Showing posts with label Constructivism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Constructivism. Show all posts

Thursday, September 4, 2014

Authentic Assessment


I would like to share the information below that has helped me to increase my knowledge on assessments, which has also made me more appreciative of the Adult Education Programs.

Authentic assessments as noted by Myer (1992) is not the same as performance assessment, in that, they are similar to the point that both forms of assessments provide challenges, and engages the students; however, authentic assessments affords the learners with sufficient time for planning, completing the assignment, “self-“assessment, revising, and consulting  with another.  Additionally, when using “authentic assessments,” student assignments must be evaluated using the “same kinds of criteria (standards) used to judge similar task,” (Wisconsin Education Association Council, 2014).

“Authentic Instruction and Learning”

Based on Wisconsin Education Association Council, (2014) authentic instructions and learning are very much like “performance or authentic assessments” in relationship to students retaining knowledge and instructions. Educators desiring for improvement in assessments, and instructions have to integrate the two.  “Newmann, and Wehlage, 1993 article” states that instructions are “authentic if they help learners obtain the following objectives:

1.      “ Construct meaning and produce knowledge”

2.      “Use disciplined inquiry to construct meaning and”

3.      “Aim work toward production of discourse, products and performances that have value or meaning beyond success in school,” (Wisconsin Education Association Council, 2014).

Reference

Re Wisconsin Education Association Council. (2014). Performance Assessment.  Retrieved

Sunday, May 25, 2014

Sunday morning Skype session

It's past noon and our group is Skyping (as I type this), to determine which direction our PLN will take... we're feeling very 21st century! In addition, the group (Karla and Mikki) are watching my screen as I demonstrate some of the functions, gadgets and widgets available in Blogger -- pretty much participating in the activities that define a PLN (Professional Learning Network). At the end of our Skype session (the first sentence of this post was typed while providing an example of how to use Blogger, labels for posts in this case), we agreed that we were grateful to have been given this assignment since this is a tool each of us can use beyond this assignment, this class and even this program (Adult Education and Training), a place where we can share new knowledge, ask questions, share our experience with the technologies we're using, air our frustrations... isn't that what a PLN is about?

Without putting too fine a point on this (and avoiding the temptation to turn this post into a paper on Connectivism or shared VLEs), I just want to say that, with the exception that this blog arose from an assignment to this learning team (the existing PLN on this blog), everything has evolved organically, through mutual agreement, one of the defining characteristics of a PLN.

Having said that, I want to point to a massive resource that will add to my understanding of what a PLN is and can be (mostly because I haven't had the time to really work on my Diigo presence):
PLN blogs on Edutopia.

That should do it, for now. In the meantime, I'm hoping to see this PLN's blogroll grow... and, while that happens, having this place attract the attention of other professionals like us who would like to participate!