A+ Assessment Workshop 5
(Version April 2004)
Assessment Plus
ASSESSMENT WORKSHOP 5
APPLYING THE CRITERIA TO
YOUR OWN WORK
Workshops on Understanding
Essay Assessment Criteria
for First-year Students
in the Sciences, Social Sciences,
and Related Disciplines
Assessment Plus (A+) is a two-year consortium project to develop tailored resources for students and staff that focus on core aspects of assessment criteria. The work is taking place at London Metropolitan University, Liverpool Hope University College, and Aston University, radiating out to a number of external partner institutions.
For further details, see the project web site at http://www.assessmentplus.net .
A+ Social Sciences Workshop 5 - Contents
(Version April 2004)
contents
INTRODUCTION
/ 5Overview of the workshop programme / 5
Note to tutors on using the protocols / 6
Support materials / 6
Comments welcome / 6
Attracting students
/ 7WORKSHOP FIVE: APPLYING THE CRITERIA TO YOUR
OWN WORK
/ 9Activity 22 – Using the Essay Feedback Checklist / 9
Activity 23 – Making action plans from feedback / 10
Resources for workshop five / 13
The Essay Feedback Checklist / 15
Overview of sample essays and marks / 17
Sample essay: 1 / 19
Sample essay: 2 / 27
Sample essay: 3 / 31
EVALUATION OF THE WORKSHOP PROGRAMME
/ 37Overview of evaluation forms
/ 37Student evaluation form for Workshop 5
/ 39Student evaluation form for the workshop programme
/ 41Staff evaluation form for the workshop programme / 45
REFERENCES
/ 51Assessment Plus: Using assessment criteria to support student learning
HEFCE funded consortium project
49
A+ Social Sciences Workshop 5 - Introduction
(Version April 2004)
Introduction
Overview of the workshop programme
One of the aims of the Assessment Plus (A+) project is to support student learning by highlighting the role of assessment criteria. This project is intended to enhance students’ academic writing skills and improve their essay writing performance. In doing this we hope to address national agendas of widening participation and retention as well as provide practical help to new entrants to Higher Education.
Most students entering Higher Education have only a limited understanding of what is meant by the term ‘assessment criteria’ and do not automatically target their work towards meeting the criteria in a way that is acceptable to the demands of their chosen subject.
It is hoped that the proposed series of workshops will:
· provide students with a clearer understanding of what assessment criteria are and how they are used
· eradicate any misconceptions students have about what is considered appropriate writing in Higher Education
· demystify the essay-writing process
· improve students’ academic writing.
All of the material in this document is freely available for colleagues to use or adapt, provided acknowledgment is made to Assessment Plus by citing the project web site.
u Note to tutors on using the protocols
The intention of this document is to provide you with some suggestions for workshop activities to help your students write better essays. As such it can be used to deliver the workshop as outlined, either on its own or as part of the series of five workshops, or it can be regarded as a resource from which to pick and choose specific activities for integration into existing tutorials or programmes.
The workshop series
Each workshop follows the standard format of a brief rationale followed by a number of suggested activities. Workshop 1 is a general introduction to assessment criteria and why they are important. Workshops 2, 3 and 4 each cover two assessment criteria, though separate workshops could be dedicated to each of the criteria if preferred. Finally, workshop 5 gets students to put it all together and apply what they have learned to their next essay or to look at a past essay and see how it could be improved.
Support materials
Most of the materials you will need to run the activities in the workshops are provided with these downloadable documents. Following each workshop protocol, there is a resources section containing relevant handouts. Occasionally, you will need to supply some of the materials needed (such as journals and books for students to evaluate in Workshop 4); when this is the case, it is clearly indicated in the protocols.
In addition, you may find that you would like to substitute some of your own materials for the ones provided here. In this case, the protocols and resources can act as a guide or template.
Comments welcome
Part of the process of developing any support for students involves trialling and evaluating, and the Assessment Plus team welcomes informal feedback and comments at any stage. Please contact Katherine Harrington at .
In addition, the project has developed evaluation forms for each workshop and for the series as a whole for both students and staff. Please see the section on Evaluation of the Workshop Programme towards the end of this document for copies of the forms.
