Monsters have become important for my Littlun

Othering & the antagonist

Fear & Delight in fighting it; neutralising it; defeating it

As a means of Rationalisation and a conceptual Instrument of Learning

Similar reactions among students in the HE Context?

Summative Assessment: A Modern Monster?

What makes Summative Assessment a monstrous item?

New environment, new people, new ways of working

Alienation caused by: Language and epistemic attitudes of the relevant Community of Practice

An Activity with High Stakes (emotive)

High levels of Stress (academic work only part of a wider, stressful context)

A Failure in Summative Assessment

Damage to Self-Esteem

Loss of money and time

Possible ejection from the Academy and effectively a small social death

Terror Management Theory Fear of death as a major motivator

Mortality Salience

Anxiety Buffers to Manage the fear of Death

Creativity/innovation/civilization/culture/ performance as affirmations of life; buffers against Death

Intellectual roots: Freud/Young, Evolution theory, Aesthetics

Greenberg, Solomon, Pyszczynski

TMT and Summative Assessment

Formative

Formative

Formative

Dissertation Proposal

Typical Assessment Structure for Business Research Methods

Might as well be asking our students to reach the mountains of Mordor…

http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140520211519/middleearthshadowofmordor7723/images/5/50/Yre1o.jpg

Dissertation Proposal???

BRS: the LoTR Version

Mines of Moria

Sauron

Helm’s Deep

Mordor

Kung Fu Master Arcade (circa 1980s)

http://cdn2-b.examiner.com/sites/default/files/styles/image_content_width/hash/be/f2/bef20a18766f550a8d122aaeecbc0b18.jpg?itok=KR9d80Rl

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/HGqp0ChVsYA/hqdefault.jpg

Many games have been playing this emotive narrative for centuries

Possible Reactions in managing Summative Assessment:

1. Pretend that Fear does not exist and dismiss that emotive aspect of learning and assessment, or

2. Remove what causes fear (aka as removing content) in an attempt of simplifying the material taught

I suggest a counter-intuitive act: put the fear of summative front and centre to students’ attention and suggest the path to victory, by providing emotional support and a clear narrative thus converting this fear of death into a story with success as the endpoint.

Gamification, TMT & Assessment A Qualitative Change: creating a narrative…

Summative assessment as the manifestation of the terror of the unknown (Mordor)

Formative assessment as gamified activities used to tame that fear; tightly designed and well-communicated

The academic “Gadalf” providing the narrative … The student need feel safe to take that leap of faith into the unknown of the discipline.

The student “Frodo” hopefully melds that narrative to their own personal journey/narrative to make sense of it in their own terms.

The application of gaming principles (especially those that make games fun) in a non-game setting.

Main principles:

1. Narratives and socialisation/collaboration

2. Rankings and Progression pathways

3. Scaffolded Learning with increasing Challenges (mastery)

4. Immediate (Multi-Layered) Feedback

Gamification

Does it work?

Dimension October Cohort 2013-14

February Cohort 2014

Period of Delivery 15 Weeks 15 Weeks

Number of students:

77 students 50 Students

Contact hours per student

36 hours 36 hours

Team Delivering the module

2 tutors One additional tutor delivering the gamification element

Team Marking the module

2 tutors Same team

Gamification Delivery per student

0 Hours 10 hours

Tasks

Perception Test Multiple-choice Qs Presentation Debates

Results:

Classification No. of Students % of Students

1st Class 3 3.90%

2:1 Class 7 9.09%

2:2 Class 30 38.96%

3rd Class 26 33.77%

FAIL 11 14.29%

Grand Total 77 100.00%

Classification No. of Students % of students

1st Class 2 4.00%

2:1 Class 11 22.00%

2:2 Class 10 20.00%

3rd Class 24 48.00%

FAIL 3 6.00%

Grand Total 50 100.00%

October Cohort --- February Cohort

Current Developments

3 Disciplines (150 students) 3 different cohorts

Same approach

So far the results indicate that success depends on the successful narrative of the formative/summative pairing…

For my cohort: 60-70% attendance (from 20% 2 years ago)

50% participate in the competition

Results unkown as of now

Satisfaction with unit according to unit survey: 85%

(quite impressive for the Business Research Skills unit)

Alexander K. Kofinas Wednesday, 20 April 2016

University of Bedfordshire

Chartered ABS 5th LT&SE Conference