Is assessment embedded into everything you do? Even your grocery shopping?
I have to admit, assessment and grocery shopping are not two activities that I normally think of as related. I tend to affiliate the concept of assessment with professional skills, learning outcomes and education. Needless to say, I don't think I have even used those same words when talking about grocery shopping. How could these concepts ever connect?
Gavin Henning, in a blog post for studentvoice.com explains the correlation by breaking down simple assessment concepts, "establishing a goal, developing strategies to reach that goal, and then determining how effectively and efficiently you've reached it." When you think of assessment in these terms, as Henning suggests, "you probably do a lot more assessment than you think."
When I thought about it, my own grocery shopping does fit into that definition of assessment
My Goal: Only go to the grocery store once every seven days at the minimum.
My strategy: Create a menu for the week before creating the grocery list.
Knowing if I succeeded: Not having to run back for an ingredient I am missing mid-week or, even worse, mid-recipe.
So, maybe this is like my professional thoughts about assessment regarding student leadership development:
Goal: For students to discover and develop their potential as leaders
Strategy: Write learning outcomes that align with institutional mission and goals and leadership development theory and then provide learning opportunities to meet those outcomes.
Knowing if we succeeded: Through outcomes from student interviews with faculty, reflection worksheets and periodic survey data.
Gavin Henning says that "Assessment isn't an activity. It's a state of mind." When you think about assessment in these basic terms, assessment can just as easily apply to our daily activities as it can to our professional activities. I bet we all are participating in assessment more often than we think. If this is true, we should be able to use the simplification of this concept to explain assessment to those who may be wary, and perhaps even to simplify our own assessment activities.
Something to think about...
Gavin Henning's Blog Post
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