New technologies require greater attention to course design than ever before. As a result, strong, well-designed course interactions are the necessary response from educators. When students tap into their strengths and interests through authentic assessment, it increases the value provided by your course offerings. Assessments provide an opportunity for students to demonstrate their skills.
Educators can address generative AI by designing assessments that are meaningful, relevant, applicable, novel, and rigorous.
Authentic assessments should require students to apply knowledge in new, complex ways. In these suggestions, students engage in actual situations from their professional surroundings, or the assessments are derived from situations that mimic the real world.
Strategies
Lean into a student-centered approach to discourage students from a more dishonest means of completing assignments. Invest time to design and implement authentic assessments to integrate relevance into your online course.
Professional trajectories and career advancement are unique to each learner. Customize your assessments with the end-in-mind by integrating real time skills and current dialogue in the field.
Examples:
- Draw from personal and professional experiences.
- Connect achievement of outcomes to professional growth.
- Center assessments around career outcomes.
- Activate intrinsic motivation by pairing student-choice with meta-cognition.
Create connections to personal realities or circumstances, increasing relevance and connection to content.
Examples:
- Collect and analyze data from their own surroundings.
- Take a position on a local policy, structure, or procedure.
- Reflect upon student conducted interviews or video vignettes of practitioners.
Encourage students to synthesize feedback and improve.
Examples:
- Emphasize the process and product as students need to be critical users of AI.
- Craft opportunities for self-reflection, peer review and formative assessment.
- Scaffold instruction so that students iterate; requiring multiple submissions.
Create unique outputs and demonstrate mastery in non-language formats.
Examples:
- Increase the rigor; design for higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy.
- Request student deliverables in multiple formats and diverse modalities (video, audio, images, graphics, etc.).
- Consider models, e-portfolios, exhibits, websites, databases, infographics, handouts, or other multimedia produced outputs.
- Teach mastered content and/or present assignments and projects.
Create unique outputs and demonstrate mastery in non-language formats.
Examples:
- Increase the rigor; design for higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy.
- Request student deliverables in multiple formats and diverse modalities (video, audio, images, graphics, etc.).
- Consider models, e-portfolios, exhibits, websites, databases, infographics, handouts, or other multimedia produced outputs.
- Teach mastered content and/or present assignments and projects.
When students tap into their strengths and interests through authentic assessment, it increases the value provided by your course offerings.
References
Bean, J. C. (2011). Engaging ideas: The professor’s guide to integrating writing, critical thinking, and active learning in the classroom. John Wiley & Sons.
Dick, W., Carey, L., & Carey, J. O. (2015). The systematic design of instruction. Boston, MA: Pearson.
Falchikov, N. (2005). Improving assessment through student involvement: Practical solutions for aiding learning in higher and further education. Routledge.
Guo, W., Chen, Y., Lei, J., & Wen, Y. (2014). The effects of facilitating feedback on online learners’ cognitive engagement: Evidence from the asynchronous online discussion. Education Sciences, 4, 193–208.
Jo, I., Park, Y., & Lee, H. (2017). Three interaction patterns on asynchronous online discussion behaviours: A methodological comparison. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 33, 106–122.
King, F. J., Goodson, L., & Rohani, F. (2016). Higher education assessment: Gaining insights into alternative approaches and practices. Routledge.
National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE). (2018). Career readiness: A competency-based framework. NACE.
University of Florida. (2018). Authentic assessment in online learning. Retrieved from http://citt.ufl.edu/online-teaching-resources/assessments/authentic-assessment-in-online-learning/
Wlodkowski, R. J., & Ginsberg, M. B. (2017). Enhancing adult motivation to learn: A comprehensive guide for teaching all adults. John Wiley & Sons.
