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Thank you all for the wonderful responses.

To follow-up:

I have 5 units each semester. Each class is 80 minutes x 2 per week.

I love Dee’s idea of a culminating activity or project and the suggestion to build on prior units as we move through the semester. This will be a fascinating course design change to explore over the summer months, in preparation for the fall semester. The prospect of designing these activities is exciting.

Dropping the unit tests, on the other hand, is scary. Individual accountability is most definitely a concern. Unfortunately, I must admit that my multiple-choice unit tests mainly consist of simple recall type questions. And unfortunately, I must admit further that too many students do not perform well on my tests. I’m constantly pondering what to try next to remedy this.

Perhaps my next move is to try a combination of instituting unit culminating activities or capstone projects, and eliminating unit tests, to be replaced by a mid-term and a final exam. That way I would have only one transition with the potential for back-to-back tests, namely following the mid-term. I could then use Karla’s idea and schedule the culminating project for that unit between the mid-term exam and the RATs for the next unit.

I do share Bill Goffe’s concern about excessive testing. Imagine all that could be accomplished and the fun we could have doing group activities, instead of taking boring exams!

And, Dee, your book is now on my reading list for summer break! I look forward to learning more about educative assessment.

Thanks again. Further thoughts on this topic or my proposed solution are welcome.

Dianne York
Lecturer, Biology
Lincoln University, PA
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