Linking Instruction with Assessment

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Linking Instruction with Assessment
William J. Hoese Dept. of Biological
Science California State University, Fullerton
How Learners Learn Teachers Teach Forum CSU
Fullerton - January 26, 2004
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Assessment

• What have students learned and how well have they
  learned it?
• High-quality assessment facilitates high quality
  learning.
• Poor-quality assessment may deter high quality
  learning and reward the wrong kind of learning.

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Changing curriculum requires changing how
students are assessed

• What students learn is influenced by how student
  performance is evaluated
• Many college science courses provide a deluge of
  information to be memorized and reproduced on
  tests
• Memorization-based tests discourages learners
  from looking for big ideas and organizing
  knowledge hierarchically with big ideas playing
  major roles

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Assessment strategies that support meaningful
learning
Identify Student Learning Outcomes
Develop and select assessment measures
Create learning experiences
Revise assessment measures
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Building student knowledge

• Students practice by completing assignments
  requiring them to organize, describe, and explore
  new information
• Students receive feedback on their progress
• Sequence of topics organized so new knowledge is
  built upon previous learning

Basketball analogy
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Assessing understanding

• Students
• explain science concepts in terms of other
  concepts
• predict the outcomes of changes to systems
• solve problems that require more than algorithmic
  recall

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Sample Student Learning Outcomes

• Biology 171 Evolution and Biodiversity (first
  biology course for majors)
• Demonstrate understanding of evolutionary theory
• Explain the role of selection in evolution
• Describe and interpret graphical data
• Collect and organize data in graphical format

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Lab Activities with Embedded Assessments
Practice with feedback
Sequence of topics
Practice with feedback
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Students practice making graphical predictions of
experimental data
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Practice learning concepts and skills

• Course website Introduction to graphing data,
  choosing types of graphs, and figure legends.
• Text supplement Analyzing figures and graphs
• Using graphs to learn concepts in lecture

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In-class formative assessment using Personal
Response System
Student responses
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Sample summative assessment on midterm
Describe the variation in Graph A Describe the
variation in Graph B Given this information
predict how human birth weights will vary over
time. Justify your answer. What mode of natural
selection is acting on this human population?
Justify your answer.
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Keys to developing assessments

• Time
• Explicitly linking assessments with student
  learning outcomes
• Providing student practice
• Review of assessments by others

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Resources

• Bloom, B. 1956. Taxonomy of Educational
  Objectives The Classification of Educational
  Goals. Handbook I Cognitive Domain. David McKay,
  New York.
• Huba, M.E. and J.E. Freed. 2000. Learner-Centered
  Assessment on College Campuses Shifting the
  Focus from Teaching to Learning. Allyn and Bacon,
  Boston.
• Mintzes. J. J., Wandersee, J. H. and J. D. Novak.
  Eds. 1999. Assessing Science Understanding A
  Human Constructivist View. Academic Press, San
  Diego.