Lesson 4: Assessment Technology and the Future of Assessment
What is this Lesson About?
In this final lesson, we are going to look at a few forms of assessment technology that are starting to become popular with educational instructors. We will also be using these glimpses at the new materials and ideas that are making their way into the assessment sector to postulate what the future of assessment might look like some time soon.
Focus Objectives
In this lesson, learners will be able to:
- Recognize the delivery methods of instruction.
- Explain the importance of differentiating delivery methods, as well as the significance of choosing the most appropriate assessment delivery method.
- Examine new assessment-related technology and interfaces.
- Apply what they have learned from the course to their own instruction and professional lives.
Do Now
Using two or more of the types of assessment from the previous lesson, create scenarios in which you would use those types of assessment to yield the results you are trying to obtain. Include at least one difficulty you would face while implementing that form of assessment, and what you would do to overcome it.
Delivery Methods
Today, evaluation of instruction and learner aptitude can be carried out in a multitude of ways:
- Paper and Pencil - the most traditional and still the most common method of assessment,
- Project-based/Collaborative - two or more learners are evaluated together on the collective result of their combined efforts. This method has been getting much recent attention due to its purported benefits in increasing positive social interaction among learners and peers, as well as for its promotion of efficacy, in giving each learner a unique responsibility to contribute to the goal of the group as a whole.
- Online - learners are assessed via a device with internet connectivity (computer, tablet, etc.)
Examples of online assessment: For recreational quizzes, try out Sporcle. Or head to Quizlet if you are prepared for more serious academic evaluation.
Computerized Adaptive Testing (CAT) - A test in which the computer uses algorithms to tailor upcoming questions based on sequences of correct or incorrect responses from the learner.
Example of CAT: You can try some CAT tests for free here: http://www.wiziq.com/tests/cat
Activity
For your last activity of the course, try out a few of the assessment methods that can be found online at the links provided under each description. Thank you for participating in Operation: Assessment Overhaul. I hope have learned from this course, and that you are going to take away some important concepts about assessment. In the words of Irish author Bram Stoker, "Sometimes in life, we learn more from our failures than we do from our successes." Thank you again for staying with this course, and the very best of luck to all of you in future endeavors.
References
Griffin, Patrick, and Barry McGaw. Assessment and Teaching of 21st Century Skills. Melboune Graduate School of Education. Melbourne, Australia: Springer, 2012. Web.
Wainer, H. (Ed.). (2000). Computerized adaptive testing: A Primer (2nd Edition). Mahwah, NJ: ELawrence Erlbaum Associates.