What is authentic assessment? How do you make your assessments truly authentic in the online modality? Why is it important to assess your students authentically? Come to learn about authentic assessment and get tips on to accelerate assessment in your online courses.
After attending the session, participants will be able to:
- Define authentic assessment
- Identify authentic assessment in the online environment
- Discuss the elements of an authentic assessment specific to the online environment.
- Examine and identify the benefits of authentic assessments on student learning
Online learning has expanded the horizon for institutions of higher education. How do you ensure that your students are being authentically assessed so that what they are learning can transfer into future courses and eventually the workforce? Authentically assessing students encourages critical thinking skills, aides students in evaluating information to deliver an informed decision, and provides students with the opportunity to demonstrate mastery of the course concepts and materials outside of the traditional test taking we have all suffered through.
In this interactive session, we will discuss the challenges of creating assessments for the online learner that are engaging and actually support acquiring those higher-level cognitive thinking skills. We will review characteristics of authentic assessment and the elements required to authentically assess a student in the online environment. Participants will be presented a variety of assessments and will be asked to identify the authentic elements or provide suggestions for improvement to make the assessment authentic.
Goals
1. Review the characteristics of authentic assessments
2. Review types of authentic assessments that can be utilized online.
3. Discuss strategies for creating authentic assessments.
4. Create dialogue amongst participants to share strategies in creating authentic assessments for the online environment.