Show #3: Assessing the Online Learner - An Interview with Rena Palloff & Keith Pratt
In this podcast, authors Rena Palloff and Keith Pratt talk with Jonathan Finkelstein about assessing learners in online courses, and offer practical ideas for measuring learner progress and gauging understanding online. They also describe the role that “social presence” plays in learner success and retention in online programs of study.
The podcast is based on the Jossey-Bass Online Teaching and Learning guide book series, and is a pre-cursor to the 2nd Annual OTL Conference Online to be held October 7-8, 2008. All participants in the online conference receive their choice of three books in the Online Teaching and Learning Series of guide books.
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September 2nd, 2008 at 10:52 am
Wow, I just finished the third course for my LERN COI certification and of course we covered assessments. During these courses, I found myself relating my learning experiences to my Adult Education classes I took years ago. I find myself doing the same thing right now as I am listening to your Podcast. Is there really such a thing as cheating anymore?
Kids today are chunk learning, skimmiming information and searching for answers with google so much that I call it schoogle.
In my last course, one of my peers stated with regard to “one-right-answer-only and ticking clock” tests that they didn’t see how a closed-book timed test validly assesses critical thinking skills…the ability to locate and synthesize and analyze information to make an informed judgment.
She went on to state that she had a lot of respect for someone who says “Let me do some research on that, some thinking about it and get back to you.”
- I never really put it in those terms, however, it makes sense; in the everchanging work environment, people need to know how to use the Internet, find articles/research and form conclusions.
I take a while to compose; people describe me as thinking things through, being contemplative and being thorough when it comes to my projects. While I have a deadline for my project, and multiple mini deadlines within, all deadlines will be shifting for one reason or another and I find that another skill I need to learn is flexibility.
I am an adult learner because I want to learn, as is the case with most adult learners. Adults are learning because they have an interest in the subject or it is a required course by their job ( credits needed or self advancement); in either case they are there because they want to be (self enrichment or work requirement).
Within that flexibility, is learning how to know where to go to get what you need; whether it is research for school or research for work.
When I developed the Call Center Training program it became a 21 day training program. At the end the learners had to pass with 80%, a 110 question assessment - it was open book, all six of their books! An evaluation is sent to their Supervisors 45 days after training to see how they are doing on the job, and, if there are any concerns or issues. An evaluation is also sent at the same time to the learner/employee with those same questions. The open book assesment is not cheating it is to help them know that the information covered in classes and need for their job is there, they just need to know where to go to get what they need.
September 2nd, 2008 at 1:53 pm
Great food for thought in this podcast.
It raises some questions for me.
Why not just use the usual written assignments for assessments rather than relying on tests and quizzes?
Why not reat tests as learning strategies rather than as assessments? I find that learners are more motivated to locate information if they believe they are being tested. They can be great learning tools.
September 2nd, 2008 at 6:18 pm
After 12 years of guiding under- and postgrad- students in learning about business techniques and topics for a local university campus, I found myself rejecting the conventional approach to assessment in spite of the university requirement for “equivalence”.
The approach proposed by Rena and Keith in this excellent podcast strikes a strong chord with me as it has many parallels with the teaching and assessment strategy I developed over these years.
I have never believed that the work associated with assessment for student or teacher from quiz and test techniques can be justified, particularly in a community of mature students. I always attempted to make assessment an integral part of the learning process, and I found this achieved three things:
1. The assignments became “real work.”
2. Students were encouraged (indeed found it necessary) to become self critical and to seek tutorial guidance on the quality of their work in progress.
3. As I implemented this progressively the number of outstanding grades I awarded increased. The number of marginal and fail grades did not change much.
The reference to case study methods is a major point of connection, and very natural for an MBA graduate like me. It is a teaching strategy I have used for 25 years, researching and writing my own case studies to explore specific issues.
The last course I taught was about government interactions with business and I described it as “discovery learning” where the students did the discovery and their learning emerged from the process. Virtually all the resources were internet websites, and the discovery process required students to hone their ability to distinguish between fact, opinion and propaganda. They had no choice but to support their conclusions. Their assignments became part of the teaching for other students. Peer assessment was far more savage on poor work that I would have been. Plagiarism was easy to identify and manage, using “Turnitin”.
I always set a group assignment that forced groups to learn to manage a multicultural and multi-language work group. They hated it at first but at the end rated it a great learning experience This is consistent with Rena and Keith’s comments on social presence.
It may be my background as a management consultant and trainer working in a field where compulsion is impossible, persuasion is everything, and student self- assessment is the only real assessment, that led me to this way of dealing with the issue.
Rena and Keith are right, and I wish them well in their efforts to change the teaching-learning paradigm.
September 3rd, 2008 at 10:23 pm
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September 22nd, 2008 at 6:55 pm
Kia ora tatou!
The speakers highlighted a real issue in relation to fostering critical thinking skills, never mind introducing the ideas associated. That was to do with openness, that’s so important.
This is a huge problem, even in a classroom environment. The put downs that occur, in the classroom, in the committee room, in the staff room, in the family lounge and the playground are all factors that modify the way critical thinking is learned by those potential exponents of it.
Critical thinking is not often fostered - in ANY community. I believe that fostering it online is great and should be pursued. But let’s walk-the-talk when it comes to the classroom, the committee room, the staff room, and perhaps critical thinking skills may also be fostered in the family lounge and in the playground too.
Ka kite
from Middle-earth