Abstract:

Feedback relies on being able to make a judgement which in turn relies on having good evidence. This suggests that the judgement we make about student learning and understanding and the feedback we can provide relies on the quality of evidence an assessment task provides. In this paper we discuss a formative student-determined assessment comprising a set of six tasks in which student-groups set, undertake, mark, provide feedback and evaluate an authentic assessment. The assessment was introduced to postgraduate students with the objective of enhancing student engagement, deepening learning, and strengthening problem solving and critical thinking skills. Taken together the tasks provide several different views and perspectives of student understanding, some of which can seem contradictory, but in fact, provide a more nuanced view thereof.

From a teaching point of view, this assessment has highlighted some very important aspects relating to how one makes judgements related to student understanding. Assessment-as-learning (LOA) has the potential to provide multiple different perspectives of student understanding to the lecturer, allowing a more effective way to measure a student’s success in learning and informing better quality feedback. By involving students in the assessment as required by LOA, a lecturer has access to at least two different indications of student understanding – their work and through their engagement as an assessor in some way. The greater the student involvement, the more perspectives created. The individual pieces of evidence of student understanding when considered in isolation support a particular result or judgement, but when all evidence is considered in relation to each other (triangulated) a more nuanced and accurate picture emerges. We found instances where apparent initial good performance was not a total reflection of student understanding, and as the tasks progressed and different evidence could be considered, misunderstandings or surface learning were exposed. In some instances, the tasks perpetuated misunderstanding or perhaps even fuelled the misconception, reinforcing student views of understanding. Feedback to the students, therefore, becomes important in surfacing and addressing such misconceptions.

We believe that the benefits of LOA reported in the literature undersell the potential for triangulation of evidence of student understanding within one assessment task and the richness of feedback to the lecturer and the learning this supports. This enhanced evidence of understanding allows lecturers to pick up on misunderstandings and misconceptions and both provide the feedback to the students holding these, as well as adjust for how these aspects are taught later in a course or programme or for the next cohort of students. From a lecturer-assessor point of view, it enabled a more complete and nuanced view of student performance enriching feedback provided.

Keywords:

Learning-Oriented-Assessment, feedback, student understanding, assessment.