories of practice

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Approaches to Learning

Surface Learning

Deep Learning

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When Do You Seek Evidence?

Formative—along the way?

For example, to ascertain progress

or development

Summative—at the end?

For example, to ascertain mastery level

of achievement

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Collectively….

Identify shared expectations for student learning (learning outcome statements that describe what you expect students to demonstrate or represent or produce based on your intentions)

Design or select methods to assess those expectations that align with learning and assessment practices

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Develop criteria and standards of judgment to assess student work (scoring rubrics)

Analyze and interpret students’ demonstration or representation of learning

Modify, change, or design educational practices to improve student learning based on analysis and interpretations of results.

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Mission/Purposes

Learning Outcomes

How well dowe achieve

our learning

outcomes?

Gather Evidence

Interpret Evidence

Enhance teaching/ learning;

inform institutional decision-

making, planning, budgeting

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Collectively Interpret Results: Seek patterns

Build in institutional level and program level discourse (formal and informal times)

Tell the story that explains the results—triangulate

Determine what you wish to change, revise, or how you want to innovate

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Implement changes

Assess to determine efficacy of changes

Focus on collective effort—what we do and how we do it

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“What and how students learn depends to a major extent on how they think they will be assessed.”

John Biggs, Teaching for Quality Learning at University: What The Student Does. Society for Research into Higher Education & Open University Press, 1999, p. 141.

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Works Cited

Biggs, J. (1999). Teaching for Quality Learning at University: What The Student Does. Great Britain: Society for Research into Higher Education & Open University Press.

Maki, P. (June, 2004). Assessing for Learning: Building a Sustainable Commitment Across the Institution. Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing, LLC, and AAHE.

National Research Council. (2001). Knowing What Students Know: The Science and Design of Educational Assessment. Washington, D.,C.: National Academy Press.