account in order to create a learning and assessment programme that is accessible to all students in my classroom . To address these issues , I integrated a formative essay assignment into the assessment model . Williams and Black broadly define formative assessment as ‘ Encompassing all those activities undertaken by teachers , and / or by their students , which provide information to be used as feedback to modify the teaching and learning activities in which they are engaged ’. 17 Specific to this module , and history as discipline , the formative assignment will be a research essay up to 2,500 words ( same length as the summative research paper ). Students select their own research paper topics and the assignment will be due in week 8 ( the summative essay will be due in week 12 ). This gives students the opportunity to practice the skills that will be assessed in the summative essay assignment . All feedback for the formative assignment is in one-on-one meetings at least two weeks before the summative assignment is due ( week 10 ). The formative assignment is optional .
Formative assessment is important to a sound teaching pedagogy as it focuses on the growth and development of a specific skill set rather than obtaining a single final grade . This also allows the instructor to measure the extent to which students are developing certain skills . Given that this will be submitted in week 8 , I have four weeks to modify the teaching programme before the submission of the summative assignment to ensure that students will achieve the intended learning outcomes . Likewise , students will have the opportunity to respond to oral and written feedback from the assignment , ‘ This shift in focus , whereby students are seen as having a proactive rather than a reactive role in generating and using feedback , has profound implications for the way in which teachers organise assessments and support learning .’ 18 In this way , students have more agency over their learning programmes and they become more accountable for the development of these discipline-specific skill sets . They are given the opportunity to demonstrate their growth from the formative assignment to the summative assignment .
The formative assessment will also make clear the objectives of academic writing to students coming from different cultural and educational backgrounds . Formative assessments help standardise students ’ understandings of their expectations in the university setting . According to Lea and Street , ‘ different assumptions about the nature of writing , related to different epistemological presuppositions about the nature of academic knowledge and learning , are being brought to bear , often implicitly , on the specific writing requirements of their ( student ) assignments ’. 19 The formative assessment is an opportunity to dismantle assumptions and to standardise expectations in the module before the summative assignment submission .
However , there are also some issues related to the implementation of formative assessment . First , as the assignment does not comprise a portion of the final mark , some students are reluctant to participate in an optional assignment ; high levels of participation cannot be guaranteed in formative assessment models . As the instructor , I remind students in every seminar about the formative assessment and highlight its importance . I also create a page on the module KLE site to explain the assignment and encourage students to contact me ( via email or in person ) with any questions . While 100 % participation cannot be guaranteed in this mode of assessment ( or any form of assessment ), I ensure that students have all available information to make the right decision for themselves . 20 However , it is important to note that formative assessment methods create a higher marking workload for instructors and may have an impact on departmental workload allocations . Instructors ’ time is a valuable resource for the Humanities and this must be taken into consideration when constructing the assessment models . 21
In addition to providing formative assessment feedback in oral and written forms , I provide feedback for the oral presentation assignment in both oral and written forms . Offering one-to-one meetings with students promotes an open dialogue between students and the instructor . Hopefully , students will feel more comfortable approaching the instructor with any issues in the future . In a similar vein , I strongly encourage students to attend my office hours in the future to strengthen these lines of communication . Also , some students find it more effective to talk through feedback comments in a more dynamic process and clarify any points that were perhaps unclear in the written feedback . 22 Again , this module strives to be as diverse and inclusive as possible in its assessment ( and feedback ) in order to empower all students to achieve the intended learning outcomes . The ability to process , respond to and enact constructive criticism is key in the development of graduate skills for life beyond university . Learning how to
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