By the end of this unit you should be able to:
Explore strategic approaches to assessment that support learning and measure achievement.
Assessment serves dual purposes in university education: supporting student learning through feedback and measuring achievement for grading. Effective assessment strategies balance these functions, using formative approaches to guide learning and summative methods to evaluate outcomes fairly and transparently.
This unit covers assessment design principles, rubric construction, peer and self-assessment implementation, feedback strategies, and academic integrity maintenance. You'll learn to create assessment systems that promote learning while ensuring fair evaluation.
Formative assessments (quizzes, draft submissions) offer ongoing feedback and guide learning, while summative assessments (final exams, graded projects) evaluate cumulative achievement. A balanced assessment strategy leverages formative checkpoints to scaffold success in summative tasks.
Categorize assessment activities by their primary purpose:
For learning & feedback
For grading & certification
In a 12-week course, what's the optimal formative:summative assessment ratio?
Clear rubrics define performance criteria and levels of achievement, enhancing consistency and transparency. A well-constructed rubric includes descriptors for quality indicators (e.g., "Logical structure," "Code accuracy") and aligns directly with learning outcomes.
Design a rubric for evaluating student research presentations:
| Criteria | Excellent (4) | Good (3) | Satisfactory (2) | Needs Improvement (1) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Content Knowledge | ||||
| Organization | ||||
| Delivery |
Complete the rubric to see quality assessment.
A student's presentation shows good content but poor organization. Using your rubric, how would you score them?
Engaging learners in evaluating their own or peers' work promotes metacognition and responsibility. Structured formats—checklists, guided reflection questions—help maintain objectivity and foster critical insight into disciplinary standards.
Create a peer assessment activity for collaborative group projects:
Select all options to generate the peer assessment form.
Learning Process Reflection:
Quality Self-Evaluation:
Students complain that peer feedback is too lenient or biased. What's your best strategy?
Effective feedback is timely, specific, and balanced: identify strengths ("Your algorithm explanation was precise") and areas for improvement ("Consider adding a visual example"). Incorporating "feed-forward" suggestions helps learners understand how to achieve higher standards in future work.
Practice writing effective feedback using established frameworks:
Student's Research Proposal Abstract:
"This research will study social media and learning. Students use Facebook and Twitter for school. Some studies show it helps, others say it hurts. I will survey 100 students about their social media use and grades. The survey will have 20 questions and take 10 minutes. This is important because technology is changing education."
Select a feedback framework to see the template.
You have 50 assignments to grade and one week deadline. How do you prioritize feedback quality?
Preventing misconduct involves educating learners on proper citation practices, designing authentic assessment tasks that resist rote copying, and utilising detection tools judiciously. Clear communication of integrity policies and honour codes reinforces ethical scholarship.
Develop a comprehensive approach to promoting academic integrity:
Educational Approaches:
Assignment Design:
Detection & Response:
Prevention Score: 0/9
Select strategies to build your academic integrity plan.
Key Message: "Academic integrity supports learning and maintains the value of your degree."
Positive Framing: Focus on ethical scholarship rather than just punishment.
Resources: Provide citation guides and writing center contacts.
You suspect a student has plagiarized but aren't completely certain. What's your first step?
Test your understanding of assessment principles:
1. The primary purpose of formative assessment is to:
2. A well-designed rubric should include:
3. Peer assessment is most effective when:
4. Effective feedback should be:
5. The best approach to preventing plagiarism is: