Summative Assessment In Education - Research Paper Example

Summative Assessment in Education Introduction One of the issues that disturb many educators in their profession is the creation of a summative assessment. A summative assessment is an assessment prepared with the purpose of measuring mastery and understanding of information, skills, concepts, and processes taught in class among students (FVTC, 2007). In the creation of a summative assessment, there are various theories, ideas, concepts, and models that can guide the educator in ensuring that he or she can design an assessment that meets his or her purpose. Moreover, a rubric might be needed to offer guidelines on how grading will be done. Summative assessment for this course Summative assessment Education course Semester I, 2012 Effective teaching practice paper 1 Time: 3 hours Section A: Short answer questions (30 marks) Give short answers to the following questions 1. Why is it important to use authentic materials when teaching English language? (3 marks) 2. Name six of the materials that can be used to supplement a course book when teaching English. (3 marks) 3. Discuss four methods which can be used to make a lesson more lively (4 marks) 4. Mention five advantages of using a course book while teaching (5 Marks) 5. Mention five best practices associated with use of a course book (5 Marks) 6. Discuss the four options for use of a course book (8 marks) 7. Give four reasons why it is important to plan a lesson (2 marks) Section B: Lesson plan (30 marks) 1. With the news article and blank lesson plan provided, devise a lesson plan that can be used to teach a certain aspect of grammar. You are free to choose any aspect of your interest, but the lesson plan should include all the stages. Make sure all spaces are filled. Teacher: Room: Observer: Expected numbers: Date & Time: Class Level: Context: Teaching Aids: Learner Objectives: Personal Aims: Anticipated problems for students: Solution: Anticipated problems for teacher: Solution: Procedure Phase Timing Interaction (“Online TESOL / Online TEFL ITTT Answers”, 2009) Section C: Essay questions (40 marks) Write an essay of about 500 words to discuss one of the following concepts 1. Use a course book in lesson planning to maximize effects. 2. An ideal lesson plan. 3. Benefits of using a lesson plan. Note: your essay must contain a brief introduction and a conclusion. An assessment Triangle and cognitive Learning model In creating my summative assessment, I relied on the concept of the assessment triangle and the cognitive learning model. According to Selah & Khine (2011), the mentioned can provide a guide which helps, when an assessment instrument to support reasoning from evidence is designed, which is my objective. At this point, I feel that it is necessary to apply the concept of an assessment triangle where I considered all its elements. One of the elements of an assessment triangle that I critically analyzed is cognition. Cognition refers to the theory, data, and a set of assumptions about how student present their knowledge and develop competency in a subject matter domain (Bernholt, 2012). Using the concept I try to align my summative assessment in the best possible way to make it test the level of competency my students have developed during learning process. To understand this cognitive behavior fully, I decided to use the cognitive learning model. According to Busemeyer & Diederich (2010), this model has a goal of scientifically explaining processes used by human brain to accomplish complex tasks. Using this model, I was able to understand the cognitive behavior of my students. This has helped me a lot in designing this summative assessment by showing me how the students behaviors interact with the goals we want to achieve through this summative assessments. Another element of as assessment triangle that I have considered is the beliefs element. These vertices of the assessment triangle represent a set of beliefs about the kinds of observations which can provide the most appropriate evidence of students’ competency (Russell & Kavanough, 2011). These concepts helped me in deciding what type of questions to include in my assessment. With the knowledge I obtained from this concept, I was able to form this assessment in a way that will help me achieve my assessment objectives. This knowledge helped me realize the importance of short answers and questions, practical thinking questions, and essay questions that I included in my summative assessment. I found from this concept that supplementing this with a question that requires students to practically reason out will yield the best evidence. The interpretation vertices of the assessment triangle represent how the observed evidence is supposed to be analyzed and interpreted to give useful meaning (Glasgow, N.A., Cheyne, M.C., & Yerrick, 2010). Using this concept, I was able to design this summative assessment in a way that will make interpretation easier. These concepts made me divide my assessment into three parts that carry a certain percentage of the total marks. Using this, I intended to extend the ability of this summative assessment to detect the competency the students have developed. This is because the subcategories can help to determine the depth of competency that has been developed by a particular student. The assessment focuses on bringing out the scores that a student scores in each of the categories. This way as an educator I can know whether my students understood only the theoretical part and failed to understand the practical part or vice versa. The summative assessment that I have designed combines the ideas of assessment triangle and the idea of cognitive learning model. Reasons why I regard the theories to be appropriate According to Bernholt, S., Neumann, K., & Nentwig (2012), an assessment triangle can provide us with a useful framework for analyzing the foundation of our summative assessments to determine how well they accomplish the set goals. This theory of assessment triangle has helped me to understand the foundation of my assessment. From this, I was able to predict how well this assessment will help me achieve my goals and make necessary adjustments in this summative assessment to make it better. An assessment triangle can help the teacher to enhance his or her understanding about the process of reasoning (Glasgow, N.A., Cheyne, M.C., & Yerrick, 2010). Since I planned my summative assessment to be based on reasoning, I had to rely on this idea of assessment process to enhance my understanding about reasoning issue. Using the knowledge I obtained through this idea, I was able to make my summative assessment based on reasoning. This has enhanced the ability of the assessment to test the understanding of the concepts learned rather than only test the capacity to internalize ideas. When implementing the concept of assessment