What role does assessment have in your life? How does assessment show up for you as a natural or unnatural part of your life inside and outside of school?
I feel like assessment is apart of all aspects of my life. In formal settings like school it's through finals or at work it's through my performance and task completion. In informal settings like with friends it's through assessing our relationships and problems or even more simply assessing an outfit. The purpose of assessment is reflecting and trying to improve/better whatever aspect of your life, so assessment is or should be consistent in all contexts of our lives.
What ways do you guys see assessment happening in your lives?
Assessment is constantly happening in a classroom setting and this does not change once you get to the university level. In my own major, professors more often assess our knowledge through weekly reflections than through exams. We are also assessed through projects we do or in-class assignments (such as representations). I'm sure teachers also do a lot of mental assessment that we aren't even aware of.
ReplyDeleteThat's interesting that assessment for you is more focused on reflections than through exams. As an English major, it is similar for me in that we usually don't take tests. A "final" for the quarter usually involves a portfolio of our best writing. Do you guys prefer having a reflection/writing focus or do you see more value in tests than your major emphasizes?
DeleteFor me, I definitely prefer writing and not having the pressure from tests, especially high stake tests, but then again, I like writing :)
For me, it really depends on what the writing is. For business, we have 3 major ways of "assessing" what we've learned over the quarter: a test (multiple choice or short response), a research paper or group presentation. I am not a fan of group presentations just because it can be easy for someone to coast by without really doing a lot of the work and it can be great at times but in terms of individual assessment, I don't think the presentation aspect does the job. I would prefer writing, especially when it's more reflective than research. I'm a horrible test-taker and I could study for months and still do poorly.
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