UNIVERSITY OF CAPE COAST, GHANA

FACULTY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION

DEPARTMENT OF MATHEMATICS AND ICT EDUCATION

EMA 309 – ASSESSMENT IN MATHEMATICS EDUCATION

Lecturer: Dr Osiakwan Japhet

ASSIGNMENT – GROUP PRESENTATION

INDEX NUMBERS: GROUP 13

ET/MAT/20/0061

ET/MAT/20/0002

ET/MAT/20/0074

ET/MAT/20/0183

ET/MAT/20/0173

ET/MAT/20/0091

ET/MAT/20/0115

ET/MAT/20/0100

ET/MAT/20/0125

ET/MAT/20/0103
 Questions:

1. Explain the term authentic assessment, clearly indicating the features.

2. What are the types of authentic assessment?

3. Explain five advantages of authentic assessment.

4. Explain fives disadvantages of authentic assessment.

What is Authentic Assessment?

Many theories of learning have been propounded by great educational psychologist which are

focused on one crucial ideology: how do learning takes place? Diverse school of thought shares

different opinions. Among these is the constructivist school of thought which have played a

significant role when it comes to theories of learning. They consider learning as an active process

where learners actively participate and construct their own knowledge in the learning process.

Based on these constructivist theory, authentic assessment has been considered as key

assessment strategy that mathematics educators cannot do away with. It is worth asking then,

what authentic assessment is.

According to Jon Mueller, authentic assessment is a form of assessment in which students are

asked to perform real-world tasks that demonstrate meaningful application of essential

knowledge and skills. It is basically about students demonstrating knowledge of a body of

knowledge, having developed a set of skills and being able to apply them in a 'real' situation and

solve life problems. Students are given the free will to demonstrate the extent of their learning.

Overall, authentic assessment is a type of assessment that is designed to reflect the complex and
 dynamic nature of learning and to assess learners' ability to apply their knowledge and skills to

real-life situations.

Features of Authentic Assessment

i. Integrative Learning: Authentic assessment often require students to integrate knowledge

and skills from different learning areas to allow for a more holistic assessment of their

abilities.

ii. Multiple Measures: Authentic assessment tasks often involve multiple measures of learning,

including subject knowledge, communication and collaborative skills.

iii. Knowledge Transfer - It ensures the transfer of mathematical knowledge from theory to

practice and from one task or experience to another.

iv. Feedback-Oriented: Authentic assessment often include detailed feedback to help learners

make meaning out of learning.

v. Metacognition - The learning reflection process are consciously planned in such a way that

students can build on different previous knowledge, experiences and areas. Through this

higher-order thinking skills such as creativity and invention are promoted.

vi. Achievement-Based: Authentic assessment are designed to assess a student's ability to

perform specific tasks or solve specific problems, not just to repeat information.

vii. Flexibility - The assessment should allow flexibility in timing of achievement of project

criteria and outcomes based on actual tasks. Learners are given the opportunity to work

collaboratively among themselves.

i. Portfolios: These are collections of work that demonstrate a learner's progress and

accomplishments over time. Portfolios can include a range of artifacts, such as written

assignments, research papers, multimedia projects, and other types of work that

demonstrate learning. Teacher can evaluate and assess learners by measuring these

artefacts constructed.

ii. Observations: These are assessments that involve an observer or teacher evaluating a

learner's performance in a real-life setting, such as in a classroom, workplace, or

laboratory. This can be done by direct observation or indirectly by using video

recording.

iii. Simulations: These are assessments that simulate a real-life situation or scenario, such

as a business negotiation or a medical emergency. Learners are evaluated based on

their ability to apply their knowledge and skills to the simulated situation.

iv. Constructed response items: this is when learners are given the chance to clearly

elaborate on their experiment performed at the mathematics laboratory based on set of

constructed items.

v. Project-based learning: Project-based learning can be completed individually or

collaboratively. If project-based learning is completed collaboratively, then a group of

students works together to demonstrate the application of their collective knowledge

and experiences.
vi. Self-assessment: This is an assessment where learners evaluate their own learning and

progress. Self-assessment can include reflection, self-evaluation, and goal-setting.

vii. Peer-assessment: This is an assessment where learners evaluate the work of their

peers. Peer-assessment can involve feedback, evaluation, and collaboration among

learners.

viii. Performance tasks: These are assessments that require learners to perform a task or

complete a project that is similar to the type of work they would encounter in a real-

life situation.

ix. Interview sessions: teachers observe learners while they perform their task and ask

probing questions in order to elicit higher order thinking among learners. This will

help learners to produce valid results.

Advantages of authentic assessment

i. It places much emphasis on all domain of Bloom’s taxonomy. Due to the nature

of this assessment procedures, students are able to relay all the domain of learning

in learning process. They have the opportunity to build from knowledge,

understanding through to the evaluation stage. Which forms a significant

component of the assessment validity.

ii. It provides students the opportunity to construct, reflect, and evaluate their own

learning. Teaching and learning become more meaningful when students are

allowed to freely construct their own mathematical understanding. The students

insights into the concept(s) and create new understanding.

iii. It promotes and develops critical thinking skills. Students are able to analyze and

evaluate concepts themselves without just memorizing it. No matter how complex

the mathematical task may be, students are able to think through and solve a

problem or create something new. Developing such logical thinking skills will

help them make right decisions outside the classroom.

iv. It stimulates learners’ interest and motivates them: Authentic assessments are

more interesting and motivating for students because the tasks are based on real

situations, which also allow students to make sense of purpose and relevance out

of mathematical concepts.

v. It enables students to solve problems in real situations: Students have the

opportunity to use different strategies and explore multiple perspectives while

completing the activity requirements. Procedures and strategies for deriving

possible answers and exploring multiple solutions to complex problems are often

evaluated in addition to or instead of the final product or single correct answer.

Disadvantages of authentic assessment

i. It is difficult to grade students using authentic assessment methods. These methods do

not have any right or wrong answers; they depend on how well the students interpret

and uniquely address the mathematical challenges and contexts at hand.

cases no strict marking scheme is made for measuring learners’ achievement but

instructor measures and evaluates learners work subjectively. Hence the validity of

authentic assessment methods is affected by the absence of a standardized evaluation

benchmark.

iii. It is time-consuming and requires a lot of hands-on activities. Authentic assessments

typically require detailed, personalized, and specific feedback which can take a lot of

time. All students must be given the opportunity to practice the concepts been

explored as well.

iv. It is resource-intensive. Teaching and learning resources must be adequately available

before this form of assessment can be implemented effectively. This may be a

challenge for the teacher.

v. It is difficult to compare students’ performance against a particular benchmark. Due

to how subjective the assessment procedure may, teachers find it difficult to

accurately compare and distinguish among the different categories of learners. This

may negatively affect the special need child.