Assessment Tools
In their article, Brodie and Irving (2007) argue that regardless of the type of learning to set, educators need to ensure that students will grasp all the important characteristics of learning including how to be a successful learner, what to learn about, the validity of learning, and the analysis of learning they have already done. To be able to critically reflect on learning experiences, the participants of the educational process have to use a variety of assessment tools. Below, a few strategies for assessing both individual learner mastery and continuous quality improvement of the instruction will be addressed. In addition, the way critical reflection is beneficial for instructors and learners will be evaluated.
First, addressing the way assessment can be used for individual mastery, it is important to note that in today’s conditions of the workforce market, a new kind of employee is needed. Particularly, only the specialists, who have acquired numerous practical skills during learning at higher educational establishments, will get their due place in the world of labor. This thought finds its reflection in the article by Brodie and Irving, who states that “the skills and abilities needed on graduation by today’s students are the same as those of employees already in the workplace, who seek to manage and adapt to change and the demands of complex employment situations” (2007, p. 12). Thus, assessment tools used for individual mastery should help learners and the instructor see the level of corresponding of the acquired knowledge to the standards, set in the workplace conditions. Among such assessment tools are presentation, reflective interview, and reflective portfolio (Brodie & Irving, 2007). All of these assessment tools oblige learners to develop evidence that upholds their claims for learning.
Next, speaking about the role of assessment tools for continuous quality improvement of the instruction, it is necessary to state that it is as significant as for individual mastery. In this vein, the three main components of assessment strategies (learning, critical reflection, and capabilities) are essential tools that help the instructor see the growth in the body of learners’ knowledge and practical skills acquisition (Brodie & Irving, 2007).
Finally, the importance of critical reflection for the educator and learners can be hardly underestimated. Particularly, through critical reflection, the educator can identify the progress of one’s learners, and help them recognize the areas, where they have to put more effort. Critical reflection is no less meaningful for learners as it helps them actualize their learning potential, learning progress, and future learning objectives that should be realized in case they want to become successful workers in the future. This idea is supported by the following comment in the article under consideration: “accreditation of prior experiential learning may form a significant part of the ‘learning repertoire’, with claims for learning supported by critical reflective accounts” (Brodie & Irving, 2007, p.). Today, critical reflection seems to be one of the most effective learning tools for students, which is explained by numerous facts. Not only the opportunity to identify one’s studying progress using critical reflection has an important role, but also the thing that there exist numerous ways, in which students can see their achievements through critical reflection. For example, students may experience the value of doing a critical evaluation of their work using their learning journals; they may benefit from peer critical reflection; and of course, a great value of instructors’ critical reflection is beyond doubts.
Assessment Methods
Today, a great variety of assessment methods is used by educators in the learning process to make research studies, aiming to identify more effective ways of teaching. Below, a few of them will be addressed in detail to identify how they may contribute to the further assessment of the instructional problem, studied within the frames of this course.
Researchers resort to the use of different data collection methods. According to Hansen and Brady (2011), in action research, the two data collection methods are especially effective – the quantitative one, which is in conducting surveys, and the qualitative one that is in using interviews. There exist many other effective methods to collect research data for the assessment of learning effectiveness. For example, these are writing reflective journals by the participants of research to discover what makes them motivated during the learning process; using a strategy for playing in isolation for assessing the educational needs of autistic children; having several reading sessions with a couple of students to identify their reading difficulties; and so on.
To further assess the instructional problem, researched during this course, which is in perceiving and understanding the material by students with different levels of learning and comprehension abilities, the following methods can be implemented: (1) a quantitative research strategy, based on conducting a written survey among students using reflective journals (Hansen & Brady, 2011), and (2) working with two students, who have different learning skills and abilities using offering them varied learning tasks and identifying their reaction. The first method implicates proposing students to participate in a series of answering questions and sharing their opinion regarding different learning tasks in their reflective journals with the subsequent analysis of their responses. As a result of this method, the instructor will be able to identify common answers of students, participate in the research, and develop a centralized theory, based on their answers. The second method will help the instructor concentrate on two different students to derive common variables in their learning abilities and the different ones. This will help the researcher to test one’s hypothesis regarding suggesting varied learning tools for different students for them to overcome their challenges in learning. After implementing the two research methods, the instructor may make a synthesis of one’s findings to see how trustworthy are the conclusions, and how they support or contradict each other.
Critically reflecting on the two proposed research methods based on Brodie and Irving (2007) findings, it is necessary to state that the two above-discussed approaches will meet my needs as the instructor in the future because they will help me identify common tendencies that students see in the educational process. In particular, I will be able to see which learning difficulties are the most challenging for students. Additionally, I will discover the ways, in which different students try to cope with their learning challenges. Besides, I will be able to identify why learners, who have the worst academic performance, have appeared in such a situation, and what can be changed in my teaching approaches to provide the necessary assistance for such students.
References
Brodie, P., & Irving, K. (2007). Assessment in work-based learning: investigating a pedagogical approach to enhance student learning. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 32(1), 11–19.
Hansen, J., & Brady, M. (2011). Solving Problems through Action Research. The LLI Review, 82-90.