Attracting students
Tutors may offer these workshops as optional or compulsory depending on the local context and the perceived necessity for such support. For those who are hoping to encourage students on an optional basis, it is important to avoid any ‘remedial’ overtones. The following workshop titles are suggested as more student-friendly and more attractive than the more soberly phrased titles in this protocol. Of course, deciding which titles to use is a matter for individual tutors who know their own students best and what is most likely to appeal to them.
Protocol titles / Student friendly titlesProgramme Workshops on understanding assessment criteria for 1st year students
/ ‘Writing at university’
Workshop 1 What are assessment criteria? / ‘The key to improving your grades’
Workshop 2 Addressing the question
Structuring the answer / ‘Where to begin…?’
Workshop 3 Demonstrating understanding
Developing argument / ‘How to show you know what you're writing about’
Workshop 4 Use of evidence
Evaluation / ‘Looking for the evidence’
Workshop 5 Applying the criteria to your own work / ‘Becoming more expert in your essay writing’
Assessment Plus: Using assessment criteria to support student learning
HEFCE funded consortium project
49
A+ Social Sciences Workshop 5
(Version April 2004)
Workshop Five: Applying the criteria to your own work
Purpose and rationale
It is important that students feel these workshops have had a point. The easiest way to do this is by showing how the subjects discussed can be applied to their own work. Although we have attempted to make the criteria meaningful by including a lot of practical activities, the real test will come when students attempt to look at their own work in relation to the criteria.
This workshop is meant to tie up what has been learned from the programme by getting students to bring their own work to the session.
Alternatively, you could conduct the activities below using one or more of the sample essays included with this pack.
Structure
This workshop proposes a choice of two activities.
.Activity 22 – Using the Essay Feedback Checklist
Students could bring along copies of draft essays and work together in pairs to identify strengths and weaknesses of their own and each other’s work. 1 Handout Alternatively, select one or more of the sample essays included in the resources section. (The sample essays included here are on introductory topics in the area of psychology. However, tutors may prefer to provide their own essays that cover different topics. Suggestions of sample essays to include in future versions of the protocols would be gratefully received by the A+ team.)
1 Handout
Provide students with a copy of the Essay Feedback Checklist (Norton, Clifford, Hopkins, Toner and Norton, 2002; Norton and Norton, 2001) to support them in this task. In general, findings from these studies have suggested that there are relatively few discrepancies between students’ and tutors’ ratings, but that there is a slight tendency for students to over-rate themselves.
The EFC is a simple tool to enable students to focus on the assessment criteria while they are actually writing an essay. It then functions as a method of targeting feedback in areas where students need it most – i.e., where there is a discrepancy between their own rating and that of the person marking their essay.
Ask students to complete an EFC for their own essays, before swapping EFCs and essays with a partner. Students should then mark and give feedback on their partner’s essay using the EFC. The value of this activity is in getting fellow students to highlight for each other the criteria which are well demonstrated and those which need working on – a very basic type of peer assessment. It is hoped that the students themselves will identify the areas in their essays that need work, but you can be on hand deal with questions and disputes as they arise.
A satisfactory conclusion might be to ask student pairs to highlight the ‘troublesome’ criteria which could then be used as the focus for tutor reassurance that essay writing is a skill that improves with practice … .
.Activity 23 – Making action plans from feedback
This activity was designed by Laurence Hopkins and Rebecca Clifford of Liverpool Hope University College. Students could bring along essays they have already produced and had returned to them with marks and feedback from their tutors. They could then work through areas that have been highlighted as needing attention as well as see if they can further improve those areas where they have been successful in meeting the criteria. One way of helping students with this is to ask them to produce an action plan for what they intend to change in writing their second essay.
As can be seen, first-year psychology students appear to have valued this activity:
‘From talking about the essays in a group, it has made me realise that most of the group have had common problems … .’
‘From discussing feedback in a group I have been able to see from others’ feedback how a different approach is needed. Also how some mistakes such as a lack of evaluation are common, therefore I need to read with a critical eye.’
‘From this detailed feedback I have learnt that other people made the same mistakes as me so I knew I wasn’t the only one … .’
