Grading and Feedback

Learning about Learning after the Exam

Exam debriefs are typically that: brief. The tests are passed back, score ranges are revealed, and the teacher goes over the most missed questions, identifying and explaining the correct answer. There may be a chance for students to ask questions, but most sit passively. This

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Making Multiple-Choice Exams Better

The relatively new Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology journal has a great feature called a “Teacher-Ready Research Review.” The examples I’ve read so far are well organized, clearly written, full of practical implications, and well referenced. This one on multiple-choice (m/c) tests (mostly

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Interviews to Assess and Mentor Students

Using Interviews to Assess and Mentor Students

Have you considered adding five-minute student interviews to your teaching tool kit? Before you calculate how long it would take to interview all of your students and dismiss this idea out of hand, consider how student interviews provide a unique setting and opportunity for you

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Encouraging Students to Think Beyond the Course Material

Encouraging Students to Think Beyond the Course Material

Research has documented the value of reflective journaling in both face-to-face and online courses. It is especially beneficial for beginning students in first-year seminar courses. But I hear you asking, “What professor has the time read a whole stack of journals?” And I would have

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Reenvisioning Rubrics

Reenvisioning Rubrics: A Few Brief Suggestions

Linda Suskie’s Assessing Student Learning documents a wide variety of common assessment errors. They result from the subjective nature of grades in all but the most factual subjects. Many failures point to the need for more objectivity and a better system of accountability, including leniency,

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Involving Students in Rubric Creation Using Google Docs

Involving Students in Rubric Creation Using Google Docs

Wide consensus confirms the usefulness of rubrics. For instructors, rubrics expedite grading with standards; at the same time, they reinforce learning objectives and standardize course curricula. For students, rubrics provide formative guidelines for assignments while—ideally—spurring reflection and self-assessment.

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Learning Styles and Test Performance

Decades of research on learning styles have resulted in widespread familiarity with the concept. Ask most students what kind of learners they are and they will often answer with a learning style descriptor—visual, verbal, kinesthetic, auditory, converger. Many will tell you they know because they’ve

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Grading Advice: For Those Who Grade a Lot

Most teachers don’t list grading as one of their favorite parts of teaching. If you’re conscientious about it, it’s a hard, time-consuming task. Dishearteningly, efforts to provide students with quality feedback aren’t always appreciated, or at least they don’t appear to be.

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Mentoring Undergraduates

Mentoring Undergraduates

“At a superficial level, everyone ‘knows’ what mentoring is. But closer examination indicates [such wide variation . . .] that the concept is devalued, because everyone is using it loosely, without precision, and it may become a short-term fad” (p. 3). That observation was made

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Low-Stakes Grading

Like a lot of terms in higher education, low-stakes grading doesn’t always refer to the same thing. In some cases it means small assignments that don’t count for much but occur regularly, as quizzes are often used. Low-stakes grading can also mean there’s a de-emphasis

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