3 July 2010 FLIP FLOP

COMPETENCE VS CAPABILITIES

At first the idea about assessing on capabilities rather than competence was a mind F***. Reason being I came through the education system with competence based assessment and having to get my head around assessing capabilities was daunting as in the pass I have taught and assessed competence. So it means I have alter the way I approach and look at assessing and teaching.

After a lot of thought and discussion i have come up with the following example about the benefits of assessing capabilities over competence. To set the scenario my students were required to do a sketching assessment of 4 tools that were covered in theory earlier on that day.

I noticed as I always have, that some students are more artistically talented than others.And these students tend to finish them alot quicker, than the ones who struggle with drawing.

The students handed their assessments into me to be marked. Now usually i would have given the higher mark to the student who had more artistic ability than the other students who struggled with the drawing.

However with the benefit of earlier thought and discussion i had recently  I decided to try something a little different. With the drawings I crossed out the names of the student, and got the whole class to put the drawings in order from not so good to really good. Not surprisingly the students put the drawings in the same order I would have marked them. All this does is work to the advantage of the more artistic students. How ever a student said to me some of these guys used rulers rather than sketching which was the requirement. I thought what a good response as he felt ripped off that he had taken the time to hand sketch the drawing and others had cut corners to make the drawing nice and straight giving it a better finish (why should he be marked down for putting more effort into drawing)

With this in mind I said to the class ok looking at the drawings has everyone passed??? They looked up at me with the look as to say are you really going to ask us if we all passed without you marking them. I asked them again did everyone pass they looked at each other and smiled and said YES haha. I than went onto to tell them that who was I to sit here and mark them when in reality they were the ones who put the hard work into the drawings. I continued to say I didn't know how much work they put into their drawings so I cant mark them on their capabilities but only their competence and that was not fair on those who struggle with drawing.

With that I told them pick up your drawing take it back give a mark you think you deserve, and write in 10 - 20 words why you gave yourself that mark and any improvements that could be made later on. once they had finished individually they told the class what they had given themselves and why they thought they deserved that mark and would they change anything else and any improvements to be made.

It was a success and I felt quite happy how it went and the students took pride in what they had achieved.

3 July 2010 update

28 June

All prototypes for letter boxes and table have been made for my next class. All templates have been made to make it easier for the class to construct the practical projects. In terms of the practical application of the course I am ready to kick off.

29 June

Met up with BINZ about the marking schedules, she has suggested a rubric that is generic and applicable to both the portfolio workbooks. Worked on workbook port folio for the letter box I have this much easier as I am using the template I used for the table. The workbooks are designed highy around focussing on the capabilities rather than competence.

30 June

The Multiskills class started today. Stayed back after work and completed the letter box work book and altering the marking schedules to suit the port folio. Sent it out to get feedback. 

1 July

Got some valuable feedback to the marking schedule I am happy to use the marking I now have in front of me.

2 July

After work I finished both workbooks for letterbox and table. Need to meet up with JP to look at altering plan sizes for the letterboxes,. YAY workbooks, assessments, pratical resources, and marking schedules have been completed!!!!!! I just need to do lesson plans for the letterbox and get all the work pre moderated before i deliver them in 4 weeks time.

28 June 2010 UPDATE

26/6/2010
Spent the day in the workshop working on letterbox templates

27/6/2010
Went into to work today being a Saturday and finished off letterbox templates. They look good just need to write up the assessment events to attach to the project

28/6/2010
Finished the Table workbook AGAIN 89th time i think HA! Completed lesson plans around the table workbook and practical project. Worked on an evaluation for the furniture and joinery course. Need to meet up with BINZ to talk over marking criteria etc.


TIME FOR BED