{"id":109,"date":"2018-08-03T11:24:12","date_gmt":"2018-08-03T11:24:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/?page_id=109"},"modified":"2019-08-05T12:02:20","modified_gmt":"2019-08-05T12:02:20","slug":"ensuring-the-balance","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/formative-and-summative-assessment\/ensuring-the-balance\/","title":{"rendered":"Balancing assessment patterns"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Making all or the majority of assessment summative means that students often become preoccupied with obtaining grades rather than on learning. This can lead to\u00a0<b>strategic or surface learning<\/b>, or a\u00a0<b>reduction of the curriculum<\/b>\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/srhe.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/0260293980230406#.W2ldedVKiUk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">(Sambell and McDowell, 2006)<\/a>.\u00a0For example,\u00a0if you set an essay topic or project at the beginning of the module to complete at the end, students might choose to only attend lectures which are relevant to their essay, therefore reducing the breadth of their learning.\u00a0If an end-of-term exam is the only module\u00a0assessment,\u00a0students\u00a0might not be motivated to study until the week before.<\/p>\n<p><b>Too much<\/b>\u00a0summative assessment channels students&#8217; attention from\u00a0assessment to assessment, and away from the parts of the curriculum which are not assessed.\u00a0<b>Too little<\/b>\u00a0means less meaningful learning occurring throughout course, and there\u00a0are few opportunities to practice assignments and to obtain feedback\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/srhe.tandfonline.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1080\/02602938.2013.792108#.W2leENVKiUk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> (Jessop et al, 2014)<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Formative assessments\u00a0affect (and can transform) learning, but they don\u2019t impact on a students\u2019 degree transcript, so\u00a0are not\u00a0usually\u00a0subject to the same\u00a0college\u00a0regulations\u00a0and scrutiny\u00a0as summative\u00a0assessments. Therefore,\u00a0there is more freedom for teachers\u00a0to\u00a0<b>innovate<\/b>\u00a0and for students to take the<strong> risks<\/strong> that are required for meaningful higher education <a href=\"https:\/\/internal.kcl.ac.uk\/kingsacademy\/Resources\/EiTC-Keynote-slides-Facing-Risk-with-Confidence.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">(see King&#8217;s Academy&#8217;s webpages for the Excellence in Teaching conference on Risk in HE).<\/a> Key factors such as feedback and indicators of performance still need to be considered, but the usual <strong>reliability<\/strong> concerns are less significant and therefore, learning,\u00a0rather\u00a0than\u00a0equitable measurement,\u00a0can be a primary concern.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/formative-and-summative-assessment\/ensuring-the-balance\/how-can-i-ensure-the-balance\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">How can I balance assessment patterns?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Making all or the majority of assessment summative means that students often become preoccupied with obtaining grades rather than on learning. This can lead to\u00a0strategic <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/formative-and-summative-assessment\/ensuring-the-balance\/\" title=\"Balancing assessment patterns\">[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":384,"featured_media":0,"parent":42,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-109","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/384"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/109\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1189,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/109\/revisions\/1189"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/42"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kcl.ac.uk\/aflkings\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}