What kind of assessment for learning is appropriate in the age of Google
and Wikipedia? Facebook and You Tube? Smart phones and text messaging? Twitter
and blogging?
August 30, 2011
Abstract:
Claims for the transformative effects of e-learning on student learning
outcomes imply changes in the nature of learning when learning is mediated by
technology. If it can be shown that the nature of learning changes in a
distinctive way when learning is mediated by technology (Andrews 2011) then it seems
plausible that the evidence for learning might also change. This paper explores
how "assessment for learning" might change in a digital culture where
students are "collaborative producers" of learning. It identifies
some distinctive changes in the nature of the evidence for learning when
learning is mediated by technology and asks whether these changes in evidence
needs a new approach and/or theory of assessment.
Does the character of learning change when learning involves
technology?
It could be argued that e-Learning utilises the characteristics and
affordances of the internet to create distinctive environments and interactions
to support learning. For example, the non-linear architecture of the
internet (a network of nodes and internodes) provides different opportunities
and structures for learning, communication, collaboration and co-construction
than those available in the face to face. Opportunities for learning can
occur: with anyone, at anytime and in any place; through one to one, one to
many, or many to many interactions; through push and pull; synchronously and
asynchronously; using multi-literacies or multiple modalities (including text,
graphic, audio, video, animation, etc.) and within open and flexible access
systems. Andrews (2011) argues that if learning is socially situated then
e-learning extends “the horizons of e-learning in space, resource and time.” He
suggests that a new theory of learning is developing because in e-learning; the
relationship between knowledge and the learner becomes “more democratic, more
potentially dialogical”; transduction (the creation of observable evidence of
learning) is easier; and the access and use of learning “according to
socio-economic, geographic, cognitive and motivational factors” is stretched further
(Andrews, 2011 p119).
MY BLOG POST 2: 2/1/12
This really makes me
think of how I can utilize technology more in my high school English
classroom. I have just started blogging
and using a wiki for a doctoral class and find them very user friendly. I am trying to get more comfortable with
using this type of technology. I know my
students are very comfortable with blogging and would love to use this type of
technology for class…I am just not sure on the logistics of it all. How would I assess blog postings? How many is
enough? Too many? And of course there is
still the question of authenticity. How
do I know that my students are not cheating?
You bring up some interesting ideas that make me truly consider using
technology to assess my students.
