Individual Assignment
This page describes an implementation of an assessment method by a lecturer or group of lecturers. The content of the page is the result of an interview conducted through the RAFT project in DIT in the 2013-14 Academic Year.
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Lecturer and Contact Details
Programme and year on which assessment was offered
BSc Computing, Year 3
Description
A generic programming assignment that gives leeway for student to customise the assignment with their own designs and features.
Learning Outcomes
Measures the students’ ability to put together a set of learning outcomes into a cohesive practical project.
What have you found are the advantages of using this form of assessment?
- Can specify the core “functionality” required to ensure learning outcomes – whilst a lot of individual detailed design (.e.g screen design, data) to the student to decide. This greatly reduces the opportunity to plagiarise.
- Student has the change to use their own flair and talent to really optimise their deliverables.
- Students get to develop a project on a subject of interest to them.
What have you found are the dis-advantages of using this form of assessment?
- Slightly more work to mark (from the lecturer’s point of view)
- Students may struggle to think of how to put their own “stamp” on their project (not really a con!)
Alternatives
A detailed assignment spec where all students submit the same deliverable (but this lends itself to plagiarism).
Assessment in practice
- Suitable for individual or group assignments
- The core part that is common across all submissions must be clearly spelt out (e.g. must use a database, must display a list etc)
- No particular constraint on small versus large classes – although correction is completely manual – so one to one demos needed in the lab sessions as part of correction
Assessment Time
- Preparation time (lecturer) - Slightly less than prep time for a more specific assignment.
- Student time to complete – Depends on the scale of the project.
- Marking time – completely manual – good but simple marking scheme needed, plus demo
- In class test: In order to ensure that it is the students’ own work, an inclass written test can be applied – which asks generic questions about their assignment. The test is graded between 0 and 1 – and this marks is used to MULTIPLY the grade . E.g. an in class test that gets 0.5, will reduce their grade by 50%.
- Ease of Feedback - Since marking is individual, individual comments with their grade are typically supplied via webcourses. Also, generic principles can be covered in class.
Writing guidelines for staff
Clear specification of the core generic functionality to be included in the project.
