The 'A's and the 'E's!

It's the time of the year again for the Annual Learning and Teaching Seminar held in NTU. This year's theme is on assessment and feedback.

So, is it "assessment FOR learning" or "assessment OF learning"? Well, I guess Singaporeans are attuned to the idea of learning for the sake of clearing the examinations. The outcomes of learning encapsulated in the form of a paper qualification is very much coveted and hence, little emphasis has been placed on the quality of learning processes to get people to that end. I'm not suggesting that we should disregard the learning outcomes in any way; but we should discern the true meaning of of these outcomes. Graduating with a degree does not qualify the internalization of knowledge and practices in the field of study. Often so, the availability of opportunities to scale professional experience and development in different work contexts greatly impact and shape job performances and employability.

The Guest-of-Honour just unveiled a new concept as I was typing away - "Assessment AS learning". Here, the assessment component is embedded as part of the learning process. A very good assessment tool to exemplify this concept would be project - based assessment. This mode of assessment is pretty much formative in nature and as members of a project team, you get to concurrently learn and to be assessed. In addition, teachers, who are the project supervisors, serve as "knowledge source" pertaining to the project discipline(s). Apart from assimilating knowledge from the teachers, the students themselves are great knowledge pool for interdependent learning when they tap on one another's "expertise" and prior knowledge to synthesize or construct meaningful knowledge to address the issue at hand.

I would like to coin this new concept as the "3-in-1 mix" where you would find the three tenets of education namely, "teach, learn, assess" - all rolled into one! Well, guess I would stop here for now. Do take some time to mull over this if you are a parent... And please expire your views...I would be glad to hear from you!