Assessment drives the knowledge networking approach: whenever designing or implementing the use of a Web 2.0 application in your teaching, think about how its direct (or indirect) assessment might motivate students, demonstrate to them the value of what you ask them to do, and also increase their attention on (and learning from) the task. Integrate innovative approaches within the entire assessment design for your units of study.
The importance of assessment
Good university teaching and learning is intimately bound up with the need for good assessment practices. The founding principles which should influence our use of the tools and technologies of learning in knowledge networks are that:
- Assessment is a primary motivator of student learning behaviour whether those students are intrinsically or extrinsically motivated to study.
- Assessment is always about learning: students learn by doing assignments, not by doing something else and then being assessed.
- Assessment must combine scholarly / academic work which meets the needs of the university; creative and engaging short activities during the course of a unit of study; and realistic versions of the work that is to be done by graduates after they finish studying.
Motivation matters, not just because of the desire to succeed in learning, but also simply because students will not even undertake, or not take seriously, learning activities unless they are motivated to do so. Assessment of activities helps to provide (though is not of itself sufficient) a crucial motivator for students. Remember, however, that assessment does not just mean ‘thinking about marks’: students are, on the whole, more clever than that. While often motivated by the extrinsic driver of achieving a good mark (or simply passing a unit of study), they are also intrinsically motivated by their sense of what is important in a unit. Those activities and tasks that academics assess tend therefore to appear more valuable and important than the ones that are not.
Students’ views on assessment
Broadly speaking, students expect
- fairness
- recognition of effort
- clarity of expectations of staff
- competitiveness
In other words, students want individual excellence differentially rewarded, where excellence is both about process and result (trying hard is as valuable as achieving well, even if recognised differently), but they also want a sense of equity. Essentially, I think students’ knowledge of assessment is driven by game-like behavioural norms – it’s competitive and some will do better than others, but everyone must play by the rules and the rules must create a level playing field. (with thanks to Chris Rust).
Concerns about assessment as a driver
We should not be overly enthusiastic about the role of assessment in motivating students to learn, however. While it is true that many students are driven by the need to achieve results through assessment, and thus attend most closely to, and learn most while doing, assessment, it is also the case that the anxiety around assessment, and competitive behaviour, can disinhibit learning. The desire to do well can overwhelm the need to learn (as for example in the case of plagiarism for fear of ‘failing’). The fear of doing badly can prevent a student from actually learning. Competitiveness can inhibit otherwise valid and useful group work.
While assessment-as-driver is an important idea, it does also embody certain qualities of capitalist economics in which the value of something is determined by the price in the market. The marks available effectively become the marker of value, in the same way that price does, regardless of either intrinsic value, or value to the individual concerned. One aspect of online knowledge production to explore is the fact that the Internet, more than most other media, is governed by different economic models, such as gifting. While gifting is not altruistic, it is not the direct exchange of capitalism. Thus, students might well be motivated to learn by the opportunity to contribute, as much as what they might ‘get out’ of the assessment directly.
Finally, assessment always contradicts the teacher’s capacity to collaborate with students, to some extent, for it brings into explicit focus the power relationships of student and assessor. The partnership of learning is suspened, at least for a while, until the assignments are marked. It is, essentially, a test of the degree to which the student and teacher have worked well together – for it the result is not as expected, then both feel let down.
Key resources on assessment practices
Assessment Futures website (by Professor Dave Boud)
Professor Chris Rust, Oxford Brookes, has an outstanding record of research and analysis on assessment, and his papers are available here
To show how assessment has always been a key focus, read Brown and Glasner (eds). 1999. Assessment Matters in Higher Education: Choosing and Using Diverse Approaches (Open University Press).
