Peer- and Self-Assessment - Drawing the Parallels Between Student and Staff Practice
المؤلف:
Lorraine Stefani
المصدر:
Enhancing Teaching and Learning through Assessment
الجزء والصفحة:
P118-C12
2025-06-24
425
Peer- and Self-Assessment - Drawing the Parallels Between Student and Staff Practice
University teachers now work within a highly complex environment, generally under severe resource constraints. There are growing demands being made on staff relating to quality assurance and accountability; pressure to be highly competitive in traditional research publication and the need to provide an effective and efficient learning experience for a growing population of students. While there has been much emphasis at a global level for expansion of higher education (Scott, 1998) and widening access, this in itself has resulted in an increasingly diverse student population with differing demands and expectations. Barnett (1994) has argued that with respect to the teaching function of Universities, our responsibilities include: the development of the student's critical abilities; the development of the student's autonomy; supporting the student's character formation; presentation and enhancement of Society's intellectual culture.
This may seem a tall order for University teachers, but the goals may well be achievable if we believe and act upon our own rhetoric of shifting from a teacher-centred to a student-centred learning environment, placing greater emphasis on the need to encourage students to take responsibility for their own learning. The word 'rhetoric' is used advisedly. A shift in the culture of learning cannot occur without due attention being paid to the design, development and delivery of the curriculum and recognition of the need to empower learners within the teaching and learning contract (Stefani, 1999). Until recently there has been an overemphasis on a transmission mode of imparting information and knowledge to students and an absence of reflective practice and questioning of the impact of our teaching on student learning (Ramsden, 2003).
As part of the shift in emphasis towards encouraging students to take responsibility for their own learning, much effort has been placed on engaging students in learning strategies such as Personal Development Planning, maintaining learning portfolios and engaging in self and peer assessment activities. While efforts to embed these learning activities into the curriculum are laudable, they are not without difficulties. They require a paradigm shift from a teacher-centred, content driven curriculum to a student-centred, inquiry based curriculum. They also require far greater knowledge of student learning than has previously been expected of University lecturers and more emphasis on academic staff themselves modelling the reflective, critical thinking processes we are now demanding of our students.
The intention is to draw the parallels between engaging students in critical thinking and reflection and staff themselves modelling these processes, with a particular emphasis on self and peer assessment/evaluation processes.
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