Konrad Golowski has a long post about assessing students – and in particular getting them to assess themselves. He makes the point:
Of course, the challenge with student self-evaluation is that many, when given an opportunity to give themselves a grade, are often too harsh on themselves. Others, on the other hand, sometimes choose not to take the task seriously and give themselves an A+. I realized that I needed to help them visualize their progress, their level of engagement, and their sense of ownership and not simply ask them to rate their own work using the traditional percentage or letter scale. Most importantly, I wanted them to see that an entry that contains lots of facts and links to many valuable resources is not necessarily as valuable as one that shows personal engagement with ideas, one where the readers can hear a unique, personal voice.
He then has a number of diagrams that he’s created to help students see where they are. Given the difficulty that I have had getting students to self assess, I think I’m going to have a closer look at them.
On Monday, we’ve got the next ExPERT centre Network Learning Lunch – meetings for University staff to discuss Teaching & Learning matters. As it’s on assessment – I think that this could be a useful set of diagrams to take.