Learning and Teaching Quality

The quality of learning and teaching is generally influenced by assessment purposes and practices. Students often decide what and how they will learn in a unit by looking at the past assignments and examination questions, and their study patterns may be driven by the deadlines for assignments. Sometimes their learning can be far from desirable or what teachers intend. We can increase the quality of learning and teaching by planning/designing assessment tasks to demand desirable types of learning, and by supporting students to adopt and develop appropriate strategies for learning.

Assessing student learning — purposes
The two primary goals of assessment are to:

• measure student achievement (summative assessment); and
• provide feedback to help students learn (formative assessment). 

Tasks for the first goal contribute to the final grade. Most summative tasks are measured according to how well the work meets a set of criteria (also known as criterion-referenced assessment). If the criteria match the learning objectives for a unit, the assessment task will help to produce the desirable/intended type of learning. Tutors and demonstrators are generally provided with a marking guide outlining in detail the assessment criteria for each individual piece of assessment.

Although students tend to focus on ‘marks’, it is the feedback we provide on their work that will greatly help learning. Strictly speaking, formative assessment provides feedback to students on their progress without affecting their final grades. In reality, any activity for which students are given feedback could be considered as formative assessment — whether or not the task is also used to measure student achievement.

This module will focus on:

3.1 Planning for learning and teaching
3.2 Giving feedback on assessment tasks
3.3 Assessing student learning (marking/grading)
3.4 Promoting academic integrity

In some situations, sessional staff members are expected to design assignments and examination questions. If you are required to perform these tasks, you should attend the Foundations to university teaching program which will provide further information on the learning topics included in this module.

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