Instructors often state that they provide lots of feedback but to little effect. This session will explore some of the reasons why this may happen and outline options for engaging students with assessment and feedback. In particular, providing choice, opportunities to apply feedback and cultivating trust are all known to encourage students to engage with the assessment processes.

Instructors often state that they provide lots of feedback but to little effect. This session will explore some of the reasons why this may happen and outline options for engaging students with assessment and feedback. In particular, providing choice, opportunities to apply feedback and cultivating trust are all known to encourage students to engage with the assessment processes.

Quality feedback (i) recognises what is good (ii) identifies limitations and (iii) suggests how the work could be improved. Shifting feedback responsibility from instructors to learners. Self-assessment & peer-assessment

Quality feedback (i) recognises what is good (ii) identifies limitations and (iii) suggests how the work could be improved. Shifting feedback responsibility from instructors to learners. Self-assessment & peer-assessment

While presenting learners with the assessment criteria and standards is good practice - they don’t necessarily result in learners developing a good understanding of the criteria and standard. This session explores the importance of dialogue around assessment and how a shared understanding of assessment requirements can be developed by applying rubrics to exemplars.

While presenting learners with the assessment criteria and standards is good practice - they don’t necessarily result in learners developing a good understanding of the criteria and standard. This session explores the importance of dialogue around assessment and how a shared understanding of assessment requirements can be developed by applying rubrics to exemplars.

When we present students with unfamiliar assessment formats, it can be difficult for them to work out what is expected of them and more difficult on occasions for them to recognise what kind of work is good enough to match required standards. If we are able to show rather than just tell them what we are looking for, they are more likely to achieve higher standards. Exemplars are a well-established means of helping students get the hang of new-to-them assessment genres and can save a lot of anguish on both sides.

Students, especially those from diverse cultural backgrounds, often find the first assignment on a course really challenging, particularly if they are ‘first in family’ to go to university and may therefore have a limited understanding of what is likely to be expected of them. It therefore pays dividends if staff put resources and energy into helping students get to know the rules of the game. Students may be able to successfully manage the unfamiliarity of new learning contexts and classroom environments that are very different to what they have experienced before. However, they can’t avoid the need to be successful in assessment if they are to progress. It’s part of our job therefore to help students overcome any uneasiness, and the best way to do this is to demystify the process and give them stress-free opportunities to practice the competencies they eventually need to demonstrate to meet the learning outcomes

Many authors (including Nicol, 2010 and Carless, 2013) suggest that good feedback should always be a dialogue, not a monologue from tutors. Students can become very good at self-assessing their work, but usually don’t have the opportunity to fine-tune their self-assessment and need feedback to help them on their way. If we just ask: ‘try to work out what your mark or grade is?’ they’re likelyvto just guess, and then probably forget what they guessed. While some students might select a grade close to that which you gave them, studies show that ‘high achievers’ underestimate their abilities and the majority of under-achievers will overestimate their mark. Research shows (Clouder, Broughan, Jewell & Steventon, 2012) that this trend is retained across different nationalities but interestingly, students form different nationalities can also have different perspectives of their abilities. Therefore, we need to educate students about making assessment judgements against well-expressed criteria, just as we try to do when we assess their work.