Summative assessment often takes the form of an assignment or a written exam after students have completed a section of work.
Traditional summative assignments may be more challenging for online students. Online learning and assessment requires more self-direction and self-motivation. Many students are still developing skills like time-management and self-regulation.
Most institutions have a Learning Management System (LMS). But if your students only have intermittent access to the internet, they will not necessarily be able to do online assessments on your institution’s LMS.
Challenge yourself to think honestly. Put yourself in your students' shoes.
What are some of the challenges your students have faced doing summative assessment online?
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Wiliam (2011) and Bennett (2009) agree that it is unhelpful, and simplistic, to equate assessment for learning with formative assessment, and assessment of learning with summative assessment. Bennett suggests that assessments designed primarily to serve a summative function may also function formatively, and those designed primarily to serve a formative function may also function summatively.
Think about this when you do the next formative activity for yourself.
Once you have integrated activities into students’ learning, you have already begun to shift the focus to more formative kinds of assessment.
Complete this true false quiz to check your understanding of summative and formative assessment.
Summative or Formative quiz
Consider each of the following statements about summative and formative assessment. Indicate whether they are true or false, in your opinion:
This quiz will form part of the Consolidated Formative Assessment Quiz you do at the end of this course, and can earn you a partial completion badge.
Our reflection and feedback on the quiz
When you integrate assessment of, for, and as learning into activity-based teaching and learning, you design integrated (summative) assessment that supports integrated learning. In certain cases, it might be useful to think about summative (and formative) assessment as gathering evidence for the purposes of marking, recording and promotion. But, when you want to ‘stop worrying about testing and start thinking about learning’, you can use activity-based teaching that integrates individual study, self-assessment, peer collaboration and assessment for, of and as learning into one activity, or a series of activities. This kind of learning and assessment supports and guides students towards successful learning. You can now see an important relationship between activity-based learning, formative assessment and summative assessment.
Think about this for a moment in relation to your own learning in this course: What did you know already when you started, what have you learned, and what questions do you have that will lead to further learning?
In the next section you will explore what online teaching and learning means for integrated activity-based assessment.