Determine assessment purposes and methods

First you will need to decide which purposes (diagnostic, formative, summative) assessment will serve. At minimum, we suggest that you use both formative and summative assessments to guide learners. 

At this point, you should examine the range of Moodle activities and resources described on the Forms of Assessment page (the page immediately before this one). The rest of Unit 4 describes how to set up and use each of the tools in more detail. 

Consider the following for your strategy.

• Using a variety of forms of assessment provides a richer and more detailed picture of the learning that is taking place. 
• Providing ample opportunities for formative assessment, or practice with feedback, can be one of the most important aids to learning. 
• Design practice opportunities with clear instructions to avoid frustration for both learners and yourself. 
• Ensure that your assessment opportunities are fair, appropriate, valid, reliable, transparent, authentic, manageable, and engaging. In other words, assessment should

1. Provide equal opportunity for success (fair)
   
2. Address the defined learning objectives (appropriate)
   
3. Demonstrate achievement of the objectives (valid)
   
4. Be consistent between students and assessment instances (reliable)
   
5. Be clearly understood by learners (transparent)
   
6. Be relevant to the working world (authentic)
   
7. Be of the right scope for students and teachers (manageable)
   
8. Encourage learners to invest the time (engaging)
   

• Communicating your assessment strategy to learners is very important. It establishes a "contract" with the learner, telling them your expectations for successful completion. 
  

In addition, this Unit 4 discusses methods for tracking progress using assessment tools. These include:

• Setting up a Grade Book
• Activating Completion Tracking and type of completion
• Using Reports and Logs to track progress