Using Moodle for Assessment

I have been using Moodle to archive class materials for a year or so, but it has been mostly a passive posting environment.  Here are some ideas I have been kicking around for future ways to incorporate Moodle in assessment practices, written up as a brief article for my school's staff bulletin.

Assignment Submissions

By adding an Assignment Activity, your students can submit text or files to you through your Moodle.  While editing your Moodle, click the “Add an activity…” box near the bottom right of each topic/week, and choose one of the options under the title “Assignments.”

Advantages	Disadvantages
-   Submissions are marked with date and time, and organized by student name – easier and faster than receiving files via usb stick or email. -   Can link to TurnItIn for plagiarism and marking tools. -   Feedback and a grade can be given through Moodle if desired -   Easy to set up.	-   Assignments must be printed if they will be assessed on paper. -   Internet problems at home could mean that students must submit documents from a school computer.

Q&A Discussion Forum

Moodle Forum activities are web pages for group discussion.  The main page of a forum shows a list of “topic” postings, and within topics others can add “reply” posts.  As the teacher, you can control who can post, and how often.  The Forum type “Q and A Forum” restricts students from seeing others’ replies before they have posted.  This could be used to ask students to individually respond to a list of questions, or for students to pose a question to the class then respond to someone else’s question.

Advantages	Disadvantages
-   Could facilitate class interaction -   Students can self-assess by comparing with others’ answers -   Easy to set up.	-   Many student replies may limit the Teacher’s ability to give feedback. -   Students may not participate if the forum is optional.

Quizzes

The Quiz activity is a highly customizable way to offer formative or even summative assessment your class.  Ten styles of questions can be used including calculated, multiple choice, matching, short answer, and even essay.  Questions can be selected or randomized to construct quizzes, and time limits can be set for responding if desired.  Customized feedback can be given, and Moodle can select questions based on previous responses.

Advantages	Disadvantages
-   Students receive immediate feedback. -   Easy for teachers to assess student understanding. -   Can be used for mastery activities with questions repeated until attained. -   Can minimize cheating by shuffling questions and responses.	-   Computer lab may be required for summative assessment. -   Diagrams can be included in questions, but difficult in answers -   Setting up quiz questions may take some time (though they can be shared among colleagues).

Workshop

The Moodle Workshop module is a very powerful way for students to submit assignments for self, peer, and/or teacher evaluation.  A workshop assignment progresses through several phases beginning with the teacher creating an evaluation tool for the assignment like a rubric or marking scheme.  Next, students submit their work, then evaluate their own or others' work according to their teacher's requirements.  Finally, the teacher evaluates the student work and arrives at mark(s) for the assignment.  A powerful feature of the workshop module is that in addition to receiving a grade for their assignment based on teacher, self, and/or peer evaluations, each student also can be assessed on how closely their self or peer evaluation corresponds with others' evaluation.

Advantages	Disadvantages
-   Powerful for learning through self and peer assessment -   Students can evaluate theirs and others work against criteria, rubric, or other tools set by the teacher. -   May make the assessment and evaluation process more efficient by tracking student and peer feedback online rather than on paper.	-   A little complicated to learn and set up. -   Some comments sound like it may be a little buggy in Moodle 1.9 (being rewritten for 2.0).

More on Moodle Workshop:

• Moodle Workshop: An overview
  A slide show demonstrating how Moodle Workshop can be used for self, peer, teacher, and meta assessment.
• Moodle Workshop Guide
  Detailed instructions on setting up a Moodle Workshop activity.
• How to setup a Workshop
  An article on Moodle Workshops from the author of "Moodle 1.9 Testing and Assessment"