Simplified Yet Effective Assessment Strategies

Using a variety of assessment strategies can help measure student learning more accurately. Test students in a variety of skill sets to gain the best insight on true student learning. Simplify the quiz process using online quiz tools.

Creating quizzes that support learning takes practice. In order to produce strong and effective questions you must first examine your course or unit objectives, and overall goal. Next, you should keep in mind what kinds of questions measure which student skill. Since productive learning is more than memorization, the most effective assessments will ask questions that allow students to demonstrate their knowledge in a variety of ways.

Five Areas of Student Learning for Effective Assessment Strategies

Good quiz questions can make a difference in assessing student outcomes. A quiz is not teaching tool as much as it is a measuring tool. But before you begin measuring, you first need to know what it is you want to measure. So what types of questions measure which skills?  Examine these five areas of student learning to help generate effective questions.

Measure student knowledge
This includes important names, dates, principles, common terms, and even definitions. To maintain variety in assessing this type of knowledge, try selecting questions that ask students to define or describe, identify, label, match, or organize.

Measure student understanding

To determine a level of comprehension ask students to give examples, explain or summarize, or even estimate or predict.

Measure student problem-solving skills
Students must use this skill to be able to apply knowledge. To assess learning for this area, select questions that ask students to demonstrate, relate, or solve. Often, these type of questions can ask students how they might teach a particular concept. This helps them to deconstruct their knowledge in order to convey it to others.

Measure student analyzing skills
To determine whether students are able to distinguish fact from inferences, use questions that ask students to diagram, illustrate, separate and arrange, then label.

Measure student evaluation skills
To measure how well a student is able to evaluate information, select questions that ask students to compare, contrast, criticize, describe, explain, or to give an example.

Students must use this skill to be able to apply knowledge. To assess learning for this area, select questions that ask students to demonstrate, relate, or solve. Often, these type of questions can ask students how they might teach a particular concept. This helps them to deconstruct their knowledge in order to convey it to others.

Measure student analyzing skills
To determine whether students are able to distinguish fact from inferences, use questions that ask students to diagram, illustrate, separate and arrange, then label.

Measure student evaluation skills
To measure how well a student is able to evaluate information, select questions that ask students to compare, contrast, criticize, describe, explain, or to give an example.
Watch How to Create an Assessment Online

Simplifying the Quiz-making task

Knowing what skills to assess is only the part of the task. Many teachers are opting to use online tools to help in simplify the job of actually creating a quality assessment.

Variety will aid you in creating questions that can measure each skill area you wish to evaluate. Assessment strategies that include variety are more engaging, as well as offering multiple ways of measuring various student skills.

When choosing an online quiz generator, consider a product which offers an assortment of question styles. The example below shows the various possible question styles in ProProfs Quiz Maker. Each question type can be used in more than one way, to assess the five skill areas listed above.

The chart below can help you determine which skill is best assessed by which type of question.

Another important factor in creating quizzes, is how easy they are to score. Teachers often have the need to create more frequent, short assessments, but the thought of grading so many assessments can seem overwhelming. That’s where tools like ProProfs Quiz Maker can really help.

Online quiz generators allow teachers to create each question using different determinants. For example, teachers can assign a different point value for each question, or choose to assign a total point value for the entire quiz. In addition, teachers can select from four different result types as you see in this screen shot from ProProfs Quiz Maker.

For teachers who wish to use percentages and letter grades, cutoff values are another item teachers can customize. These options allow teachers to have complete control over the grading. As each quiz is completed, results are automatically scored based on teacher preferences. Results of each quiz can be reviewed by student or by class.

Efficient, Effective, and Re-Usable

When creating quality assessments, there can be a lot to consider, but don’t be discouraged. Effective assessment strategies are easily attainable using guidelines described above.

Consider the value of assessing student knowledge accurately, yet efficiently. Because student learning is multifaceted, it makes sense that teachers offer assessments that examine the various aspects of student learning.

Using online quiz tools can help make your assessment process simpler, more reliable and easier to grade. The best part about making new quizzes is the ability to reuse them. Use the methods and tools you have just read about and you are well on your way to creating quality assessments to complement your instruction.