Contents
Dr Andrew Cobb (Lecturer in Biological Sciences) School of Health and Psychological Sciences, City, University of London
[Lightning talk 1]
This talk focuses on several formative assessment approaches that are used during teaching sessions and during student independent learning. These tools include the use of poll Everywhere quizzes during lectures, scratch cards during tutorials and interactive activities on Moodle. All tools provide instant feedback to students and highlight gaps in knowledge.
Formative assessment has several benefits in higher education. Provision of continued feedback throughout the duration of a course can identify areas for improvement and provide the opportunity for early remedial action (Hattie and Timperley, 2007). In addition, well-designed and stimulating activities can promote student engagement, allow students to reflect on their own learning and facilitate development of metacognitive skills that are instrumental for lifelong learning (Flavell, 1979). Another key element of timely formative assessments is that learning effectiveness can be greatly improved through the early detection of course material that have not been well understood by the cohort and thus providing the opportunity for immediate intervention (Heritage, 2010).
The talk describes the varied approaches used during a first-year module taught at City, including anonymous polls during lectures and weekly multiple choice question quizzes – accompanied by diverse interactive H5P activities – on Moodle. The focus of the talk will be on formative assessments that take place during tutorials that are fun and provide a competitive element to the learning environment. These tools include the creation of novel ice breakers (that include formative assessment elements themselves) and also the use of immediate feedback assessment technique (IF-AT) scratch cards during group-based quizzes. These IF-AT cards allow teams to ascertain if they have correctly answered the set questions and in due course obtain an overall score for the activity – teams scoring the highest amount of points are declared the winners of the session. Student feedback to these formative assessment tools will be presented.
References
Flavell, J.H. (1979) ‘Metacognition and cognitive monitoring: A new area of cognitive–developmental inquiry’, American Psychologist, 34(10), pp. 906-911 Available at: 10.1037/0003-066X.34.10.906
Hattie, J. and Timperley, H. (2007) ‘The Power of Feedback’, Review of Educational Research, 77(1), pp. 81-112 Available at: 10.3102/003465430298487
Heritage, M. (2010) ‘Formative assessment: Making it happen in the classroom.’, Corwin Press, Available at: https://doi.org/10.4135/9781452219493 APA.
