3. Student evaluation
Research shows that students’ experience of learning is a valid indicator of the quality of learning outcomes.
Students engage more seriously in future evaluations when they see that their feedback matters.
Example 3.1
Student feedback is valued in this unit. Last semester student representatives were elected in week 2 and met twice during the semester with the coordinator and tutors. The end-of-semester Unit of Study Evaluation includes both ratings and opportunity for qualitative comments. As a teaching team we reviewed all the ratings and comments at the end of the semester to plan changes for this semester. The same feedback approaches will be incorporated this semester.
Last semester students liked the weekly optional Blackboard quizzes and commented favourably about the turnaround and feedback on the case studies. The major concerns raised related to the amount of content covered in lectures, some 'free-riders' in groups and the slow response rate to questions posted in the online discussion board about the assessments.
Several changes have been incorporated this semester to improve the student experience including:
- posting lecture notes onto Blackboard 3 days before the timetabled lecture.
- various resources and activities have been incorporated to prepare students for groupwork such as the team building activity in week 5 tutorials and self and peer assessment in week 10
- questions posted on the Blackboard discussion board are now addressed every second day by the development of a relevant FAQ and answer.
A unit of study evaluation will be conducted at the end of the semester during lectures. Feedback will be used to make changes to improve the unit of study.
Seeking feedback from students early in a semester is proving to be valuable in making improvements that students can see immediately as well as clarifying for students why the units is designed in a particular way.
For example students will readily respond to a simple questionnaire that asks them in a lecture to take a sheet of paper and write:
- what I like about this unit
- what I don’t like about this unit
- how this unit could be improved.
Feedback at this point provides lecturers with a way to improve the overall students’ experience of the course. Here is an abstract from a UoS Outline that contains description of mid-semester feedback:
Example 3.2
Student feedback will be sought for this unit in two ways:
a) through an informal questionnaire in the middle of the semester
b) through the Unit of Study Evaluation (USE) instrument conducted by the University’s Institute for Teaching and Learning at the end of semester.
The USE will allow the teaching team to review the overall ratings given by students to plan changes for next semester. The USE will be conducted at the end of the semester during lectures.
The mid-semester questionnaire will provide the teaching team with feedback on what things are going well and where we can improve our performance. This questionnaire will be conducted in tutorials during Week 6 of the semester.