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Clarifying Questions: Formulate questions that arise as you engage with the material. These should be questions that delve deeper into the content, seeking further explanation or exploration. Consider what you would ask the author if you had the opportunity.

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Prevailing Points: As you read the article and watch the video, identify the main ideas and key points. Summarize these points in concise notes and post them in this section. Think about the overarching themes, significant insights, and crucial details that encapsulate the essence of the material.

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Aha Moments: Reflect on the content and note any surprising or particularly enlightening moments. These are the instances that made you think, "I never thought about it that way before!" or introduced you to new concepts. Share these moments and explain why they resonated with you.

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Does pretesting happen in areas of higher education? When one is teaching skills that are more based on critical thinking and higher levels of Bloom's taxonomy (analyzing and evaluating), what kind of pretesting would you use?

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The weight or % of points assigned to each assessment needs to reflect the importance of each objective (i.e. there will be heavier % assigned to the objectives/concepts that are of higher importance for student to understand than objectives of lower importance)

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Objective v. performance assessment: Objective questions have single/best answer and focus more on knowledge or skill BUT do not give the student the opportunity to use more critical thinking skills, organize and integrate ideas. Performance Assessment (ex, extended response, oral presentation) may have multiple "right" answers and allow students to use other skills that may better demonstrate their evaluation and integration of concepts.

-It is important when thinking about essays the difference b/w extended essay v. restrictive. While extended essays helps to measure students understanding of concepts/principles, can be difficult to grade AND can be difficult to show factual knowledge. Restrictive essays are easier to grade and show understanding of factual knowledge but d/t the structure, may not be able to see as much of the integration of ideas/concepts

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Testing goal is to obtain valid info regarding student achievement. Can occur before, during, and after instruction period. Many different types including T/F, short answer, matching, restricted response. Formative improves instruction between learners and teachers and assesses progress. Summative measures learners competency when marks need to be formally recorded (exam, end of semester, etc).

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The soup analogy is awesome

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What formula is used to decide the number of formative assessments that should be assigned? Additionally, does the lack of weight relating to formative vs summative assessments affect the motivation of the learner to complete the assigned (formative) assessments?

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Test items/performance assessments should match the learning objective (i.e. the questions themselves are based on what the student is trying to accomplish through each objective).

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Avoid ambiguity in writing test questions! Make sure sentences are concise, avoid overcomplicated vocabulary, and words that lack precise meaning (I am the queen of long winded sentences so I need to pay attention to this!)

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Tests that have a variety of learning outcomes (i.e. both objective test items and performance assessments and/or interpretive exercises help students learn that memorizing facts alone is not sufficient to understanding and comprehending the course content.

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Formative assessments aid learners in recognizing areas of improvement and also demonstrates their understanding of the content

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Summative assessments allow learners to recognize their progress in the course. They are mostly used for grading and promotion purposes

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I loved the idea of ensuring alignment of the test questions and learning objectives. The verb should match the learning objective.

Ex: If explain, use short answer; If identify, use multiple choice.

It makes sense!

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I appreciated the tip on keeping answers relatively the same length and to avoid negatives. I remember negatives being confusing on tests myself!

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Formative assessments are used to assess the learner's progress, while summative is used for formal grading and competency in the course. There are various types of assessments, but an essay format allows for the student to have freedom in expressing their knowledge instead of being constricted to multiple choice, true and false, etc.

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It is very interesting to think about assessments from the teacher's perspective because the results allows for adaptation of teaching methods to enable better comprehension for the students. Another piece that stuck out to me was formative assessments can be given very frequently for this same reason: to track the student's learning.

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I've had previous courses with no assignments and few exams, which sticks out to me after reading this because I believe it would be difficult to track learning progression with few assessments. My question would be how do the teachers track learning progression without many formative assessments?

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The whole idea of a table of specifications and using it as an assessment blueprint is new to me.

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Formative assessments, which may not contribute to a learner's grade, are used FOR learning and to assess progress in the course. Summative assessments are used for grading and to identify competency in a course. The decision to use an objective test and/or a performance assessment is informed by the learning objectives.

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Basic types of classroom tests and assessments include:

1. Readiness: A low-level of difficulty items for prerequisite measurement assessment in which the educator gains an understanding of deficiencies or extent of what students have already achieved in the beginning of the course or unit.

2. Placement: A wide-range of difficulty items for a course or unit objective that takes place at the beginning of the course or unit to modify instructional planning and advanced placement.

3. Formative: A formative assessment utilizes variable difficulty items for a predefined segment of instruction to assess any improvement and direct learning through ongoing feedback. This is typically in the form of quizzes and tests.

4. Diagnostic: A low-level of difficulty items utilized as-needed during instruction to remedy errors related to persistent learning difficulties.

5. Summative: A wide-range of difficulty items given at the end of a course or unit to assign grades, certify accomplishments, or evaluate teaching.

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I never realized there are different types of ways to assess learning outcomes based on the verb utilized. For example, "names/draws" can be assessed with fill-in-the-blank questions, "identifies/matches/distinguishes" can be assessed with multiple choice questions, and "describes/explains" can be assessed with essay questions.

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A table of specifications helps to prepare a list of instructional objectives (ie specific learning outcomes), outlines course content (describes the type of performance students are expected to demonstrate), and prepares for a two-way chart (relates objectives to the content of the nature of the sample of test items and assessment tasks).

