Assessment for eLearning - Week 7

My final project was up early in the week, so I have had the pleasure of receiving feedback from a number of peers. Everyone has made great suggestions, from my images to my objectives. I'm working to take those suggestions and work with my gut instinct to make improvements to the final project.

Completing this project helped me to see that carefully designing your learning objectives before creating the assignments and assessments will really help to drive learning. I've heard it all before, but that was the first time I have really tried to drive the activities and assessments by the objectives.

One of my focuses with this module was to create a more student centered, constructivist module. Prior to the redesign, students read a "lecture" I wrote about information source types, then answered very low level quiz questions on information source types, then went out and found examples. The new approach gives students a number of resources, and asks them to research one information source type, then create a presentation for their peers. By the end of the module, students will have viewed all presentations, created a concept map, complete a quiz (which now focuses on higher order thinking skills) and engaged in a discussion where they determine and defend the appropriate information source type to consult.

This was quite an undertaking, but by far the most difficult part for me was creating the concept map over, and over, and over, and over. I guess I am not that good at transferring what's in my head onto a concept map for others to understand!

"Arriving at one goal is the starting point to another."

-John Dewey

There couldn't be a quote more fitting as I moved on to reviewing the products of my peers. I've enjoyed seeing what my peers have produced, if for no other reason than to give me more ideas of activities I can do with my students. Buffy and Maureen have designed projects that are very much like what I have my students do at the conclusion of the course, with the exception that my students must somehow connect their project to history, and they are allowed to present their information as a research paper or a historical fiction piece (short story or short movie). Kelly Anne's project looks at a piece of historical fiction through the lens of capturing the author's voice. This will also help me as I work with students through the creation of their final pieces. I will definitely be reliant on it to redesign some of the reading activities my students do.

My Final Project

Can be found here

Assessment for eLearning - Week 6

Cyber-Coaching Readings

Some of the ideas I took away from Petersen:

"The Cybercoaching model assumes that instructors and students have compatible online technology and word processing tools. " (Petersen, 2005) Prior to becoming a Google Apps school, I had to ask students to submit all work as an RTF document, that was I would be able to open it no matter what device I was using. Now, I don't need to worry about this, because students are asked to use their Google Apps account, which takes away from the "I don't have access to that tool" problem. Assuring that everyone has equitable access is really important in any classroom, but particularly important in a potentially global classroom. I keep thinking of Stephen, in China, who cannot access the Google products, and it is truly a shame!

"In the process of instruction, the instructor gets to know the learner’s weaknesses based on pre-stated objectives. The knowledge is formulated through consistent reflection centered on the objectives from the learner’s perspective." (Petersen, 2005) Again, reflection is vastly important to learning. Without it, we do not internalize what we knew, know and can know on any given subject.

Petersen, Naomi Jeffery. (2004). Cybercoaching: Rubrics, feedback, & metacognition, oh my! Paper presented at E.C. Moore Symposium on Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, Indiana University. February 25, 2005.

Discussions This Week

It is interesting to see the variety of levels amongst my peers when it comes to the idea of cyber-coaching. Perhaps it is because those in this course do not have an awful lot of experience in online learning that not many seem to use this method. I firmly believe, based on my interactions with peers, that many of my classmates would have made the transition to the cyber-coach, even without prompting.

Based on my post in the discussion forum, it is apparently clear that I have a passion for online learning, which is a nice take-away, because I really do. I never thought anyone would aspire to be anything like me, or want me to teach in their school, but this week and last has been a pretty good ego boost. It is always nice when your peer notice something in you and compliment you. I suppose that is one of the many reasons for utilizing peer feedback!

Final Project Update

I am in fairly good shape for content for the final project, I am in the process of combining some of the documents I have made to have less repetition on the pages. My biggest struggles are that I don't yet know how I want to present my final project, and that I feel like I need to actually build the module in my course. To me, a plan is not enough. I want to build every activity and assessment, video tutorials, and tip sheets, which causes me some undue strain. I know that this is my own demon, but I am struggling with it.

