Developmental Testing: an Empirical Approach to Course Improvement

Henderson, Euan S.; Nathenson, Michael B.

doi:10.1080/1355800760130405

Cited by 7 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…Henderson and Nathenson [8] comment: ".. .weaknesses in the instruction can be identified, often with considerable precision, from responses to closed-ended items or on the basis of an analysis of the performance measures discussed above. But it is the open-ended responses which provide insights, directly or indirectly, into ways in which the material may be changed to correct the faults.…”

Section: The English Language As An Alternative To Ratingsmentioning

confidence: 98%

Can students’ ratings inform course design?

Burt

1979

International Journal of Mathematical Education in Science and

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Students' reactions to courses are often sought in an attempt to improve the design of these courses. Usually, reactions are obtained via rating scales or other objective instruments. There are also a number of studies which investigate the reliability and validity of these objective measures.A critique is offered of one such study. It is suggested that the study should be seen not as a scientific investigation of reliability and validity but rather as a process of becoming more discriminating. This greater discrimination could have been achieved more directly by 'qualitative' methods. Moreover a qualitative approach tends to yield more useful information than does a statistical approach.Studies are often reported without adequate discussion of the potential usefulness of these studies. A consideration of the design process shows that while student feedback does have a role to play in course design this role is limited by certain aspects of course design. Thus, many important problems of course design remain untouched. It is suggested that more resources should be diverted to tackling these latter problems.

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Section: The English Language As An Alternative To Ratingsmentioning

confidence: 98%

Can students’ ratings inform course design?

Burt

1979

International Journal of Mathematical Education in Science and

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“…It was therefore decided to adopt a modified version of the Integrated Feedback System successfully used in developmental testing projects at the Open University in 1976-78 (Henderson and Nathenson, 1976;Henderson, Hodgson, and Nathenson, 1977). Each feedback question was interpolated into the unit text at a point immediately following the particular teaching strategy to which it referred.…”

Section: Figure I An Example Of a Feedback Question On Objectivesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Bridging the Gap between Teaching and Learning at a Distance

Nathenson

1979

Brit J Educational Tech

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Unlike teachers in traditional universities, Open University teachers are faced with the very difficult task of having to produce course materials for students learning at a distance. Typically, Open University materials include a number of adjunct teaching aids which encourage students to become actively involved in the learning process (eg, aims and objectives, study guides, self-assessment questions, in-text summaries, etc). Unfortunately, few of these teaching aids have been evaluated systematically. Open University teachers simply do not know, for example, whether a list of objectives placed at the beginning of a course unit actually helps students to learn the related material. This paper describes a methodology for helping Open University teachers find out whether the particular teaching practices they adopt are successful. The effectiveness of the methodology is also evaluated. IntroductionOpen University (OU) teachers are faced with the very difficult task of having to communicate with students at a distance. To do so, they aim to produce course materials which encourage students to become actively involved in the learning process. Unlike textbooks which are usually written to convey information about content in a subject area, OU courses try to create materials which are designed to teach.During the past three years, I have been examining the way in which OU course materials are designed and have identified a number of common teaching strategies. These are set out below.

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An analysis of guidelines for expert reviewers

Saroyan

Geis

1988

Instr Sci

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Forty eight sets of recommendations identified by their authors as practical heuristics for the evaluation and revision of instructional materials were reviewed and consolidated. These guidelines were extracted from professional journals, book chapters and independent publications. Initially, all items were compiled, and then sorted into three categories according to their specific focus: content (subject matter), design, and presentation. In a second sort, identical items were eliminated and semantically equivalent items were grouped together. Three independent judges performed the same tasks for reliability. The outcome is a comprehensive list of 67 items, representing all of the reviewed guidelines. This instrument could be a successful aid in identifying deficiencies of instructional materials in the areas of content, design and presentation.

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Developmental Testing: an Empirical Approach to Course Improvement

Cited by 7 publications

References 2 publications

Can students’ ratings inform course design?

Can students’ ratings inform course design?

Bridging the Gap between Teaching and Learning at a Distance

An analysis of guidelines for expert reviewers

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