• Home
  • Topics
    • Academic Leadership
    • Blended and Flipped Learning
    • Course Design
    • Educational Assessment
    • Effective Classroom Management
    • Effective Teaching Strategies
    • Faculty Development
    • Online Education
    • Philosophy of Teaching
    • Teaching and Learning
    • Teaching with Technology
  • Free Reports
  • Magna Products
    • The Teaching Professor
    • Magna Online Seminars
    • 20-Minute Mentors
    • Online Courses
    • About Magna
  • Conferences
  • About Us
 
Sign Up
Faculty Focus | Higher Ed Teaching & Learning
Higher Ed Teaching Strategies from Magna Publications
  • Home
  • Topics
    • Academic Leadership
    • Blended and Flipped Learning
    • Course Design
    • Educational Assessment
    • Effective Classroom Management
    • Effective Teaching Strategies
    • Faculty Development
    • Online Education
    • Philosophy of Teaching
    • Teaching and Learning
    • Teaching with Technology
  • Free Reports
  • Magna Products
    • The Teaching Professor
    • Magna Online Seminars
    • 20-Minute Mentors
    • Online Courses
    • About Magna
  • Conferences
  • About Us
Faculty Focus | Higher Ed Teaching & Learning
  • Home
  • Topics
    • Academic Leadership
    • Blended and Flipped Learning
    • Course Design
    • Educational Assessment
    • Effective Classroom Management
    • Effective Teaching Strategies
    • Faculty Development
    • Online Education
    • Philosophy of Teaching
    • Teaching and Learning
    • Teaching with Technology
  • Free Reports
  • Magna Products
    • The Teaching Professor
    • Magna Online Seminars
    • 20-Minute Mentors
    • Online Courses
    • About Magna
  • Conferences
  • About Us

Educational Assessment

  • Uncategorized
  • Subscription Newsletters
  • Magna Online Seminars
  • Magna Online Courses
  • Free Reports
    • Teaching & Learning
    • Online Education
    • Free Reports: Teaching Strategies
    • Free Reports: Online Teaching Strategies
    • Free Reports: Online Course Design
    • Free Reports: Course Design
    • Free Reports: Classroom Management
    • Free Reports: Academic Leadership
    • Educational Assessment
  • Articles
    • Teaching with Technology
    • Teaching and Learning
    • Philosophy of Teaching
    • Online Education
    • Faculty Development
    • Effective Teaching Strategies
    • Effective Classroom Management
    • Educational Assessment
    • Course Design
    • Blended and Flipped Learning
    • Academic Leadership
student studying

View Post

In Educational Assessment

What’s a Good Faith Effort?

October 28, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

In some types of assignments, it’s the process that’s more important than the product. Journals and online discussion exchanges, even homework problems, are good examples. Students are thinking and…

Continue Reading

frustrated student

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Dropping Scores: The Case for Hope

October 22, 2015 Nicholas F. Skinner PhD

In “Calculating Final Course Grades: What About Dropping Scores or Offering a Replacement?” (The Teaching Professor March 2014), the editor notes that “some students ... assume that course content…

Continue Reading

one student in lecture hall

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Calculating Final Course Grades: What about Dropping Scores or Offering a Replacement?

October 20, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

Instructors commonly cope with a missed test or failed exam (this may also apply to quizzes) by letting students drop their lowest score. Sometimes the lowest score is replaced…

Continue Reading

student taking test

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Student-Written Exams Increase Student Involvement

October 8, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

What? Students writing their own exams? Yes, that’s exactly what these marketing faculty members had their students do. “The Student-Written Exam method is an open book and notes take-home…

Continue Reading

three students with writing assignment

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Provide ‘Feedforward’ with Exemplars

October 1, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

There is growing interest in the pedagogical literature in something called feedforward. It is, as the name implies, the opposite of feedback, which provides input after the fact. Feedforward…

Continue Reading

Professor in empty classroom

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Student Ratings—Reminders and Suggestions

September 16, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

Recent research verifies that when looking at small differences in student ratings, faculty and administrators (in this case, department chairs) draw unwarranted conclusions. That’s a problem when ratings are…

Continue Reading

Exploring the advantages of rubrics

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Exploring the Advantages of Rubrics

September 9, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

“I don’t believe in giving students rubrics,” a faculty member told me recently. “They’re another example of something that waters down education.” I was telling him about a study…

Continue Reading

Using Grading Policies to Promote Learning

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Using Grading Policies to Promote Learning

