Edward B Nuhfer
Director, Office of Teaching Effectiveness and
Professor of Geology, Campus Box 137
University of Colorado at Denver, 80217-3364
e-mail: enuhfer@carbon.cudenver.edu

ABSTRACT

Assessment requires (1) measures of results, (2) evaluation of the processes that lead to the results, and (3) a commitment to promote change for the better. Complete assessment employs both summative and formative evaluations. Summative evaluation is the most common. It takes place at the end of a course, is used for evaluative purposes and commonly measures student satisfaction. Formative evaluation takes place while a class is ongoing. It is the indispensable part of assessment that provides a way for us to continuously monitor our students' learning and our own teaching practices. Knowledge surveys provide convenient ways to examine changes in students' learning, and data from knowledge surveys have both formative and summative applications. Formative surveys of teaching practices examine process and define a "fingerprint" of the professor's teaching style, which can outline specific areas for improvement. Consultation, in-class videotapes, student management teams and classroom assessment techniques (CATs) are activities through which one can use formative data to produce real change.

KEY WORDS:

INTRODUCTION

Assessment begins with educational values and should be part of the ongoing process of teaching and learning, not an add-on exercise at the end (Banta and others, 1996). Assessment is aimed at continuous understanding and improvement of student learning. Assessment requires (1) measures of results, (2) evaluation of the processes that lead to the results, and (3) a commitment to promote change for the better.

"Formative" evaluation refers to structured evaluation that is provided while the course is ongoing so as to permit improvements (Scriven, 1967; Tessmer, 1993). It stands in contrast to "summative evaluation," which refers to structured evaluation provided at the end of a course. Formative evaluations can monitor student learning (through classroom assessment techniques--CATs and knowledge surveys) and teaching practices (through diagnostic surveys). Summative techniques can also measure student learning (standardized examinations and knowledge surveys) and student satisfaction (summative student ratings), but they do not define why students are satisfied or what changes would result in the most significant improvement. The term "student evaluation" is a common synonym for the summative ratings of teaching and teachers by students (Cashin, 1988; 1995), but formative and summative surveys are both "student evaluations" whenever students provide the responses to the evaluation items. Departments should not mistake evaluations of faculty for rank, salary, tenure, or merit reward as "assessment." Evaluation is only a part of assessment and it must be balanced by support in order to obtain continuous improvement.

This paper presents several formative tools that have all been used to good advantage in both lab and lecture geology classes, shows how they complement the fairly universal summative evaluation, and demonstrates how formative data can be used to obtain improvements. Some tools presented here were developed in geoscience classes, but have been described in literature not commonly accessed by geoscience teachers. References cited in this paper represent key literature on evaluation and assessment that can help close the gap between geoscience education and educational research. Like good teaching and learning principles, the concepts of evaluation and assessment are related and have universal applications that are not discipline-specific. The outcomes I anticipate for this paper are (1) that the tools provided here will be used by geology instructors who will be pleasantly surprised by the improvements they produce and (2) that an understanding of the broader nature of evaluation and assessment will permit geology faculty to contribute more to their own institutional governance structures where evaluation and assessment plans and policies are designed and implemented.

To download the complete The Place of Formative Evaluations in Assessment and Ways to Reap Their Benefits document, click here.