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dominknow

Best Practices for Writing Effective eLearning Test Questions - 0 views

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elearning best practices elearning test questions effective elearning elearning

shared by dominknow on 15 Oct 19 - No Cached
  • dominknow on 15 Oct 19
     
    When writing effective test questions, it's important to focus on writing an objective test. Ideally, add at least one test question for each Learning Object and ensure that question addresses the learning objective.
Sasha Thackaberry

Competency-based education gets a boost from the Education Department @insidehighered - 0 views

www.insidehighered.com/...ets-boost-education-department

education department gets competency-based financial aid

shared by Sasha Thackaberry on 10 Nov 14 - No Cached
  • On Tuesday the department announced a new round of its “experimental sites” initiative, which waives certain rules for federal aid programs so institutions can test new approaches without losing their aid eligibility. Many colleges may ramp up their experiments with competency-based programs -- and sources said more than 350 institutions currently offer or are seeking to create such degree tracks.
  • the federal program could help lay the groundwork for regulation and legislation that is better-suited to competency-based learning.
  • Supporters of competency-based education called the experimental sites announcement a big win.
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  • “The department recognizes that this is new territory and they don't have a regulatory framework for it,” said Paul LeBlanc, president of Southern New Hampshire University.
  • Colleges have faced plenty of red tape as they seek to give competency-based education a try. That is particularly true for “direct assessment” programs, the most aggressive version, which does not rely on the traditional credit hour standard.
  • Only two institutions -- College for America, a subsidiary of Southern New Hampshire, and Capella University -- have been successful in the lengthy process of getting the department and regional accrediting agencies to approve direct assessment programs. Other institutions have tried and either were rebuffed by the feds or are still waiting for the final word.
  • For example, the University of Wisconsin-Extension last year created ambitious direct assessment degree tracks. But the university has had to cover for the absence of federal aid for its “Flex Program” by spending more on grants for students. Officials with the system said Tuesday they were eager to participate in the experimental sites program.
  • Clearing the Way
  • The latest round of experimental sites grew out of a request for ideas the department issued last year. Many colleges sent in suggestions.
  • Mitchell drew rave reviews from several participants in the Washington, D.C., meeting of the Lumina Foundation-funded group, which is called the Competency-Based Education Network (C-BEN).
  • Jim Selbe is a special assistant to the chancellor of the Kentucky Community and Technical College System, which is a pioneer in competency-based programs in the two-year sector.
  • Experimental site status would give the Kentucky system the ability to “be broader and have more flexibility,” said Selbe. “This is going to give us a chance to really go field test.”
  • For example, Selbe said, the system is considering new programs that would charge students a monthly fee for all they can learn. This subscription-style approach could also apply to four-month terms.
  • A move by the Kentucky system to try subscriptions is “impossible right now” under federal aid rules, said Selbe. But experimental sites could open the door to monthly aid disbursements, saving students time and money. “This will give us a boost to go forward.”
  • The department said it is seeking experiments in four areas. They should increase academic quality and reduce costs, the feds have said. And the announcement said the department would conduct evaluations of the selected programs, to test their effectiveness
  • The four targeted areas include self-paced competency-based programs, such as direct assessment degree tracks. Colleges can also test “hybrid” programs, which combine elements of direct assessment and credit-hour-based coursework. That version is currently not allowed under federal rules.
  • The new experimental sites will also include prior-learning assessment
  • Finally, the program will test federal work-study programs under which college students mentor high school students in college readiness, student aid, career counseling and financial literacy
  • Experimental sites programs have rarely been so promising, said Amy Laitinen, deputy director of the New America Foundation's higher education program and a former official at the department and White House.
  • “We don't have to wait for a reauthorization,” she said. “We can inform a reauthorization.”
Filip Dimitrijevic

YouTestMe | Testing Platform - 0 views

www.youtestme.com

learning education teaching technology software testing

shared by Filip Dimitrijevic on 18 Mar 16 - No Cached
  • Filip Dimitrijevic on 18 Mar 16
     
    Testing platform easily adaptable to all industries. Advanced test generation, integrated reporting and performance metrics are core functionalities.
anonymous

