| A series of lunchtime seminars began this fall for UNL faculty to
share ideas on using assessment to evaluate and improve student learning.
These seminars are sponsored by Brownstone Learning, the UNL Department
of Mathematics and Statistics, and the Center for Science, Mathematics,
and Computer Education and held in the Burnett Hall Testing Center.
Essential to these efforts is the web-based assessment engine known
as Enterprise Diploma (EDU), also marketed by John Wiley as eGrade.
Dr. John Orr, UNL Professor of Mathematics and Statistics, wrote
the software.
UNL is collaborating with Brownstone Learning to further develop
EDU. Brownstone brings 18 years' experience developing educational
software to this partnership.
At UNL, EDU is presently used in math, statistics, geology, astronomy,
physics, psychology, educational psychology, chemistry, biology,
history, political science, and distance education courses.
During the 2000-2001 academic year, it was used by at least 8,500
students - almost half of UNL's undergraduate enrollment.
Many faculty use EDU as part of a proficiency-teaching environment
to enhance student learning. EDU allows students to work and re-work
question sets 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, over the Internet until
they achieve proficiency.
There are two parts to the motivating theory behind this strategy.
First, a student-centered assessment system helps students achieve
proficiency by providing opportunities to practice while giving
immediate feedback and allowing students to work through material
at their own pace.
Second, assessment gives instructors greater knowledge of each
student's abilities, enabling them to improve their instructional
practices and course design.
Sophisticated assessments can go beyond multiple-choice formats.
EDU questions incorporate images, animations and Java applets. Students
are asked for responses to open-ended math, numeric and short-phrase
questions, as well as fill-in-the-blank and multiple choice.
Using Java applets, EDU can ask questions which students answer
by maniplulating an animated virtual environment into a predefined
state.
Such questions might prompt students to sketch a graph or perform
a virtual physics experiment as part of their assignments.
These new technologies will give educators the tools to tackle
issues in assessment such as 'How do you truly measure student learning?' |
