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Ask a question from your peers to help you in your professional work. Seek different points of view on a topic that interests you. Start a thought-provoking conversation about a hot, current topic. Encourage your peers to join you in the discussion, and feel free to facilitate the discussion. As a community of educators, all members of the Career Ed Lounge are empowered to act as a discussion facilitator to help us all learn from each other.

Student View

Student View Perhaps the best description of how rubrics work from a student perspective is this insight I was provided: “I have often wondered about the weight given to different aspects of our assignments over the course of my entire tenure with AIU. It was nice to be able to see it in black and white, before grading. I would honestly like to see all of the instructors incorporate this information into communications with the students. I think it helps in deciphering what the key points to the assignments actually are.”

Online Assessment

teach strictly online and I like the flexibility of giving tests any time and any place. I am required to do a Live Chat using Adobe Connect where I can quiz students on the spot and it seems to work quite well.

Falling back on the Rubric

When I teach an online course that gives me the option of creating it I take full advantage of it. It is basically a contract with the student and I have it as a back up to avoid any disputes with grades. JD

Summative Assessments for both

Instructors are responsible for delivering any content that will be on a quiz so if the majority of the class does not do well it would certainly reflect the instructors delivery content or methods. Jim

Assessing students in a pre-requisite course

Regarding a course that is a pre-requisite - I think that it's so important to have a well thought assessment structure to know if a student is truly proficient in a topic in order to proceed.

Flawed Value Added Assessments

While I see a lot of positives concerning value added assessments, I think there is a concerning flaw. I'm sure we are all aware of people who intentional (or sometimes unconsciously) present themselves deficient in some fashion. This could be financial, intelligence, or relationship. The attention to these areas, rather favorable or not, reassures and encourages the behavior. If an online student deceptively presents herself as an inefficient writer, she will gain attention and (intentional or not) favoritism as she "improves." Like dangling a carrot to her instructor, the writing skill increases until she surpasses others during the final exam.… >>>

Diagnostic assessments help along the way

I find that those pre-tests can be used later in the course to show a student how far they've come. In my legal classes I use this a lot. In particular, I use a pre-test in contracts with just one test question - "What is a contract?" As we go through the course, I have them pull out their answers from the first day, and we as a class add to that definition based on what we have been covering. The students like it because they can see immediately where they've been and where they are. Anyone else find a… >>>

Assessments vs evaluation

This was a very hard topic for me to wrap my head around as we use these terms interchangeably. On our online course you click on a link that is called tests. Once you get into this link its called assessments. But in our communications to our students we call them evaluations. I'm wondering how important it is to distinguish this vocabulary first among the teaching staff and secondly the students. Jenn

Rubric Structure

One thing that I have seen as I have developed rubrics is that students do not seem to understand the point system without a key. I like to break down the points to explain what excellent, good, average, needs improvement and unacceptable. Does anyone else use some form of key to accompany rubrics and if so, what do you use for descriptions?

Alternative Assessments

Student performance on assessments can be measured in two very different ways, both of which are important. Achievement describes the absolute levels attained by students in their end-of-year tests. Growth, in contrast, describes the progress in test scores made over the school year. In the past, students and schools have been ranked solely according to achievement. The problem with this method is that achievement is highly linked to the socioeconomic status of a student's family. For example, according to Educational Testing Service, SAT scores rise with every $10,000 of family income. This should not be surprising since all the variables… >>>

EL 106

Class, Students require constructive criticism You have to provide praise as well as polish in your feedback. Thank you, Christopher Davis

The Experience

Please make sure to use The Lounge to help you apply what you learned in this course. In The Lounge, you can share your successes and challenges in applying the concepts and techniques acquired from your online coursework. You can also learn from the experience of others. I was empowered from the teaching of the EL106 class. The Performance TV interviews with career college executives were very interesting. Thank you, Christopher Davis

Best type of rubric

Hello everyone! I have been struggling with the way I assess classroom participation. In the past I have generally given everyone full credit for participation despite the fact that my class (economics, yes I know) tends to divide into two groups; those who participate and often "carry" the class, and those who participate very little. I already use rubrics in other aspects and I am excited to apply a rubric to grade class participation. However I have some questions, mainly (1) does anyone use a rubric for grading their students class participation? (2) do you use an general or a… >>>

Consistent Grading and Feedback

The main reason I like to use rubrics is so I know I am treating all students the same. If points are assigned based on specific criteria, then I do not have to worry that I am treating one student's work different from another. It also gives me the opportunity to give consistent feedback to students so they are all hearing the same things from me. After teaching the same subject so many times, you forget whether you mentioned certain things to everyone or not. And if so, did you describe them the same. I save my comments and refine… >>>

rubric issues

I really appreciated how the module conveys the deep need for very detailed planning of rubrics. I have created a number of online courses and the rubric is a very involved tool to create but well worth the effort --- really important for the student to know what to expect for course outcomes and so on.

rubrics

Rubrics can be a wonderful guide as to what is expected from a student. As a student I truly appreciated the rubric. Teachers know how to accurately provide feedback to their students by using the rubric. By using rubric scores to analyze it was noted that improvement was needed within the educational program in a study (Little, 2009). Rubrics, however, need careful thought to construct the most optimal one for a given class. Reference Little BB. (2009). The use of standards for peer review of online nursing courses: a pilot study. J Nurs Educ. 48(7):411-5.

Authentic Asessments

I do like authentic assessments quite a bit, it is important in my own profession of law enforcement. Authentic assessment is a type of assessment in which students use their understanding of a subject to solve real world situations and problems. This is what law enforcement officers have to do every day, in my opinion.

Summative versus formative- Which is Best

If given the opportunity I would sue both types of testing in the classroom, but online it is not always quite so possible to do this. I have always leaned towards testing that puts the student into a situation like they would be faced with in the real world and then encourage them to research the topic fully and respond.

Reflective journals

I saw a previous comment by an instructor about reflections journals, I think these are great tools for learning, after all, are we not interested in how the student can make sense out of what they are learning and put it to use?

Interesting observation

While doing a bit of research on the topics I saw the following quote, what is your opinion about what the author said? "Assessing learning alone is not sufficient because the ultimate success of students is also dependent upon their motivation and commitment to learning."