triangle in creating any kind of an assessment, there are various things required. According to Sawyer (2006), some of them are an explicit model of deep understanding, tasks carefully designed to test target knowledge, a reliable scoring method based on the model, and a valid process of making inferences. Therefore, if this is used in the making of an assessment, it makes the process of designing the assessment more systematic. This increases the chances of achieving an effective assessment, thus increasing the chances of realizing the assessment objectives. The assessment triangle indicates that any of the elements, whether it is cognition, observation, or interpretation, if they are used separately, cannot be perfect when an assessment is designed (Coffey, J., Douglas, R., & Stearns, 2008). Therefore, a combination of these three elements is recommended to achieve a good assessment. Using this knowledge, I was able to put into consideration these elements of an assessment triangle as my aspects of consideration during the designing of this summative assessment. Combining these aspects helped me to acquire the necessary information needed for the design of the assessment prior to the actual designing. This has helped me to end up with a good assessment, which is in line with the objectives and has a high probability of achieving these objectives. According to Wilson & Bertenthal (2005), an assessment triangle provides logic that underlies any assessment process and offers a systematic approach to designing an assessment. This shows that it has the ability to provide knowledge that can be used to make a better assessment, whether formative or summative. Moreover, this systematic approach and logic can actually make the process of assessment designing easier, regardless of whether it is a classroom assessment or a large-scale assessment. The use of this assessment triangle offered me these assessments making-strategies, so there was not much difficulty in the designing of this summative assessment. Rubric Grading Content Marks Grade A (Excellent) Most of the section A questions in part one are correct and well explained. The lesson plan has almost all the parts filled. The lesson plan has a well explained engagement stage. The lesson plan has a well-explained study stage and ends with a logic activation stage. The essay part meets the required number of words; it has a logical flow, has good and well-explained concepts, and has no spelling mistakes or grammatical errors. Should receive above 80 marks overall and above 25 marks in each part Grade B (Very Good) A good number of sections A questions are correct and well explained. The lesson plan has almost all the parts filled. The lesson plan has a good engagement stage and study stage and ends up with a logic activation stage. The essay part meets the required number of words, has a logical flow, and has good, but not well explained, concepts. Has a few grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Overall marks between 70 and 80 and not below than 20 marks in each of the parts of the assessment Grade C (Good) A good number of sections A questions are answered but not well explained. The lesson plan has all the parts filled. The lesson plan has an engagement stage and study stage, which are not well explained, and activation stage which is not logical. The essay section meets the number of words but fails to have good and well-explained concepts. Have several grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Overall marks between 50 and 70 and on each of the parts not below 15 Grade D (Fair) There are very few correct and well-explained answers in section A. The lesson plan has all the parts filled but lacks one or two of the stages. The essay part meets the number of words but lacks flow and well-explained concepts. The essay part is full of grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Overall marks between 40 and 50 and marks on each part not less than 10 Grade F (Poor) Very few section A questions are well answered and correctly explained. The lesson plan is not fully filled. The essay part fails to meet the number of word and lacks both logical flow and well explained concepts. The essay is full of grammatical errors and spelling mistakes. Overall marks less than 40 and marks on each of the parts less than ten. Note: Scoring poorly in one part of the assessment automatically results in demotion to a lower grade, even if high marks are scored overall. Conclusion Designing any form of an assessment instrument is a demanding task if one wants to come up with an assessment that has the capacity to achieve the assessment goals. However, there are various theories, ideas, concepts, or models which can be used to make this process easier and more systematic. One of such ideas is the use of an assessment triangle helpful in preparing to design the summative assessment and in the actual designing. There are various ways in which this assessment triangle can be used, and modeling cognitive behavior is one of them. It is important in many ways in the assessment process. For example, it offers logic to the assessment activities and provides a systematic approach to the process of designing of summative assessments. Thus, these and similar ideas – a psychometric model, for example – are very important as regards designing of a summative assessment, and, therefore, they should be adapted. References Bernholt, S., Neumann, K., & Nentwig, P. (2012). Making it tangible: Learning outcomes in science education. Berlin: Waxmann Verlag. Busemeyer, J. R., & Diederich, A. (2010).Cognitive modeling. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications. Coffey, J., Douglas, R., & Stearns, C. (2008). Assessing Science Learning: Perspective from Research and Practice. Washington, DC: NSTSA Press. FVTC. (2007). Summative Assessment Definition of Terms. Retrieved from: http://e3t.weebly.com/uploads/1/0/5/2/1052598/summative_assessments_list1.pdf. On 3 June 2012. Glasgow, N. A., Cheyne, M.C., & Yerrick, R.K. (2010). What Successful Science Teacher Do: 75 Research Strategies. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press. Online TESOL / Online TEFL ITTT Answers. Unit 14. (2009). Retrieved from http://adamsittt.blogspot.co.uk/2009/03/unit-14.html Russell, M., & Kavanough, M. (2011). Assessing students in the margin: Challenges, strategies, and techniques. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing Group. Saleh, I. M., & Khine, M. S. (2011). Attitude research in science education: Classic and contemporary measurements. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishers. Sawyer, R. K. (2006). The Cambridge handbook of the learning sciences. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Wilson, M. R., & Bertenthal, M.W. (2005). Systems for state science assessment. Washington, DC: National Academic Press. Read More