A lot of students mentioned using assessment as a tool to make improvements to their work
Some had very strong negative emotions associated with assessments – “scary, daunting”,“anxious”, “stress”, “a source of great pressure and stress at times” and “ nauseating, overwhelming and something I have associated difficult, heavy emotions with”
What students considered contributed to a positive assessment experience:
- Different formats of feedback, especially something they could re-visit in their own time
- Clear and honest feedback that gave direction on what to do/ where to improve
- Assessment format that allowed them to express their creativity/ showcase their work
- Clear expectations and understanding of the marking criteria
- Ability to discuss feedback further/ have a dialogue
- Scaffolded and structured support before and leading up to the assessment
What students considered contributed to a negative assessment experience:
- Not being inclusive to students with different needs, I.e needing more time/ language barriers/ learning difficulties – not feeling considered within the assessment design
- The work feeling misunderstood/ tutors not understanding the concepts or feeling like they did not spend enough time marking the work
- marking criteria:
- Unclear, too much jargon, difficult to understand what is expected of students
- Unsure about the marking criteria, especially if it is different to their previous education system
- Peer assessments:
- ignored student politics, did not trust their marking over the tutors’
- Did not feel inclusive to those with learning difference/ negatively impacted self esteem
- Unclear assessment process/ lack of familiarity with it
Types of feedback rated highest to lowest:
- Written feedback (64% said very helpful)
- Verbal feedback
- Peer feedback
- Self-assessed feedback
What makes feedback helpful:
Written:
– can access and review the feedback given
- digest it and improve at their own pace.
Verbal:
- Feels more honest
- Offers more discussion and communication
Peer feedback:
- Offers more discussion and communication
- Can give a wider perspective on the project
- More perspectives, especially if contradicting, makes it easier to be more critical of the feedback you are receiving rather than accepting one P.O.V
- enables an opportunity to compare and develop.
- help see how the project is perceived by others
What makes feedback unhelpful:
Written:
- No space to discuss or ask for clarification
Verbal:
- Very easy to forget what was discussed
- Not enough processing time > not very inclusive to those who need more time
peer:
- Students are too scared to be critical
- Can feel very forced
- Feedback is not always useful/ overly positive
- Can lead to more confusion if there are conflicting opinions
Self-assessed:
- Depends if student is at the stage to be able to answer the questions/ done enough work
- Challenging if you don’t understand the marking criteria
- Can easily be biased to yourself
How effective or ineffective do you find the current assessment process?
- Group assessments:
- gives you a better understanding of how our own work is assessed.
- One-to-one tutorials feels personal and allow for discussion
Making the assessment process more of a learning experience, engaging and beneficial for students:
- Being inclusive to different learning styles/ those that need more time
- more specific criteria for each unit
- Better understanding of the marking scheme
- Invite outside perspective/ people from industry
- Self assessment needs more support – a lot of jargon
- Minutes/notes given alongside verbal feedback
- Online forum/ dashboard where students can post questions/ FAQ section
- More opportunities for one-to-one tutorials
- Having work examples to break down assessment criteria – exemplars
Barriers:
- Lack of confidence talking about your idea/ public speaking
- Language barrier / English is a foreign language
- Not understanding the mark scheme
- Unclear expectations or deliverables
- Not enough time to apply the feedback
- Lack of materials/ resources that can be accessed/ reviewed in own time
- Not enough variety in assessment and presentation styles