Rethinking Assessment in Higher Education Learning for the Longer Term [Paperback]

Assessment is a value-laden activity surrounded by debates about academic standards, preparing students for employment, measuring quality and providing incentives. There is substantial evidence that assessment, rather than teaching, has the major influence on students learning. It directs attention to what is important and acts as an incentive for study.

This book revisits assessment in higher education, examining it from the point of view of what assessment does and can do and argues that assessment should be seen as an act of informing judgement and proposes a way of integrating teaching, learning and assessment to better prepare students for a lifetime of learning. It is essential reading for practitioners and policy makers in higher education institutions in different countries, as well as for educational development and institutional research practitioners.

Part 1: Setting the Scene  1. Assessment for the Longer Term  2. Reframing Assessment as if Learning was Important  Part 2: The Context of Assessment  3. Assessment in Higher Education: An Impossible Mission?  4. Learning Assessment: Students Experiences in Post-School Qualifications  Part 3: Themes  5. Contradictions of Assessment for Learning in Institutions of Higher Learning  6. Grading, Classifying and Future Learning  7. Assessment Engineering: Breaking Down Barriers between Teaching and Learning, and Assessment  8. Rethinking Feedback and Assessment-for-Learning  9. Conceptions of Self-Assessment: What is Needed for Long Term Learning?  10. The Place of Peers in Assessment  11. Assessment and Emotion: The Impact of Being Assessed  Part 4: The Practice of Assessment  12. Writing about Practice for Future Learning  13. The Contribution of lӗ