文档介绍：Principles of
4 student assessment
Richard Wakeford
INTRODUCTION
The assessment of students’ learning is a not well understood and, in most disci-
plines, an under-researched aspect of higher education. This is understandable –
teachers may feel that their educational energy is being sapped by curricular and
pedagogical demands, and what’s wrong with the present assessment system,
anyway? – but it is not tolerable. Why not? Why is it important to include a discus-
sion of student assessment in a handbook for teachers in higher education?
It is important for two quite different reasons. First, assessment is an integral
component of the teaching and learning system. Assessment may be used explic-
itly to guide students in their study. But also, student perceptions of what is
rewarded and what is ignored by more formal examination procedures will have
a substantial impact upon their learning behaviour and thus upon the es
of a course.
Second, for a variety of reasons, assessment needs to be accurate – and if it is not
itself examined, then we cannot know how accurate it is. We need assessment to
be accurate because it is pointless and unfair to students if it is otherwise. We need
it to be accurate for internal and external quality assurance purposes; and we need
it to be accurate to defend the increasingly likely legal challenges from disaffected
students who feel they have been unfairly judged, classified or even excluded.
Thus assessment may be seen as informal and formative (see also Chapter 12),
within the teaching process, or summative, making formal decisions about
progress and level of achievement. While the distinction may not always be a true
one – less formal assessments may be summated and included in summative
assessment, and failing a summative assessment may be most formative – this
chapter concentrates on the formal, summative assessment and the principles
underpinning it.
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