An "All You Can Eat" College Degree Could Be The Future Of Higher Education | Co.Exist ... - 0 views

www.fastcoexist.com/...the-future-of-higher-education

PLA Flexdegree

shared by anonymous on 24 Oct 13 - No Cached
  • The model is fundamentally different, however, than any other adult bachelor programs that you’ve heard of. Students will pay a flat subscription fee of $2,250 for three month’s of “all you can eat” access. During that time. they’ll be able to use the school’s instructional content online, its advisors, and other resources. More importantly, they’ll be welcome to try to pass as many “competency tests” as they want.
  • “We are in essence creating a virtual university--a new one,” says Ray Cross, Chancellor of UW Colleges and UW-Extension. “What is a full-time student in a self-paced competency-based model? Well, we’ve got to define that.”
  • Only 10 students will be accepted for each degree program in January 2014, but as the program expands, Cross says the “sky is the limit,” especially given how many students are open to self-taught online courses around the world.
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  • The Lumina Foundation just awarded the university a $1.25 million grant to evaluate the program and document its creation so that it can be replicated at other schools.
  • For public universities, new ways of thinking about fundamental business models are becoming a necessity. “Our reliance on state funding is shrinking, and that’s true in every state that I'm aware of,” says Cross. “But it’s increasingly difficult for students to afford higher education costs at all levels. That is not a sustainable trend. It just is not. We need to seek alternatives.”
  • anonymous on 24 Oct 13
     
    Description of Wisconsin's "Flex Degrees."  Pay $2,250 for three months and learn and test as much as you want.
Garry Golden

Muddying the Waters on Common Core - 1 views

www.edexcellence.net/...the-waters-on-common-core.html

learning education teaching oped common+core adaptive

shared by Garry Golden on 10 Jun 13 - No Cached
  • Garry Golden on 10 Jun 13
     
    testing vs standards - age of adaptive 
Sasha Thackaberry

Competency-based online program at Kentucky's community colleges @insidehighered - 0 views

www.insidehighered.com/...m-kentuckys-community-colleges

online program kentucky community colleges competency-based elearning

shared by Sasha Thackaberry on 10 Nov 14 - No Cached
  • Sometimes potentially “disruptive” approaches to higher education arrive on campuses with little fanfare. And they can become solid additions to traditional colleges rather than an existential threat. Take Kentucky’s two-year college system, which three years ago began an online offering aimed at working adults. The project, dubbed “Learn on Demand,” hits most of the buzzwords du jour, featuring modular courses that lead to stackable credentials, with both self-paced and competency-based elements. All that’s missing is a MOOC.
  • Roughly 1,000 students are enrolled in Learn on Demand at any one time, according to officials at the Kentucky Community and Technical College System. Many heard about it by word of mouth, and a growing number of the system’s 33,000 online students have been attracted to the convenience of the classes, which can be broken into modules that take as little as three weeks to complete.
  • On-campus students have also begun “plugging their schedules” with the courses, says Jay Box, the system’s chancellor.
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  • “There was still an audience that we were missing, and that was working adults,” Box says. The problem was one of scheduling, because many “could not commit to a traditional semester.”
  • Under Learn on Demand, students can enroll whenever they want. There are no class schedules or assignment deadlines in the self-paced courses. And students can leave without facing problems when they re-enroll. As Box says, with modular courses, students have “exit points along the way.”
  • The program offers full, 15-week courses as well as ones that are broken into three or more “bite sized” pieces. Faculty course developers “determine the most logical competencies or learning outcomes to group together in a module,” Box says. Some of those modules come with a credit hour. Some don’t, and offer fractional credit. But all of them build toward a certificate or associate degree, including ones in business administration, information technology and nursing.
  • Each module is worth a half-credit, and the course is pay-as-you go, like other modular classes. Tuition is a flat $140 per credit. So in the management course, that’s $67.50 per module. With additional fees, such as charges for e-texts, the course’s modules range from $88 to $105, which is fairly standard across the program. So students can expect to drop no more than a c-note per credit.
  • The project also attempts to make remedial education more efficient.
  • The project, however, includes a college readiness course which enables a student to test out of individual modules -- breaking down their remedial requirements into small pieces. “A typical developmental education student who might test into the highest level of developmental math and would normally have to take a 16-week long course to get the credit for the course,” Box said via e-mail, “might only have to be enrolled through Learn on Demand in one three-week module.”
  • Faculty members at Kentucky’s two-year colleges studied the Western Governors model when they were building their new online program, officials said. They also took a long look at the University of Phoenix, mostly to try to duplicate how the for-profit runs its online programs all day, every day, with instructors and student services always on-call. Rio Salado College, an online two-year institution that is part of Arizona's Maricopa Community College System, also served as an example.
  • For example, the University of Wisconsin System and Northern Arizona University this year announced new degree programs with heavy competency elements. And Western Governors, a nonprofit, online institution that offers bachelor's and graduate degrees, keeps expanding.
Garry Golden

