Postgraduate Course: Assessing Students (EDUA11176)
Course Outline
| School | Moray House School of Education and Sport |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Not available to visiting students |
| SCQF Credits | 10 |
ECTS Credits | 5 |
| Summary | The twin starting-points for this unit are on the one hand the myriad and competing purposes, goals and functions associated with the assessment of student progress and performance in higher education, and on the other the advent of mass higher education, where questions of quality, accountability, student-centredness and economy further complicate considerations of goals and functions. Participants will be invited to relate these challenges to consideration of which stakeholders university teachers are accountable to, and in what respects, as far as their assessment practices are concerned.
The tensions between contrasting assessment goals and functions and the available empirical evidence will be reviewed by means of three illustrative themes: the relative extent of alignment or congruence between different methods and strategies of assessment and intended learning outcomes; the growing evidence on the benefits of formative or learning-oriented assessment; and the impact of developments in assessment practices (largely but not wholly technology-driven), which can open up opportunities to strike new balances between competing goals but also prompt a reappraisal of traditional assumptions about student assessment.
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| Course description |
Not entered
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Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
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Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Course Delivery Information
| Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- review and critically appraise the principal goals and functions of student assessment in higher education
- identify and evaluate the empirical evidence on the competing tensions to which these may give rise
- critically examined the balances which can be struck between these tensions in designing and implementing assessment strategies
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Reading List
Bloxham, S., & Campbell, L. (2010). Generating dialogue in assessment feedback. Assessment &
Evaluation in Higher Education, 35(3), 291-300.
Hounsell, D., McCune, V., Hounsell, J., & Litjens, J. (2008). The quality of guidance and feedback
to students. Higher Education Research & Development, 27(1), 55-67.
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Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
Cognitive skills
Students gain experience critically evaluating current practice and using relevant research literature in designing enhancements
Communication, numeracy and IT
Students will gain experience of communicating their critique of current practice and their rationale for change in a persuasive manner.
Autonomy, accountability and working with others
There is a presumption that students will apply their critiques to a real work situation they are dealing with and that they will be intending to carry out the changes they propose.
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| Additional Class Delivery Information |
Two full days of face-to-face teaching. |
| Keywords | assessment,feedback,student learning |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Neil Lent
Tel: (0131 6)51 7199
Email: N.Lent@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Emily Salvesen
Tel: (0131 6)51 6661
Email: Emily.Salvesen@ed.ac.uk |
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