Day 1: Innovation in assessment.

This week, we will be looking at innovative approaches to assessment – particularly (though not exclusively) those involving technology.

Many staff are already starting to use tools such as Turnitin, Questionmark and My Dundee’s assignment tool for online submission / grading, but this week we’ll be looking at other tools, both those that we have within the University, perhaps in ways that you may not have used them before, and other freely available tools.

The plan for the week is :

• Tuesday – individual students. For example, could we replace a written reflection with a video reflection.
• Wednesday – group assessements. For example, creating a group blog – rather than a shared written report.
• Thursday – whole class. For example, creating a wiki page not an essay; however, as it’s a wiki, all students can see what others have done.
• Friday – how can we involve students. For example, peer evaluations of assessment artefacts.

There will, of course, be overlaps between all of these!

To start, though, what experiences do you have with anything that you feel is an innovative use of technology in assessment. It doesn’t matter if others have already tried it – we’re looking at what’s an innovation to you. Are there barriers in place to you implementing ideas you’ve read about elsewhere?

You may find the following article useful to get a broader view of the issues.

Bennett, S., Dawson, P., Bearman, M., Molloy, E., & Boud, D. (2017). How technology shapes assessment design: Findings from a study of university teachers: How technology shapes assessment design. British Journal of Educational Technology, 48(2), 672–682. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjet.12439

Do you know of others you could share with this group?