I know I'm late to the dance; just had a lot on my plate lately. To encourage students to read, I have students prepare index cards in some classes--the must include a question they have as a result of the readings for the day and they must include a quotation with an explanation of why they liked that particular quotation. Sometimes I also ask them to include a multiple choice item over the material and I use good ones in the exams (there aren't too many of those). If there are 15 chapters then they must hand in 10 of these in the semester for full credit and they are only a few points but generally even at that motivate most students to do the readings.
Alternatively, I give 10-item quizzes from a pool of about 30 items on webCT, which randomizes the items so each quiz is fairly unique. This helps me see what they have missed in general and also encourages reading. Again, I drop the lowest scores at the end of the semester for any quizzes in excess of 10. I give no makeups because they go to the dropped scores category. Again, this does work pretty well in getting readings done in advance. In upper division classes especially I give a more substantive assignment: students have to read 3 classic articles from a predetermined list and have to hand in an article summary/critique for each. They are spread out for due dates across the semester; this means they pick from different areas. The first time I tried this I got all three in the last week of class, from the last 3 chapters of the book ;) Here are my questions: ARTICLE EVALUATION GUIDELINES FOR RESEARCH STUDIES Introduction 1. What is the main point of this article? 2. What hypothesis was tested in the study? Method 3. Does the author’s method actually test the hypothesis? 4. What is/are the independent variable(s)? 5. What is/are the dependent variable(s)? 6. What is/are the control variable(s)? Results 7. How did the author(s) analyze the data? 8. Were the obtained results as expected? 9. Note how large differences are between groups—not just whether results are ‘significant’; significant differences are not always meaningful, and nonsignificant findings can be meaningful 10. How would I interpret these results? Discussion 11. Does the author’s interpretation represent the data? 12. What would be a good follow-up study? Because I primarily teach cognitive upper division classes we also do coglabs for some points. In intropsych, students also have to do a website critique. There are many resources online and you can pick your favorite on how to evaluate a website. I tell students they can go to any website that purports to provide information on human behavior, but it must end in .com or .net (in other words no .gov, .edu, .org sites because these are generally quite good and don't challenge their evaluation. In many classes I have brief presentations... OK, I'm tired of listing these; there are lots of ideas around. I'm sure I picked these up from various many instructors' manuals over the years. So there are some ideas for other assignments with relative development of other skills than just tests. Some count a lot some count minimally. Annette Annette Kujawski Taylor, Ph. D. Professor, Psychological Sciences University of San Diego 5998 Alcala Park San Diego, CA 92110 [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]> ________________________________ From: Carol DeVolder [[email protected]] Sent: Sunday, January 16, 2011 9:07 AM To: Teaching in the Psychological Sciences (TIPS) Subject: [tips] Favorite non-test evaluation Dear TIPSters, I know this has been discussed previously (repeatedly), but I wonder if you might answer a question for me. What is your favorite mechanism of evaluating student learning other than an exam? In other words, do you assign a paper? A project? What else? The thing that prompted my question is something I read from a presentation by Ike Shibley, _23 Practical Strategies to Help New Faculty Thrive_, summarized by Mary Bart and disseminated on our campus by our Center for Teaching Excellence i9n other words, that's as far as my reference citation can go). In the presentation Shibley recommends having multiple means of assessment, including "high stakes" assessments such as exams, and "low stakes" assessments such as participation points. Personally, I see the low stakes assessments such as participation points as "gimme" points and I don't like to reward students just for showing up. On the other hand, I'm willing to be open about other means and would like to mix things up a bit. So that is the basis for my question--what is your ideal mix of "grading opportunities" for students? Thanks, Carol -- Carol DeVolder, Ph.D. Professor and Chair, Department of Psychology St. Ambrose University 518 West Locust Street Davenport, Iowa 52803 563-333-6482 This e-mail might be confidential, so please don't share it. --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13534.4204dc3a11678c6b1d0be57cfe0a21b0&n=T&l=tips&o=7934 (It may be necessary to cut and paste the above URL if the line is broken) or send a blank email to leave-7934-13534.4204dc3a11678c6b1d0be57cfe0a2...@fsulist.frostburg.edu<mailto:leave-7934-13534.4204dc3a11678c6b1d0be57cfe0a2...@fsulist.frostburg.edu> --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=8244 or send a blank email to leave-8244-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
