Friday 27 June 2014

Notes from teaching and learning conference at Plymouth University. (UKPSF A3 V3)

My notes on the 12th Vice Chancellor's teaching and learning conference at Plymouth University

Prof.  Sue Bloxham  University of Cumbria  --

She gave a talk on how different markers can give very different marks to an essay. The formal  quality criteria were not really used by the markers, but the students tried to use them to get them good marks.
She felt that it was better to talk to the students about pieces of work.

There is no point in "learning outcomes."

The use of first year marks was being used for student engagement. In the past the first year was to allow the students to experiment with new things, so the marks don't matter.

Too much work was marked. Many of the marks didn't apply to the final classification.

In her student days all the assessment was din in two weeks in the third year.

Too much assessment is bad.

This applies  to essay writing.  How does this work for maths?

1) Small amount of essay type question
2) Many issue with maths is the amount of the working required.