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students may know that
they are not learning but
be unable to say just
why not. Formative
assessment can help
them understand what
they struggle with most.
With our guidance they
may be able to translate
that into more intelligent
study habits.
On the other hand,
summative assessment is
critical when we want to
prove that what we are
doing really works. No
matter how much we
tweak the teaching and
learning process, the
real arbiter of our
success is whether
students ultimately
learned what they
needed to learn. When
we want to assess the
outcome, not just the
process, then summative
assessment is what we
need. As Robert Stakes
said, “When the cook
tastes the soup, that’s
formative; when the
guests taste the soup,
that’s summative.”
P
eople assess
student learning
for different reasons at
different times.
Sometimes the point is to
measure and document
the success of our
courses. Other times, we
are trying to get
immediate feedback
about how things are
going so far. (We plan
on making – if you’ll
pardon the pun – mid-
course corrections.) In the
terminology of
assessment, the first is
summative assessment
and the second is
formative assessment.
Summative assessment
sums up all that the
students have learned. It
usually occurs towards
the end of the course,
when we can best
decide how complete
the students’ learning has
been. There were things
you wanted your
students to be able to do
by semester’s end: can
they do them now? That
is the key question.
Formative assessment
helps to form your
teaching approach. You
try to find out what is
working for students and
what isn’t. It’s important
to do it early enough in
the semester that you
can adapt immediately
to what you discover.
You may find yourself
assessing just one critical
step in the student
learning process, instead
of trying to measure an
entire learning outcome.
Effective formative
assessment doesn’t just
give feedback to the
teacher, it also gives it to
the learner. Without it,
Cooking up the Proper Assessment Methods
Important Dates MARCH 9
- SPRING INSERVICE. CONSULTANT ROBBIE TEAHAN IN SESSION
APRIL 10-
HLC VISIT ADVICE 2
ADJUNCT CORNER 2
LEARNINGS LAUGHS AND LESSONS
3
CAAP RESULTS 4
SIMPLE CHANGES TO 4 NAVIGATE THE ASSESS- MENT FOLDER
Inside this issue:
January 2006
by Kevin Megill
A
t the Faculty Workshop on October 25 th, President George Mihel opened the day with words of advice for us all as we prepare for the Focus Visit in April. An experienced HLC visit team member himself, he suggested three things that he expects the HLC visit team to look for in a successful assessment program:
1. Dialogue: We need to
be ready to demonstrate to the HLC visitors that we are
talking to each other about what we are learning about ourselves and our students.
2. Multiple paths: We
need to be ready to demonstrate that we are taking multiple approaches to assessment.
3. Identified change: We
need to be ready to show that as a result of assessment data, change is taking place in our classrooms. The Core Team believes the system is set up to allow for all of these qualities to be
present. The question is whether you as an individual instructor are aware of them and ready to illustrate their presence in your own participation. If you can’t identify one of these in your own experience, please contact your Area Facilitator or a Core Team member so we can “dialogue.”
course outlines written up for just about every course here at Sauk. However, like many of us cleaning out a closet, once the task is done we don’t think about keeping the closet clean until it needs to be done again. Many of the course outlines haven’t been updated in ten years! And yes courses have evolved and ideas about language use in terms of assessment have also changed. During the In-Service day on Oct. 25th, the Full-Time Professors spent most of the day going over course outlines to make sure they still adequately reflect the course. They also went over course syllabi to make sure they follow the campus syllabi template and to make sure student-centered outcomes are on the syllabi. Basically the course outline should be flexible enough to accommodate multiple
I
worked for Seward County Community College, in Liberal, KS before moving here. If I had stayed there, I would have had to write course outlines for my classes. What was I doing in my classroom and how would I assess it? When I moved here and didn’t hear much about outlines or assessment, I was relieved to think the “Full- Timers” had that responsibility covered. And for the most part they had wonderful
instructors for most courses. The syllabus is also where very specific assessments are matched up to the outcome language. Are you in a panic yet? Well for most Adjuncts there is a full-time faculty member who spent the entire in-service day on Oct 25th^ looking over outlines and syllabi. They have put a lot of work into ensuring “alignment” for the Spring semester for their courses. At the Spring 06 Adjunct In-service in January, we will be given instructions on where to go to look up outlines and full-time syllabi. Hopefully many of us will be able to cut and paste syllabi outcomes and tweak some assessment language on our syllabi. It is hoped that Adjuncts will have outcomes and assessments on our syllabi by Fall 06.
President Mihel Shares HLC Visit Advice
Outcomes?
Adjunct Corner
By Roberta White
“WHAT WAS I
DOING IN MY
CLASSROOM,
AND HOW
WOULD I ASSESS
IT?”
T
he results of the CAAP test from Fall 2005 have been compiled and a
report is now available from the Welcome page in the assessment folder.
We tested 341 students and administered 609 tests during the PSY 100 classes.
Thanks to Alan Pfeifer for analyzing all of this information and assembling the
results into a usable format. Also, thanks to all the test proctors that helped during
the testing process.
To view the report, use your desktop link to the Welcome page or open
http://intserver.svcc.edu/assessment/Welcome.doc in Microsoft Word. The user
name is “guest” and the password is “account”. Select the link for “CAAP report”.
This round of testing allowed us to establish base score values to compare to
the results these same students will achieve after completing 45 hours at Sauk. At
this time, the results only compare this group of scores to national norms. Please
review this information and email any comments regarding test results or test ad-
ministration to the General Education Subcommittee at mcphers@svcc.edu. We
still need to determine a method for testing students in the Spring semester after
they have completed 45 hours.
CAAP Test Report Information
By Steve McPherson
Simple Changes in Microsoft Word Ease Assessment
Folder Navigation
At a recent Faculty Discussion hour, Jane Hamilton shared a couple of
simple tips for making navigation of the Assessment folder a snap!
Annoyed at always having to hold down the CTRL key in order to follow
links? You can disable this feature by doing the following:
1. With Word open, click on the TOOLS menu
2. Select OPTIONS
3. Select EDIT
4. Deselect Use CTRL+Click to follow hyperlink
Now you can follow a link with a simple click!
A second great tip Jane shared was a shortcut to quickly close
all open windows you’ve visited in the Assessment folder.
Navigate to the taskbar at the bottom of the screen. You’ll see
a button showing the number of files currently open. Simply
right-click on this group and select “Close Group” from the
shortcut menu. All windows will close at once.
Contact Jane at extension 224 if you have any questions on these tips.
