Abstract:

Higher order thinking, learning and performances are influenced by Higher Education, its curricula and assessment methods. However, Universities have ill-equipped graduate recruits, for the new demands placed on them by the working world as well as 4th industrial revolution discourse. It is pointed out that the technologies of the 4th industrial revolution is changing the way we live and work resulting to automation economy. Research show that despite the economy experiencing 450 000 vacancies for skilled graduates, 365 000 South African graduates are unemployed. The same sentiments reverberated by the director general of the British Chambers of Commerce (BCC), who stated that, today's learners often lack the personal skills, awareness and basic self-discipline that is essential in the workplace.

The aim of the study is to investigate the extent at which the skills and values are explicitly, systematically and adequately assessed in the lecturers’ assessment instruments using Bloom’s taxonomy as a theoretical framework. Bloom’s taxonomy is mostly used in course design as it provides rigorous framework for designing assessment tasks. This paper presents the doctoral work in progress and the conceptual paper. Studies on assessment of skills and values revealed that affective domain is the least applied and least understood of all Bloom’s Taxonomy trilogy. The researcher has not come across any literature or study and standardised instruments internationally and nationally that has investigated the explicitness, systematic and adequacy of assessing skills and values. This is the gap in literature this study intends to contribute.

Participants are 250 lecturers who attended a professional development programme on assessment over the past five years at a study university in South Africa. The question that arises is to what extent are the skills and values explicitly, systematically and adequately assessed at a University of Technology. To answer the latter, a mixed method approach will be used. The quantitative data will be collected by means of survey questionnaires and the qualitative data by means of semi-structured interviews and document analysis (exam papers, test papers and assignments). Qualitative data will be analysed using the ATLAS ti and quantitative data using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS).

Keywords:

Assessment, 4th industrial revolution, Blooms trilogy, higher education.