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Objective assessment items are highly-structured task that limits the type of response the students can make. Cannot be in their own words, and the scoring is quick, easy, and accurate.

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Performance assessment can measure understanding, critical thinking, and complex learning where originality of response is desired

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I think a lot about innovative learning strategies in the health education sector and see how relevant and valuable performance assessment tasks are. However, there are times when objective assessments are required in order to meet state/federal licensing exams for board certifications.

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The reading highlights that assessing information's validity, reliability, and usefulness heavily depend on careful planning and preparation. The main goal is to obtain valid, reliable, and useful information about student achievement.

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The reading helped me to understand that not all objectives can be measured by traditional classroom tests, such as multiple-choice or essay questions. Performance assessment tasks are necessary for outcomes involving verbs like "constructs," "delivers," or "measures". The combined weight of classroom tests and performance assessments should reflect the importance of the objectives.

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The reading brings to mind that end-of-instruction tests that are primarily for summative assessment (grading), can also serve formative functions like providing feedback, encouraging advanced work, and assigning remedial tasks, or even acting as a pretest for subsequent units. This dual utility was not immediately obvious to me before this module.

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This reading shows that effective assessment requires precisely determining and defining what is to be measured to construct tasks that target intended knowledge, skills, and understanding.

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Goal: gather accurate, consistent and actionable information about student achievement

Types:

Pretesting: Assess readiness or prior knowledge.

Formative Assessment: Monitor progress, detect errors, and provide feedback during instruction.

Diagnostic Testing: Identify specific learning difficulties.

Summative Assessment: Evaluate achievement at the end of instruction.

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Assessment FOR vs. OF Learning is very helpful in thinking about the difference between formative and summative assessments.

The way we design tests influences how students study and learn. If tests only measure memorization, students will focus on memorization. If tests include application and critical thinking, students will engage more deeply with the material. This highlights the power of assessment design in driving meaningful learning rather than just "teaching to the test."

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Performance tasks can assess science and math just as effectively as essays assess writing. I often associate performance assessments with arts or writing, but they’re equally valuable for STEM fields.

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How do you balance the trade-offs between objective tests and performance assessments?

Objective tests are efficient and reliable, but performance assessments measure higher-order skills. How do you decide when to use each (or both)?

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How can teachers ensure that performance assessments are scored fairly and consistently?

What rubrics or criteria can be used to minimize subjectivity in grading essays or projects?

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Formative assessments are continuous, used to provide two-way feedback between student and learner and guide the experience for both parties over time. Summative assessments, on the other hand, are final assessments are often have more "weight" given their use for promotion/retention.

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Though not for a grade, guided notes are submitted. This might be a way in which this course's instructor is assessing teaching/learning (formative)

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This reads to me a little like a false dichotomy. Let's say there are weekly quizes worth 10% of a students grade. Are they not formative (continuous, assessing both ways) and summative (because of contribution to final grade / because final summary of each weekly unit's content)

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formative: a chef is tasting the recipe while it is being made, to make adjustments, so that it comes out just right

summative: think of the judging process of a cooking contest, what the customer tastes and how they rate it

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Educators need to understand when to adjust instruction to ensure it stays on point and meets the objectives.

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adding some incentive to the diagnostic/formative testing helps learners to engage with things like the required reading

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Assessment isn't just about slapping a grade on someone at the end of the semester; it’s about figuring out their baseline, catching their mistakes mid-stream with formative feedback, and using tools like a test blueprint so we don't accidentally write lazy exams that only test memorization. If we want our future students to actually gain the knowledge, skills, and attitudes we’re teaching, we have to be clear on our learning objectives before we even think about course design and exam questions.

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The ten item rule for unit tests is a wake-up call. It makes sense that you need at least 10 objective items per specific learning outcome to get a reliable, fair sample of what a student actually knows. But the biggest aha moment for me was the talk about "irrelevant barriers". In our world, forcing a student to memorize a rigid, arbitrary script for a health assessment instead of evaluating their actual clinical reasoning is the perfect example of a construct-irrelevant barrier that just gets in the way of true evaluation.

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Since the text allows lowering the item count from 10 to 5 for "extremely limited" learning outcomes, how do we objectively determine if a complex nursing concept is narrow enough to safely justify this smaller sample size without hurting test reliability?

When combining written exams and hands-on performance tasks to score a single objective (as shown in Table 6.4), how do we determine the ideal mathematical weight or ratio between the two methods to ensure the final grade accurately reflects true competence?

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Assessment is important to identify the learner's competency on the content taught. Formative assessments are critical during the learning process. They reveal the learners progress and give the instructor insight to adjust future instruction. Summative assessments are culminating and formally graded to measure mastery.

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Formative assessments should shape instruction. I think a lot of the time instructors view assessment as strictly revealing the learners' ability, but we should also view assessment as a reflection of our instruction and allow it to guide how we design how we teach.

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What are best practices in removing bias from assessments and making students feel that the assessment is fair?

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Assessments should be valid, reliable, and aligned with learning objectives

A table of specifications can ensure that content and objectives line up well

Formative assessments = ongoing checks during learning

Summative assessments = evaluation after instruction

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Assessment planning should occur before writing actual test questions by matching objectives, content, and assessments

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What strategies can be used to ensure performance assessments are scored consistently and reliably?