Re-Engineering Assessment Practices in Scottish Higher Education
Faculty of Education: Educational & Professional Studies
The Faculty of Education redesigned the 1st year Educational Studies module Learners & Learning (ED111) which enrols 170 students each year, in order to address issues with student engagement, standardisation in approaches to formative assessment and alignment of formative and summative activities. Modelled in part on the Department of Psychology's redesign, the class implemented collaborative techniques and principles of social constructivism to increase student engagement with tasks and content; facilitate greater and more timely feedback; improve pacing and time on task; and remove an end of module marking burden from staff. The results of the completed redesign can be found by following the links below:
At a Glance
| Department: | Educational & Professional Studies |
| Class/Course: | Learners & Learning (ED111) |
| Students: | 170 |
| Technology: | e-portfolio |
| Assessment Activities: | E-portfolio software used to support group tasks and peer and self assessment activities. |
| Efficiencies: | Significant reduction in staff time spent on assessment Potential for reduction in tutorials next semester will save further 32 hours. License cost of £4 per student per annum. |
| Learning Gains: | Significant gain in overall exam mark (+10.4 %) compared to 2005/06 diet. "Compared with previous iterations of this course I would say that the evidence is that they are more motivated. They have been more committed. They’ve certainly shown evidence of being a lot more of a level of doing the work throughout the course than they ever did before." Tutor comment. |
Initial Planning
- Project Proposal (May 2006)
Principles in Practice
- Principles in Practice (June 2007)
Summary Report
- Summary Report (June 2007)
Evaluation Report
- Evaluation Report (June 2007)
Staff Involved
- Magnus Ross [m.b.ross 'at' strath.ac.uk]
- Mary Welsh [mary.welsh 'at' strath.ac.uk]