whalley shu-talk-final

Masterchef, GBB-O and Tom

vs

Mr Gove and Captain Najork:

some thoughts onEducation and Assessment

Brian Whalley

Monday, 16 September 13


vsMr Gove and Captain Najork:



vsMr Gove and Captain Najork:

some thoughts onEducation and Assessment


Personalising HE for students -

Towards better education by integration of tasks, activities,

achievements and feedbackin a time of mass education


Personalising HE for students -

Towards better education by integration of tasks, activities,

achievements and feedbackin a time of mass education

(and give value for money)


On the road - links and ideas

• Mr Stobart’s fine transport system– personalised tractive units

• Hayton Coulthard• Fagan and Whalley

Mass Education and Bulk Transport

Image: Khuene + Nahel


On the road - links and ideas

• Mr Stobart’s fine transport system– personalised tractive units

• Hayton Coulthard• Fagan and Whalley

Khuene + Nagel = bulk transport of Philosophy of Science?

Mass Education and Bulk Transport

Image: Khuene + Nahel


Thomas Nagel

‘What is it like to be a bat?’The Philosophical Review 83 (1974); 435-50

Reductionist - Scientism etc


Thomas Nagel

‘What is it like to be a bat?’The Philosophical Review 83 (1974); 435-50

Reductionist - Scientism etc

But we should explore......

‘What is it like to be a student?’

Because I think ‘we’ have forgotten in an age of ‘massification’


What is it like to be a student?(with apologies to Chiroptera and Thomas Nagel)

Higher Education Challenge

Original Image: BBC


Higher Education

Website Image: Guardian


Higher Education

We think we might knowNot the same as what students

(or their parents)

expect from a degree

Thinking ≠ lectures + (unseen) exam

Website Image: Guardian


Learning experiences ....NOT: ‘pile ‘em high and lecture ‘em long’and then examine them!

Image: Wikipedia Image: Unknown source


Learning experiences ....NOT: ‘pile ‘em high and lecture ‘em long’and then examine them!

Sage on the stage from this; the lecture?

The Name of the Rose - Umberto Eco (The Sage of Bologna)

‘The Sage of the Page’

Image: Wikipedia Image: Unknown source


'You know what a learning experience is? A learning experience is one of those things

that says, 'You know that thing you just did? Don't do that.’

(Douglas N Adams 'The Salmon of Doubt', p274)

Image: Wikipedia





So what do we do? Image: Wikipedia





Use UUE - Unreal University ExistenceGive ‘em exams - which students don’t like,These aren’t RLEs* (usually - but can approximate)Are not experiential (mostly)And students don’t do well at them

And we never seem to ask why not?








How to avoid the panic?








How to avoid the panic?

So what do we do?

* RLE - Real Learning Experiences (employability)

Image: Wikipedia


Heading towards .... ?

• ‘Achievement’ how do we measure this?

• The 2i student

(>50% of students with >59% overall marks)

• A 2 hour exam and a 1500 word essay

What Mr Gove means by ‘rigour’ ?

who also doesn’t like ‘continuous assessment’

• What do we deliver for a module of 10,

20 or 30 credits? (and how to assess?)Monday, 16 September 13

Personalised learningHigh quality teaching and learning

Target setting and tracking

Focused assessment

Intervention

Pupil grouping

The learning environment

Curriculum organisation

The extended curriculum, and

Supporting children’s wider needs DfE ‘Personalised Learning- A Practical Guide’ 2008


Active Learning(and learning spaces)

Images: Brian Whalley


Assessment +feedback


The ‘connoisseur approach’ to assessment



The ‘connoisseur approach’ to assessment

They want ‘the higheststandards’ - achievements

How do competitors know they have achieved?

Criteria Set – doing cookingFeedback – comments (and faces from Monica)



Or Tom vs Captain Najork

You win by ‘messing around’ rather than learning the Nautical Almanack

Image: Quentin Blake (Red Fox)


Images: Quentin Blake (Red Fox)


Image: Brokensymphony


Module Planning Hmmm…..

I think we do this too often





Constructive Alignment the underpinning concept behind the requirements for programme specification, declarations of Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

and assessment criteria –





Constructive Alignment the underpinning concept behind the requirements for programme specification, declarations of Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

and assessment criteria –

Criterion Based AssessmentImage: Brokensymphony


Assessment criteria

are descriptions of what the learner has to do in order to demonstrate that the learning outcomes have been achieved.

