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The bit at the end

Assessment for Online CoursesCarol Dixon & Michael Wallace

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Overview• Benefits of asynchronous discussion

• Assessment of asynchronous discussions

• Benefits of synchronous discussion

• Assessment of synchronous discussions

• Activities to round up and finish online courses

+Benefits of asynchronous discussions:

• Assist learners to interact and so build a supportive learning community

• Provide opportunity for learners to participate at a time and place that suits

• Allows for more research and more considered learner and tutor comments

• For the L2 learner, allows time to rehearse and correct answers – perhaps through a friend or tutor

• By recording scripts provides opportunity to for teacher(and students) to gain a better appreciation of how much preparation and understanding students have of the material.

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Assessment of asynchronous discussions

• Make the rationale explicit and the criteria clear and fair such as: disagreeing does not impact on a grade.

• Include several opportunities for formative assessment to clarify the procedure.

• Carefully consider the weighting against other assessment.

• Ensure topics are interesting and varied as highly motivated learners may care more about the discussion than the grade they receive. The tutor should stimulate discussions with timely and provocative comments.

• Restrict the number of topics, keep groups small and assign roles. Include self and peer assessments.

• Involve learners in the monitoring of the usefulness of the discussions and elicit feedback from them on their attitudes.

Research indicates tutors should:

+Benefits of synchronous discussions:

• Immediate feedback from and interaction with peers and tutor

• Save time as communication is in real time (no back and forth of emails)

• Provides real time contact with fellow participants

• Provides opportunity to collaborate in real time with online white boards

• Encourages language practice for L2 learners, can be monitored and guided by e-moderator

• Particularly in chat rooms, provides L2 learners opportunity to recognize and correct mistakes.

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Assessment of synchronous discussions

• Make assessment central to the course objectives.

• Make assessment innovative – don’t just use traditional forms of assessment.

• Synchronous discussion lends itself to group based assessment.

• Assess collaboration. • Focus on process rather than product – make

assessment based on the work participants put into completing the task.

• As with asynchronous assessment, allocate groups and roles – possibly set up break out rooms followed by feedback together as a group.

• Intervene - monitor and intervene when groups need help. E.g. One student is dominating, participants are off topic or completing task incorrectly. Check that all participants are actually there and not AFK (away from keyboard).

• Motivate and support participants. Add comments to stimulate interest.

• Record sessions – video/transcripts

Research indicates tutors should:

+Activities to round up and finish online courses

We can’t have that farewell party but we can ……

• Give a parting gift in the form of something written (joke or poem) played (favourite music) visual (picture or photo or video)

• Group presentations – a way of bringing participants together once more.

• Farewell message

• What I will take away from this course is…

• Recorded feedback that students can all access

• Online ‘get together’ – virtual party

All think about the most important thing learned from the course discussed on a forum or even better displayed on an online notice board or poster! Use Glogster or Wallwisher

http://www.glogster.com/ and http://wallwisher.com/

+ References Banbrook, Lyn; Clandfield,, Lindsay; Gates, Dylan; Graf, Doris; Rickman Tom; Michael

Wallace; Zainab Bukhari, Syeda Sara; Zeimanis, Janas E-Moderation: The Consultants-E Online Training and Development Consultancy

Hockly, Nicky, Activities for Online Courses –the end, http://www.emoderationskills.com/?p=88

Kahrimanis, Georgios; Mikroyannidi, Eleni; Avouris, Nikolaos; Assessing the Quality of Sychronous Network Learning Activities using Machine Learning Techniques. http://www.networkedlearningconference.org.uk/past/nlc2008/abstracts/PDFs/Kahrimanis_187-194.pdf

Liu, Shijuan, Reference: Assessing Online Asynchronous Discussion in Online Graduate Courses: An Empirical Studyhttp://www.slideshare.net/tcc07/assessing-online-asynchronous-discussion-in-online-courses-an-empirical-study

Oskoz, Ana, Students’ Dynamic Assessment Via Online Chat, University of Maryland, Baltimore County. https://calico.org/html/article_148.pdf

“Supporting Students using Synchronous Tools: Chat, Audio conferencing and the Rest” Taken from:

Danchak, MM. & Huguet, M.P (2004) ‘Designing for the changing role of the instructor in blended learning.’ IEEE Transactions of Professional Communication, 47 (3), PP. 200-210http://www.gowerpublishing.com/pdf/white_papers/Gower_White_Paper_Blended_Learning_Online_Tutoring.pdf