http://scrapthemap.files.wordpress.com/2013/05/teacher-work-group-on-assessment-recomme... - 0 views

scrapthemap.files.wordpress.com/...ecommendations-spring-2013.pdf

HOTS schools testing learning education teaching Seattle

shared by Garry Golden on 07 Jul 13 - No Cached
  • Garry Golden on 07 Jul 13
     
    from Seattle MAPS protest gropu
anonymous

EBSCOhost: The trouble with competence - 0 views

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competence PLA Badging

shared by anonymous on 01 Oct 13 - No Cached
  • Wood & Power go on to say that a successful conceptualisation of competence would show "how specific competencies are integrated at a higher level and would also accommodate changing patterns of salience among these skills and abilities at different ages and in different contexts" (pp. 414-415). These authors emphasise the importance of a developmental approach to competence that is not fixated by operational definitions such that what we can measure is taken to be what develops.
  • Typically competencies are described in terms of observable behaviour and explicit criteria. Like its forerunner behavioural objectives, the language of competence invites a spurious precision and elaboration in the definition of good or effective practice. The specification of competence is assessment led in that it is usually associated with a statement which defines performance criteria and expected levels of performance. Like the objectives model, competency-based approaches to professional education and training attempt to improve educational practice by increasing clarity about ends.
  • Such models can be highly reductive, providing atomised lists of tasks and functions, or they can be highly generalised, offering descriptions of motivational dispositions or cognitive abilities such as problem-solving. In the case of the former the sum of the parts rarely if ever represents the totality of good practice; paradoxically the role is under-determined by the specification. In the case of the latter it is difficult if not impossible to provide an operational account of a disposition or ability that does not rest solely on situational judgement. A more significant feature of models of competence is that in their tidiness and precision, far from preserving the essential features of expertise, they distort and understate the very things they are trying to represent.
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  • Glass (1977) identifies six techniques for determining the criterion score or point in criterion-referenced assessment: (i) the performance of others, (ii) counting backwards from 100%, (iii) bootstrapping on other criterion scores, (iv) judging minimal competence, (v) decision-theoretic approaches, (vi) operations research methods [ 3]. He argues that educational movements in the USA like accountability, mastery learning, competency-based education and the like rest on the common notion that a minimal acceptable level of performance on a task can be specified.
  • To put it bluntly there is a massive mismatch between the appealing language of precision that surrounds competency or performance-based programmes and the imprecise, approximate and often arbitrary character of testing when applied to human capabilities.
  • If competence is about what people can do then at first sight it appears to circumvent the issue of what people need to know-it shifts the balance of power firmly in the direction of practice and away from theory. It focuses attention on questions of relevance: knowledge for what purpose? By making education and training more practical, by emphasising what a person can do rather than what they know, competency-based approaches supposedly make access more open.
  • What is needed are standards of criticism and principles of professional judgement that can inform action in the context of uncertainty and change.
  • actions cannot in themselves be seen as competent. Rather, competence is to be located in the accounts used to license or warrant actions. In this analysis the mark of a competent practitioner, in this instance police officers, is one who can choose the right account for the right audience. The approach recognises that what is good practice cannot be defined simply by reference to the function of the organisation or its aims and objectives. There are, Fielding would argue, a plurality of audiences who may or may not judge competence in similar ways.
  • locates the definition of competence firmly within the interaction between values and situational decision-making
  • there is nothing new about competency-based approaches to education and training
  • Cambridge Journal of Education. Nov91, Vol. 21 Issue 3, p331. 11
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