August 26, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

I just finished putting together some materials on grading policies for a series of Magna 20-Minute Mentor programs, and I am left with several important take-aways on the powerful…

Continue Reading

All in a group

View Post

In Educational Assessment

An Interesting Group Testing Option

August 21, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

Is this situation at all like what you’re experiencing? Class sizes are steadily increasing, students need more opportunities to practice critical thinking skills, and you need to keep the…

Continue Reading

Male professor in classroom with students

View Post

In Blended and Flipped Learning, Educational Assessment

Four Assessment Strategies for the Flipped Learning Environment

August 10, 2015 Robert Talbert, PhD

Flipped learning environments offer unique opportunities for student learning, as well as some unique challenges. By moving direct instruction from the class group space to the individual students’ learning…

Continue Reading

Teacher talking to a student

View Post

In Educational Assessment

What Kind of Feedback Helps Students Who Are Doing Poorly?

August 5, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

Students perform poorly in our courses for a variety of reasons. Here are some students you’ve likely encountered over the years, as well as a few ideas on the…

Continue Reading

Fitness tracker

View Post

In Educational Assessment

What Fitness Bands Can Teach Us about Classroom Assessment

July 22, 2015 Karen S. Buchanan, EdD

A colleague of mine recently engaged with a new technology tool that has changed her life. She purchased and became a vigilant user of the fitness band. This wristband…

Continue Reading

instructor talking with student

View Post

In Blended and Flipped Learning, Educational Assessment

Flipping Assessment: Making Assessment a Learning Experience

June 15, 2015 Susan Spangler PhD

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you’re already aware that flipped instruction has become the latest trend in higher education classrooms. And for good reason. As it…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment, Effective Teaching Strategies

Using Student-Generated Reading Questions to Uncover Knowledge Gaps

March 30, 2015 Erika G. Offerdahl PhD and Lisa Montplaisir PhD

Editor’s note: The following is an excerpt from Student-Generated Reading Questions: Diagnosing Student Thinking with Diverse Formative Assessments, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education, 42 (1), 29-38. The Teaching Professor…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

A Grade Forecasting Strategy for Students

February 6, 2015 Michael J. Armstrong PhD

Optimism is generally a good thing, but it can sometimes interfere with learning. Some students are overly optimistic about their learning progress and anticipated course grades, with weaker students…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Ten Tips for More Efficient and Effective Grading

February 2, 2015 Victoria Smith PhD and Stephanie Maher Palenque

Many instructors dread grading, not just because grading takes up a sizable amount of time and can prove itself a tedious task, but also because instructors struggle with grading…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Course Design, Educational Assessment

It’s Not Too Early to Begin Preparing Students for Cumulative Finals

January 23, 2015 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

There are a couple of reasons why students don’t like comprehensive finals. First, they’re more work. Rather than four weeks’ worth of material to know and understand, there’s a…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Is Praise Undermining Student Motivation?

January 5, 2015 John Orlando, PhD

We think of praise as a good thing, even admirable. Don’t we praise our kids when they show us the drawing that they made in art class? To be…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Seven Mistakes to Avoid When Writing Multiple-Choice Questions

October 6, 2014 Jim Sibley

The goal of any well-constructed test is to test students’ expertise on a topic and not their test-taking skills. We need to eliminate as many flaws in our questions…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment, Online Education

Alternative Assessment Methods for the Online Classroom

October 3, 2014 Rob Kelly

Tests and quizzes are often the primary means of assessing online learner performance; however, as Rena Palloff and Keith Pratt, online instructors and coauthors of numerous online learning books,…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Blended and Flipped Learning, Course Design, Educational Assessment

Formative Assessment: The Secret Sauce of Blended Success

July 23, 2014 Oliver Dreon, PhD

A few weeks ago, a colleague emailed me about some trouble she was having with her first attempt at blended instruction. She had created some videos to pre-teach a…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

To Improve Student Performance, Start Thinking Like a Coach

July 7, 2014 John Orlando, PhD

I have a confession to make. I was wrong. You see, I once thought that teaching was lecturing, and I thought that because that is how my graduate mentors…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Assessing What Your Students Know, Want to Know, and Have Learned

June 13, 2014 Thomas Dyer and John Steele

Measuring student success is a top priority to ensure the best possible student outcomes. Through the years instructors have implemented new and creative strategies to assess student learning in…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

A New Way to Assess Student Learning

April 4, 2014 Deborah Bracke, PhD

I’m “reflecting” a lot these days. My tenure review is a few months away, and it’s time for me to prove (in one fell swoop) that my students are…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment, Effective Teaching Strategies

