(Re)design Learning Outcome Assessment Methods

Formative assessments are ongoing, typically low-stakes opportunities used throughout a course to provide feedback and guide student development. Examples include quizzes, drafts, peer reviews, and reflection papers. A culture of feedback, providing feedback throughout the course, helps students track progress, stay motivated, identify areas for improvement, and develop a better understanding of their own learning.

Summative assessments typically occur at the end of a learning period and measure the extent to which students have met their learning outcomes. They focus on gauging the achievement of cumulative knowledge, skills, or attitudes. Examples include final exams and capstone papers.

This refers to the consistency of an assessment. A reliable assessment produces stable and consistent results across time, raters, or varying conditions (e.g., inter-rater reliability).

This measures whether the assessment accurately reflects the learning outcomes it is meant to measure. A valid assessment ensures that the tasks or criteria truly represent the skills and knowledge the instructor aims to measure. There are different types of validity (e.g., content validity, construct validity, face validity, etc.)

Direct methods involve reviewing and measuring actual student work, such as exams, essays, and performances. These methods provide concrete evidence of student achievement. 

• Rubrics: Rubrics are a powerful tool in direct methods of assessment, offering clear and objective criteria for gauging student learning. They help ensure that assessment practices are purposeful, aligned with learning outcomes, and transparent in their expectations. By breaking down the criteria for success, rubrics provide specific performance descriptors that directly reflect the learning outcomes. This structure is invaluable for maintaining consistency in grading, for example, and for providing students with clear expectations and targeted feedback to help them improve.
  
  For examples and guidance on creating rubrics, refer to the AAC&U VALUE rubrics for reliable, well-structured sample rubrics that have been tested for validity and can serve as valuable starting points to assess learning outcomes.

Indirect methods capture students' perceptions of their learning experiences. Methods such as surveys, interviews, and focus groups offer valuable insights into how students feel about their learning progress and their educational experiences. While indirect methods do not directly measure student performance, they complement direct ones by revealing patterns in students' self-perceptions of growth and their achievement of learning outcomes. It is often useful to calibrate student perceptions with the data gathered from direct methods to get a fuller picture, especially when considering curricular changes.

• Surveys: A valuable tool for gathering student feedback on their learning experiences, self-perceived progress, and engagement. They provide essential data for understanding students' attitudes toward a course and can inform instructional and curricular adjustments. To gather actionable insights, survey questions should be clear, concise, and aligned with learning outcomes.

1. Start with an Engaging Introduction: Begin with easy or interesting questions to capture interest and encourage participation.
2. Ensure Clarity and Simplicity: Use straightforward language. Avoid jargon or complex terms that might confuse respondents.
3. Focus on Single Topics: Address one topic per question. If a question includes "and," split it into two separate questions.
4. Avoid Double Negatives: Rephrase questions to eliminate double negatives, ensuring statements are positive for clarity.
5. Organize Responses Logically: Arrange response options in a logical order, typically with negative or lower choices on the left and positive or higher options on the right.
6. Clearly Label Response Scales: Label each point on the response scale to maintain consistent understanding among respondents.
7. Maintain Consistency: Use the same response scale for similar questions to avoid confusion and simplify survey completion.
8. Group Questions by Topic: Organize questions by theme to help respondents focus and answer accurately.
9. Prioritize Question Importance: Place the most important questions at the beginning of the survey and less critical ones, such as demographic questions, at the end.
10. Test and Revise: Have others test the survey and provide feedback before finalizing it. Ensure all technology functions correctly, including question display and any logic or piping used.

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