Design and implementation choices > Roles of e-assessment in course design

Question 29
What are suitable roles for e-assessment in formative and summative assessment?

• Peter Rowlett
• Niclas Larson

What motivates this question?

E-assessment has considerable advantages, around efficiency and effectiveness of assessment. It also has limitations, including user input and automated marking. Finally, there are grey issues - areas that it is not certain whether they are purely advantages, limitations, or a combination. For example, the issue of whether instant feedback at the point of submission encourages positive learning behaviour appears to be open. The advantages and limitations vary in formative and summative circumstances, for example formative work doesn’t suffer issues around impersonation or guessing. Though it is uncertain how often truly formative use of e-assessment takes place, with some reporting the need to award some credit to motivate engagement (e.g. see Broughton, Hernandez-Martinez & Robinson, 2013). The advantages and limitations also interact with broader assessment practice, for example using e-assessment for procedural elements of assessment and reserving the more resource-intensive human-marking for more conceptual elements may be a suitable approach to avoid disadvantages around e-assessment encouraging procedural learning. Given this balance of advantages and limitations, and the changes in different circumstances, what are suitable roles for e-assessment?

This question has potential to impact on the ambition of those implementing e-assessment. For example, Foster (2007) introduced e-assessment in first year undergraduate mathematics, from a feeling that “assignments at this level could be handled by computer-based methods, and computer-based marking, without compromising standards”, reporting that staff eventually recognised that the questions asked at first year level provided appropriate challenge. Later, Foster extended this to “most second year modules”, but observes that “clearly, given the limitations of any computer-based assessment tool, it is not possible to set all questions as [e-assessment] at this level”.

What might an answer look like?

Perhaps a comprehensive survey of assessment practice integrating deeply the purposes and design of whole-module assessment approaches could be undertaken and analysed to draw broad conclusions about these issues.

Related questions

• The issue of instant feedback is related to Q12: In what circumstances is instant feedback from automated marking preferable to marking by hand?.
• The issue of e-assessment limitations with respect to summative assessment is related to Q36: To what extent do existing e-assessments provide reliable measures of mathematical understanding, as might otherwise be measured by traditional exams?.
• The issue of whether e-assessment encourages positive learning behaviour is related to Q16: What should students be encouraged to do following success in e-assessment?.
• Summative e-assessment is considered in Q28: How can regular summative e-assessments support learning?.
• The issue of formative e-assessment supporting learning is related to Q27: How can formative e-assessments improve students’ performance in later assessments?.

References

Broughton, S.J., Hernandez-Martinez, P. & Robinson, C.L. (2013). A definition for effective assessment and implications on computer-aided assessment practice. In A.M. Lindmeier & A. Heinze (Eds.), 37th Conference of the International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education, Kiel, Germany, vol. 2 (pp. 113-120). Berlin: The International Group for the Psychology of Mathematics Education.

Foster, B. (2007). Using computer based assessment in first year mathematics and statistics degree courses at Newcastle University. MSOR Connections, 7(3), 41-45.