Activity 1: Group Test
Activity 2: Statistics as Reality


Activity 1

Title: Group Test

Instructional Strategy: Brainstorming/Critical Thinking/Cooperative Learning

Purpose:

This activity is designed to give students a context for considering assessment and evaluation issues.

Objective:

• Develop awareness of issues related to assessment and evaluation

Student Activity:

Form groups of four to six. Create a test "bank" of items for this educational psychology class. The groups are responsible for providing the following:

• exam items (these can be in any format: true/false, multiple choice, short answer, essay)
• the answer(s) acceptable for these items

Each group should type up an exam (without answers) and bring enough copies to class so that several students will have the opportunity to take the exams. If students will be doing much of this activity over multiple class periods, it may be useful for group members to also design a study guide for potential test-takers. Group members will administer the exam, grade it, and compute the test statistics. Create a frequency histogram and provide information about the mean, median, and mode scores as well as the standard deviation. Some group members should briefly interview students who took the exam to find out how those students thought it measured their knowledge or learning about the chapters in question. Did the study guide help?

Group members should prepare a brief poster presentation addressing the following:

• How did the group decide which items were appropriate?
• Did the group collaborate or were there dominating influences?
• Provide an example of the group process (e.g., how one item was decided on).
• Discuss the ideas, concepts, terms, and specialized knowledge you have gained from this course in terms of assessment issues brought forth by the exam your group created.
• Did you create a norm-referenced or criterion-referenced test? How do you know?
• Is this a formative or summative assessment? How might the results be used?
• Why did your group choose a particular format instead of another? (e.g., objective items versus essay-type questions)
• Was your exam a fair measure of what students learned? Provide evidence supporting your opinions.
• Would you omit or add questions if you were to revise the exam? What questions would you change? Why?

Variations:

1. This activity may be assigned to take place out of class or in class. Time could be spent on this activity over several class periods. The latter is especially helpful as students begin to calculate test statistics and interpret the results.
2. Students could also create an assessment based on current events or a favorite TV show/movie and administer it to the class, or to friends outside of class. Class discussion could focus on outcomes and why some items were better than others.

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Activity 2

Title: Statistics as Reality

Instructional Strategy: Critical Thinking/Connections to Prior Knowledge

Purpose:

To provide a meaningful context through which to learn about concepts of test interpretation.

Objective:

• Develop an understanding of concepts related to test interpretation.

Student Activity:

The instructor will administer a scheduled quiz or test. He or she will use the class results to provide examples of mean, median, and mode (descriptive statistics). How do these vary? How might one or two scores dramatically change one or more of these statistics?

Discuss general issues of measurement (reliability and validity) in terms of this specific quiz or test. Also have students consider how one measurement is or is not a reflection of what they have learned. Discuss whether or not a criterion-referenced or norm-referenced assessment would be preferable?

Variations:

1. The instructor will administer a "pop" quiz over difficult concepts (just about all statistical concepts are difficult for newcomers to statistics). Do the same activity, but discuss the usefulness of study guides and the utility of advance preparation. What different things are measured in unannounced versus announced exams?
2. Have students bring in scores from a test that they took in another class to analyze in order to bypass concerns regarding identifiable personal information or focusing too much on trying to criticizing a test for the purposes of getting a better grade.