In preparation for the course seminar on Wednesday I read Allan Davies article Learning outcomes and assessment criteria in art and design. What’s the recurring problem?
Alan led UAL’s Centre for Learning & Teaching in Art & Design several years ago and the article below was described as ” offer[ing] a balanced critique of outcomes-based learning and assessment from a position of considerable experience working with art and design HE institutions.
I was asked as I read the article to:
- nod sagely at the things you knew already
- raise your eyebrows at anything that is new to you
- google things you’ve never heard of (e.g. Bloom’s taxonomy, SOLO, Constructive Alignment, QAA)
- OPTIONAL: you might want to write, sketch or speak a blog post about how—and to what extent—the author’s observations and examples of art & design assessment correspond with your own experience.
Nods – 5
Eyebrows – 6
Googles – Hussey and Smith
– Norm referenced vs Criterion Referenced
– John Biggs SOLO taxonomy
– Bloom Taxonomy
I was trying to read this while working in the workshop, so was interrupted a lot through the day with student enquiries. However, as this is such horribly dense material, it was actually refreshing to come back to a paragraph i had left, and find i had more understanding once i had returned after a small break doing something irl with a student.
Speaking with Andrew today, we discussed how a lot, if not all the material of the course so far feels very directed towards the academics, and it is hard to understand how to apply this to my role as a technician.
I was not sure of should try to relate it to technical work, or to understand it theoretically as an academic. I have no problem following it theoretically, but i have been struggling to feel motivated as it is all so far from my actual role.
We discussed that though to asses a student, and create learning outcomes doesn’t exists in the same way in our roles, we are constantly assessing students abilities, in as much as “are they capable of doing this on their own?” and guiding them towards objectives – leaving the workshop with a piece of work finished to a professionall standard.
It was interesting to see your thoughts about the disconnection between the content given on the course and your teaching practice. I do have a more academic teaching role and actually found it so valuable to see the response of other teachers who occupy a different space and practice and the debates and conversations that stem from that, but I hand’t considered the extra mental work that must require for you.
I do agree with Andrew in that even though the way you deliver sessions might take on a different format: with each student that uses the workshop, asks questions, comes to a tutorial, there must always be an element of thinking about student needs, what they might need to take away from the interaction and making sure that they have understood. This mimics the process of considering learning outcomes and assessment, just in a more spontaneous way and through a shorter time-frame.