My Pre-Course Survey

Assessment for eLearning - Week 5

Rubrics

Sometimes I feel like I have ESP. Somehow I managed to talk about rubrics and how detailed they should be last week, and low and behold, here we are talking about them this week!

Mueller recommends providing descriptions for each point level awarded, which is one of the things I was struggling with last week. As Mueller points out, "it is very useful for the students and the teacher if the criteria are identified and communicated prior to completion of the task." (Mueller, 2002) I lean more to the side of providing as much detail as possible in the rubric after this weeks readings. This will help the student as they are working, as well as serve as a good reflective tool for them to evaluate their work prior to submission. Providing more detail will also help the instructor with assessment as it allows the rubric to be more objective and consistent, which, as Mueller points out, leads to "greater reliability and validity in the results."

On another note, I had never seen a holistic rubric before! At the high school level, I think an analytic rubric helps to pinpoint where the student needs work specifically.

Andrade gave me a two great ideas! the first is simple, use "I" statements in the rubric, which will help students connect the rubric with self assessment. The second is a little more complicated to explain. I have always used rubrics, and I have always asked my high school students to self assess using rubrics, but so often, I feel like they just picked a number and moved on. My original tactic was to award bonus points to students who self assessed within two points of my assessment, but my new technique will follow Andrade's tactic. Students will have to highlight or change the font color of their assignments to match assigned colors in the rubrics. In this way, students will be really self assessing and checking that they meet the requirements! Brilliant! It may be a little harder to do this with multimedia projects, but I am committed to adapting! I also took this idea two days ago and modified it. When students (very low level special ed students) were doing research, I gave them all 5 highlighters, one for each question they had to answer. I then had them read the first article they found and highlight the answer to the questions in the color that matched the question. It was like a total breakthrough for both myself and the students! (Andrade, 2000)

Andrade, H. G. (2000). Using Rubrics to Promote Thinking and Learning. Educational Leadership, 57(5), 13-18. Retrieved March 30, 2014, from http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/feb00/vol57/num05/Using-Rubrics-to-Promote-Thinking-and-Learning.aspx

Mueller, J. (2002, October 1). Rubrics (Authentic Assessment Toolbox). Retrieved March 30, 2014, from http://jfmueller.faculty.noctrl.edu/toolbox/rubrics.htm

Bloom's

I am so overwhelmed with verbs right now, my brain is about to explode. It's nice to see all of the different representations of verbs, but just a bit overwhelming! It is really hard to pinpoint where an activity falls on the taxonomy unless you use the proper verbs. Articulating what you really want students to do with learning objectives is very helpful, adding the appropriate verbs helps to drive the activities and assessments to the higher level.

I like the idea Bilyk has, of using the "presentation of information, followed by a case study in which students apply the information learned." It's definitely something I want to incorporate in my classes. Although it takes more work on the part of the instructor, the activity truly helps drive home the ideas and concepts students are learning.

Bilyk, R. (2012, June 8). Climbing Bloom's Taxonomy in Online Learning. Retrieved March 31, 2014, from http://lodestarlearning.com/samples/Bloom_Taxonomy/

Plagiarism

I don't even know what to say here. This topic is my favorite soapbox. I am on the Academic Integrity Committee in my building, and the un titled expert in my building. I created a video last year for all students in my building to view (though I seriously want to update it using PowToon now!). What more can you say than, if it wasn't yours, say who it came from? I have a very large issue with people who do not see using other's things without indicating their origin as a problem, particularly in the education profession when we are supposed to be modeling to our students. There are so many resources on plagiarism and copyright, I am amazed that schools do not do a yearly copyright workshop to protect themselves from lawsuits.

Peer Feedback

I love the process of peer feedback. It's nice to look at the work of others and get ideas and see how others approach an assignment. It also nice if people do not hold back and really offer helpful advice!

My Taxonomy Table

Can be found here