There is good evidence that student achievement is related, first and foremost, to engagement (Astin, 1997). Engagement does not simply equate to the amount of involvement in and time on task, important though that is. It extends to learners’ engagement in communities of practice, to their involvement in a variety of networks and to the amount and quality of interchanges with others. Cognitive engagements with others are powerful stimuli for learning (learning as social acts, Vygotsky).
The award of a degree should attest that graduates have largely achieved what the curriculum specifies, with the added implication that what has been achieved is, in some measure, transferable.
Notice that these assessments have at least three conditions to meet if they are to be consistent with the account of learning that has just been sketched.
1. They have to be faithful to the curriculum (charged with developing understandings, skills, self-theories and reflectiveness).
2. They must align with the notion that education is concerned with some degree of abstraction, generalisation or transfer.
3. They should not impede student engagement in communities of practice, but should encourage behaviours associated with good learning.
Copied from
Knight, P. (2002). Summative assessment in higher education: practices in disarray. Studies in Higher Education, 27.3, pp. p275-86.
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