A Quiz Design that Motivates Students

December 19, 2013 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

Many faculty members use quizzes to keep students prepared and present in class. The approach often tends to be punitive, however, motivating students by extrinsic means. Karen Braun and…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Students, Studying, and Multiple-Choice Questions

November 22, 2013 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

Multiple-choice questions are not the pariah of all test questions. They can make students think and measure their mastery of material. But they can also do little more than…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Learning from Mistakes: A Different Approach to Partial Credit

November 8, 2013 Kelly A. Jackson

When you are a math teacher you are often faced with the dilemma of whether to assign partial credit to a problem that is incorrect, but that demonstrates some…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Course Design, Educational Assessment

A Different Kind of Final

October 15, 2013 Karinda Barrett PhD

Last semester I implemented a different kind of final exam. In the past I have used the standard multiple-choice and short-answer exams. I was thinking about making a change…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment, Online Education

Using Classroom Assessment Techniques: A Proactive Approach for Online Learning

September 23, 2013 Emily Bergquist and Rick Holbeck

There are two main forms of assessment often used within the online classroom. Both formative and summative assessments evaluate student learning and assist instructors in guiding instructional planning and…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Exams: Maximizing Their Learning Potential

May 10, 2013 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

We give students exams for two reasons: First, we have a professional responsibility to verify their mastery of the material. Second, we give exams because they promote learning. Unfortunately,…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Assessing Critical Thinking Skills

May 3, 2013 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

The guidelines suggested below propose how critical thinking skills can be assessed “scientifically” in psychology courses and programs. The authors begin by noting something about psychology faculty that is…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Assessing Assessment: Five Keys to Success

April 22, 2013 Vickie Kelly, EdD

There are those in the academic community who dread hearing and reading about assessment. But aside from the mandatory reporting required by credentialing and accreditation agencies, how can faculty…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment, Online Education

Frequent, Low-Stakes Grading: Assessment for Communication, Confidence

April 18, 2013 Scott Warnock PhD

After going out for tacos, our students can review the restaurant on a website. They watch audiences reach a verdict on talent each season on American Idol. When they…

Continue Reading

In Educational Assessment

Assessment as an Opportunity for Developing Independent Thinking Skills in Students

April 1, 2013 Katherine Robertson PhD

The liberal arts college where I teach recently underwent review for accreditation. Like many other colleges and universities, we were criticized for our lack of assessment. Faculty resistance, it…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment, Teaching and Learning

The Effects of Collaborative Testing

March 1, 2013 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

Although letting students work together on exam questions is still not a common instructional practice, it has been used more than might be expected and in a variety of…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

The Assessment Movement: Revisiting Faculty Resistance

January 18, 2013 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

“We ought to be up to the task of figuring out what it is that our students know by the end of four years at college that they did…

Continue Reading

In Educational Assessment

Critical Thinking: Definitions and Assessments

January 3, 2013 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

Despite almost universal agreement that critical thinking needs to be taught in college, now perhaps more than ever before, there is much less agreement on definitions and dimensions. “Critical…

Continue Reading

In Educational Assessment

Should Student Effort Count?

November 1, 2012 Maryellen Weimer, PhD

We’ve all had conversations with students who want effort counted in their grade: “But I tried so hard ... I studied for hours ... I am really working in…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Gimme an A! Confronting Presuppositions about Grading

October 29, 2012 Christopher Willard

Sometimes, in informal conversations with colleagues, I hear a statement like this, “Yeah, not a great semester, I doled out a lot of C’s.” I wonder, did this professor…

Continue Reading

View Post

In Educational Assessment

Working Toward a Fair Assessment of Students’ Reflective Writing

September 10, 2012 Karen Hughes Miller, PhD, V. Faye Jones, MD, PhD, Pradip Patel MD, and Michael Rowland, PhD

There is little argument that reflective writing is a good way to foster critical thinking, encourage self expression, and give students a sense of ownership of their work (Chretien…

Continue Reading

Posts navigation

Previous 1 2 3 4 Next

 

Topics

Faculty Focus | Higher Ed Teaching & Learning
  • Home
  • Articles
  • Free Reports
  • Conferences
  • Magna Products
  • About Us
  • RSS Feed
  • Privacy Policy
  • Rights & Permissions
  • Submission Guidelines

© 2019 Faculty Focus | Higher Ed Teaching & Learning - All Rights Reserved.