Chapter 10: Assessment for Distance Education
1.
Assessment:
The process of measuring, documenting, and interpreting behaviors that
demonstrate learning.
2.
Keller’s ARC Model: Reinforcing expectation for success,
providing opportunities for success and attributing success to effort and
ability will enhance learner motivation.
3.
Criterion
Referenced Scoring: Compares the
learner’s performance with that of the outcome.
4.
Validity:
The degree to which an assessment provides an accurate estimate of
learning gains.
5.
Reliability:
The stability of an instrument or activity.
6.
Clarity of expectations: Refers to how clearly
the instructions are written and if any special conditions are met.
7.
Subjective Assessment: Designed to result in products that are
similar from one student to another, yet demand individual scrutiny.
8.
Objective Assessment: Do not require human intervention to
determine whether students achieved mastery.
9.
Formative Assessment: Activities that lead to the refinement of the
instruction itself.
10.
Summative Assessment: Outcomes focused and emphasize the final
results of a course or model.
Discuss the role of assessment in the instruction design
process, especially for distance education.
Assessment is defined
as the process of measuring, documenting, and interpreting behaviors
that demonstrate learning. The purpose for assessment on an administrative
level includes: program evaluation and improvement, facilitating student
placement, justifying funding, and reporting trends to state, federal or
corporate entities. However, the most
important purpose is to provide feedback to learners and instructors.
Describe the
characteristics of several types of assessment activities and the appropriate
use of each within a distance education environment.
A good
assessment needs to be aligned with the objectives. The assessment reflects the learners progress
and understanding of the objectives being taught and documents the results of
the instructions.
The validity
of the assessment should be looked at if the learner did not master the
materials; but performs well or if the learner whom mastered the material does
not perform well on the assessment.
The reliability
of an assessment should be consistent when measuring learning gains.
The clarity
of expectations of the learner should be very specific and clear.
Online Quizzes and Test used best as formative assessment, self-study activities that provide feedback to learners, motive them to keep up with course reading and provide reinforcement of important ideas.
Asynchronous Communication is a way for students to discuss material online with other students. Instructors can post a thought provoking questions to promote higher order thinking with students’ response. Student can form debates questions by having discussion from the reading materials on how the information is interpreted. Blogs and Wiki will allow students to collaborate online and allow the instructor the ability to see who participated. Online journals are also used to keep track of students’ progress but only allow the teacher access to view the information.
Discuss
issues related to academic misconduct and describe how cheating, plagiarism and
other forms of unethical behaviors may be preempted or alleviated in distance
education course.
Cheating,
plagiarism and other unethical behaviors are issues to exist in the distance
education course. Cheating is an issue
that is difficult to address due to working behind a computer. Instructors are not aware who is
participating at that time. Students
should be honorable to complete their own class assignments. Plagiarism is an issue with distance
education can be aided by educating students and also providing tools to check
for plagiarism before submitting assignments.
Life Long Learner of Assessment for Distance Education
Assessment is defined as the process of measuring,
documenting, and interpreting behaviors that demonstrate learning. As a Life Long Learner, the process of
assessment is very beneficial to students learning. Assessments are going to determine if the
goals are met. When learners are
introduced to a new concept or skill they are taking in all the information
provided so that they can attain the information and skills to be successful.
Learners should be
provided with summative and formative assessment. Formative assignments will be used to provide
the instructor with feedback on instructions and the learner. An example of formative assignment may
include a discussion question to see if students understand the
information. This will also allow the
instructor the ability to provide immediate feedback at that time. Summative
assessment are the final outcomes of the learning goal. Summative assignments are used mainly for
administrative purpose such as testing results.
I will continue to explore new ideas relating to assessment
as a component of the instructional design and refine the old ideas to reflect the
best practices.
Assessment for Distance Education
Summary
Assessment is the method of evaluating, documenting and
interpreting behaviors that demonstrate learning. Assessment provides feedback of the
instruction to the instructor as well as feedback of mastery level to the
learner. Although grades are a reason for
assessment it is not a very effective means to measure a learning
behavior.
Assessment is very significant to the instructional
process. For a learner to be assessed
the instructor must identify the outcomes.
Once the outcomes are identified the instructor can develop an
instructional plan and assess students learning. In most cases it will be very valuable to
create the assessment before the instruction process to make sure that the
instruction is aligned with the assessment.
Objective and Subjective assessment are two different forms
of assessment that depends on the activity and the form of result the
instructor is looking for. Subjective
assessment results that are individualized but must contain similar products;
however objective assessment produce identical results. Objective are easier to create, grade and to
provide information. Subjective
assessment is most useful in real world applications.
Formative and Summative assessments are somewhat similar but
the effect of how the information is used is unique. Formative is the process of assessing
learners to drive the instruction. It can be used to provide feedback to the
instructor and the learners to identify misconception of the learner before the
summative assessment is given. Summative
assessment emphasizes the result.
Assessment strategies are instructional tool that can be used
in distance education and face to face instructions. Some of the strategies are online quizzes,
portfolios, term paper, games, problem based activities and graphic
organizers.
Academic misconduct is a very crucial issue in distance
education. There are problems such as
plagiarism, cheating; therefore, some school put honor codes and tools to aide
in this process.
Assessment is headed in a direction to make the workload of
assessing students a little lighter by using automated essay scoring and mobile
devices. This tool will also help assess
the student’s formative by providing feedback on early drafts. Mobile devices are used as an attention
grabber. These finding are dated by to
2008-2010 and now in the year 2107 you will see over 90 percent of students
utilizing mobile devices such as iPad, netbook and cellphones in there distance
education class.
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