Participation in collaborative environments should be addressed in a way where members feel valued as both individuals and contributors in a group. To effectively do this, Dr. Siemen's (2008) suggests that community members be provided with opportunities to role-play so they can gain an appreciation and understanding of how indivuals effect the productivity and effectiveness of the group as a whole. Moreover, the assessments must also be done in an effective manner that coincides with the shift from focusing on individual students to focusing on a collaborative community of students.
To ensure that assessments are fair and equitable within a diverse body of students with varying skill levels, it is important that the focus is on growth and development. For example, Dr. Siemen's suggest looking at where the student was and where they are now (2008). In doing this, the online facilitator or instructor is looking at the students growth and development in terms of their contributions. Questions that might arise are 'Did the student complete the assigned task?' and 'Did the student complete the task to the best of his or her ability?' and 'What evidence is there that the student has grown in his or her ability between this previous task and the current task?' By basing assessments on growth and effort in lieu of how the student compares to the other members of the group, there is acknowledgement and embracement of the fact that all students are not going to start at the same place with the same knowledge base; and therefore, cannot be expected to end up at the same place with the same level of skills. So although collaboration happens within a group, the role of the instructor is to ensure that fair and equitable assessments focus on the degree to which the individual contributions align with the individual abilities within the group.
In addition to the role of the instructor in assessment, the members in the collaborative community also have a role in assessment of each other. To set the stage for online learning, Palloff and Pratt (2005) suggests parameters and guidelines for participation be estabilished. If members of the group are not participating to the agreed upon standards, then it is up to the group to decide how those non-collaborative members should be handled. In my learning community, we have all agreed that if a member is not adhering to our group procedures, we will address them as a community prior to involving the instructor. However, this may vary from group to group or in different collaborative settings.
Resources
Laureate Education, Inc. (2008). Assessment of collaborative learning. Baltimore: MD, Author.
Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2007). Building online learning communities: Effective strategies for the virtual classroom. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
4 comments:
I like your comment on assessing where the student is versus where s/he is ending. True assessment should incorporate evaluation of growth over statistical achievement. While I still struggle with getting the best out of the students, there as those who seem to excel and make the experiment even more revealing that otherwise might have been.
NCLB does not acknowledge this pedagogy, though is a best practice and good for the growth of the student. This is as large an issue for the teacher as is the improvement of the student.
Jeff
Greetings Jeff!
As a member of my school's Building Leadership Team, one of the issues we have discussed is creating a universal grading system that enables us to evaluate students according to their growth in lieu of their academic standing in relation to their peers. I am not sure if you are familiar with MAP testing, but the assessments allow students to see whether or not they have grown academically. Where on the other hand report cards that simply list letter grades and standardized assessments such as the ISAT do not. I think it is important that we celebrate student achievement and growth - - even if the student has not yet met a particular standard but has come closer to doing so. Thanks for your feedback.
Module 3 Response to Rachel Salley's post:
Greetings!
I totally agree with allow students to assess their peers. Not only does this help the student evaluator get to better process the task they just completed; but the student also gets to assess whether or not they have adequately met all the criterion for completing the task at hand. Establishing rubrics and allowing students to use those rubrics to assess each other also helps estbalish trust since students know they can depend on each other to be honest and provide constructive feedback.
Tawana Stiff
Module 3 Response to Rachel Salley's Story Board:
Response to Module 3 Story Board:
So far your presentation is well organized and I clearly establishes the purpose for each slide. I look forward to see your presentation progress as we move forward. Have you already started compiling resources or have you mainly just focused on the layout of the presenation thus far?
Tawana Stiff
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