Technology applied to classroom assessment

Compiled by Tom Creed.

This month's Virtual Companion, designed to accompany the article, TechnoCATs, in The National Teaching and Learning Forum, Vol. 7 No. 5, provides links to several resources for those interested in using technology to enhance and extend their use of Classroom Assessment Techniques (CATs). We provide links here to several sites that will be of assistance to both beginners and seasoned users of classroom assessment alike.

General descriptions of classroom assessment.

The following web sites have general overviews of classroom assessment, including descriptions of many of the more common CATs.

• The National Teaching and Learning Forum.
• Center for Academic Excellence at Portland State University.
• The Teaching Resources Center at Indiana University.
• Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching at Pennsylvania State University.
• Undergraduate Assessment and Program Review at Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville.
• Teaching Resource Center at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.

• A Structured Unit. Briefly describes how faculty can use active learning techniques in an integrated way to enhance student learning. Includes links to a summary of effective pedagogy and descriptions of Pre-class Writing Assignments, Cooperative Learning, and Classroom Assessment.
• Classroom Assessment. PowerPoint slides of a talk on CATs given by Devorah Lieberman of Portland State University.
• Classroom Assessment: Enhancing The Quality Of Adult Learning by Diana K. Kelly of Cuyamaca College, El Cajon, California, presented at the 1995 conference, Innovations in Higher Education, Technology and Workplace Literacy at National University.
• Think-Pair-Share-DISCUSS, a description of how to use this simple cooperative learning technique as classroom assessment. Published in Cooperative Learning and College Teaching, Vol. 7, No 1.

• Operant behavior, a somewhat abbreviated example of a typical unit that my students would read. It incorporates an online self-assessment quiz and a what I would like to know more about electronic conference.
• Electronic conference as a TechnoCAT. This is a fairly typical discussion forum from my Principles of Learning and Behavior course last semester. My students post a what I would like to know more about question at least two hours before the first class meeting on a topic, giving me the opportunity to assess what they know and are interested in before class begins. After class, they respond to each others' postings, giving me an idea about what is clear/unclear after the class meeting. This forum covers the same topic, operant behavior, that is demonstrated in the link above. There are some hints on how to follow the conversation on the site.
• The Perception Analyzer by Columbia Information Systems is a device that records and displays various forms of feedback from an audience.
• Alec Testa's site at Eastern New Mexico University. Of particular value are the examples of Online assessment techniques that Alec uses in his classes and the online Teaching Goals Inventory from Angelo and Cross.
• TechnoCATs: Ways to use technology as Classroom Assessment Techniques. A pre-conference workshop being offered at the annual POD conference, October 15, 1998, Snowbird, UT.

If you have examples of TechnoCATs, or feedback on this site, e-mail me (tcreed@csbsju.edu)

See the TechnoCATs sent in by other readers.