‘Talking about the essay in a group has helped me think about the changes I need to make to my own essay. It has helped me think about typical errors which are made in essay writing (e.g. lack of evaluation) … .’
(Norton et al., 2002, p.121)
Conclusion
By the end of this workshop students should have a much clearer idea of some practical steps they can take to improve their next essay.
Assessment Plus: Using assessment criteria to support student learning
HEFCE funded consortium project
49
A+ Social Sciences Workshop 5 - Resources
(Version April 2004)
Resources for Workshop Five:
Applying the Criteria to
Your Own Work
The Essay Feedback Checklist
The following Essay Feedback Checklist is an adaptation of that developed by Norton, Clifford, Hopkins, Toner and Norton (2002) and Norton and Norton (2001).
Please give a rating of how confident you feel about having met each of the assessment criteria:C = Confident – I think I have met this criterion to the best of my ability.
P = Partially confident – I have tried to meet this criterion but would appreciate more
feedback.
N = Not at all confident – I do not understand this criterion and need more guidance.
C / P / N
Addressed the question throughout the essay?
student feedback
Organised the essay clearly with a structure that supports a considered conclusion?
student feedback
Demonstrated understanding of the research, concepts, and/or theories?
student feedback
C = Confident – I think I have met this criterion to the best of my ability.
P = Partially confident – I have tried to meet this criterion but would appreciate more
feedback.
N = Not at all confident – I do not understand this criterion and need more guidance.
C / P / N
Put forward a reasoned argument which shows evaluation and analysis?
student feedback
Use of evidence to support essay answer?
student feedback
Evaluated research evidence and theoretical concepts?
tutor feedback
Norton, L., Clifford, R., Hopkins, L., Toner, I., & Norton, J.C.W. (2002). Helping psychology students write better essays. Psychology Learning and Teaching, 2, 116-126.
Norton, L.S. & Norton, J.C.W. (2001). Essay feedback: How can it help students improve their academic writing? Paper and workshop given at the first international conference of the European Association for the Teaching of Academic Writing across Europe (EATAW), Groningen, 18-20 June 2001.
Overview of sample essays and marks
Title: Compare behaviourist and cognitive explanations of learning using evidence from both fields.
Essay 1: 74%
Essay 2: 58%
Essay 3: 43%
Sample essay: 1
Title: Compare behaviourist and cognitive explanations of learning using evidence from both fields.
Learning is a vital part of being human. Through learning we can acquire new skills, facts and fit into society successfully through knowledge of their norms of behaviour and so on. The majority of a humans’ life is devoted to learning, much of which is never even put into action. Due to evolution, humans are also born with a certain amount of innate behaviour, for example, babies possess a sucking reflex which is stimulated when placed near its mother’s nipple. However, all behaviour cannot be innate as our environment is constantly changing due to advances in technology and so on, consequently, much of our behaviour must be acquired after birth. Psychologists use the term ‘plastic’ to refer to learnt behaviour and declare that the more variable the environment the more plastic the behaviour. (Anderson, p.1-2)
The behaviourist approach in psychology originated in America at the beginning of the twentieth century. Learning was central to the behaviourist approach, which believed “ most human and animal behaviour could be understood as the result of basic learning mechanisms operating on the experiences provided by the environment.” (Anderson, 1995) Behaviourists aimed to develop theories without referring to processes going on in an organisms mind, insisting that psychology should have a firm empirical basis. It was their claim of being the first truly scientific psychology that contributed largely to the popularity of behaviourism. Until behaviourism began, psychology had consisted largely of philosophic speculation, rather than science. Behaviourists argued that by concentrating only on visible behaviour, all the virtually impossible questions about the mind that philosophers and psychologists had laboured over for thousands of years could be avoided. Behaviourism, therefore, appealed to people because it was practical and focussed on commonsense knowledge rather than trying to obtain ultimate solutions. (Anderson, p.3 and Hunt, p.262-3) Non-human animals tended to be used in behaviourist research as when behaviourism began at the turn of the century, Darwin’s theory of evolution was still influencing societies beliefs and as he argued that we were continuous with other animals it was thought that the laws of learning that held for animals would also hold for humans. Also behaviourists felt that research on learning using human participants may be affected by language and culture. (Anderson, p.3)