[threshold standard; minimum expectation to achieve credit]

Show students how the mark given was achieved

Dumbing down?


Students do not perform well:

If they have social problemsIf they have financial problemsIf they have housing problems etc

If they hate examsIf they don’t have good ‘memories’If they have special needsIf they are ‘detail’ people and need general

view (and vice-versa)If their first language is not English etc


Kathy Sierra

headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/11/why_does_engine.html


http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/11/why_does_engine.html

http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/11/why_does_engine.html

Student Engagement

Hu and Kuh (2001, p. 3) “the quality of effort students themselves devote to educationally purposeful activities that contribute directly to desired outcomes”.

.... focuses on the extent to which students are engaging in activities which higher education research has shown to be linked with high quality learning outcomes.

Kerri-Lee Krause and Hamish Coates


What the best college teachers do (Ken Bain, Harvard UP 2004)

What big questions will my course help students answer?

What reasoning abilities must students have/develop?

What mental models are students likely to bring with them?

What information will my students need to understand?

How can I help students have difficulty understanding questions?

How will I confront my students with conflicting problems?

How will I find out what they know already?

How will I help students learn to learn?.......


6 Competenciesstudents need to gain

Competence – encouragement by challenge and remarks to achieve skills levels

Confidence – promoting remarks to show themselves, and others, their achievements

Critical thinking – which is what we have been wanting all along in 'Thinking skills’, used in problem solving

Creativity – in what students do and how they do it

Collaboration – bringing in team-working and ethics

Commonality – of purpose, to achieve specified (and unspecified) objectives

Curtiosity – which is more than curiosity.

Marcia Mentkowski Mihály Csíkszentmihályi


Feedback(

Assess(

Reflect(

Person

alize(

Contextualize(

Collaborate(

Engage(

Connect(Inform(

Outcomes(

Tutor Contact

Tutor facilitation

Peer moderation

Social/Professional Context

Personal Context

Reflection

Assessment

Feedback

Learning Materials

Objec?ves(

Simon Atkinson’s SOLE project

Student-Owned Learning-Engagement ModelImage: Simon Atkinson


Atkinson’s amplified Bloom (domain) taxonomy

Image: Simon Atkinson


Atkinson’s amplified Bloom (domain) taxonomy

Domains – Knowledge structures, from knowing facts to thinking skills

Image: Simon Atkinson


Feedback and Feedforward in a control system sense

Do ‘exams’ provide a reference input (or even output?)A MCQ might do this. Criterion Referencing might too.


Educational ‘ramp up’

To raise the level of ‘attainment’We need controlled input, ramping up.

– Output, achievement, results





attainment





attainment

EeEe Marks, no remarks for

Exam events





attainment


Exam events

Ese Ee Delayed marks and remarks forEssay event





attainment


Exam events

Ese Ee Delayed marks and remarks forEssay event

TTask set with CriterionReferenced assessment


Also ‘Grade Descriptors’

• These are from the tutor’s point of view.• How do students know how to achieve

designated grades?• How does ‘feedback’ help with this

process?• How are standards maintained? Eg by

various markers?‘I know a 2:1 when I see it; understanding criteria for

degree classification in franchised university programmes’ Ecclestone, K. (2001) Journal of Further and Higher Education 25: 301-313


Assessment and Feedback,Engagement and Competencies


Image: BBC


Assessment and Feedback,Engagement and Competencies

How do we do things better,from the students’ point of view?


Image: BBC


Follow-up references:

Atkinson, S. P. (2010). Embodied and embedded theory in practice: The student-owned learning-engagement (SOLE) model. The International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 12(2), 1-18.

Bain, K. 2004, What the best college teachers do. Harvard University Press

Hoban, R. and Blake Q. 1974. How Tom beat Captain Najork and his hired sportsmen. Jonathan Cape, Red Fox

Krause, K-L and Coates, H. 2008, Students’ Engagement in First-year University, Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 33(5).

Sierra, K. Headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/11/why_does_engine.html


http://ng_passionate_users/2006/11/why_does_engine.html


