ontario cla handouts

aligning teaching,learning, & assessment

Chris JacksonDr. Julie Patterson

“Bad…”

We ask our students,

quite simply, to count fish.

The need for adifferent assessment

Feasibility study in 2003 (n=14)

Formal launch in 2004 (n=61)

CLA longitudinal study 2005-2009

Formal launch of CWRA 2007 (n=11)

St. Louis University in Madrid administers the CLA 2007

Voluntary System of Accountability launches 2007

CLA in the Classroom launches 2007

Douglas College (BC) administers the CLA 2008-2010

OECD selects CAE as the centerpiece of the Generic Skills Strand of AHELO 2008

HETAC (Ireland) Project 2008 (n=8)

Academically Adrift released 2011

Ontario institutions begin piloting the CLA 2012

CAE selected to author performance tasks for next generation of US-based assessments (via Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium) 2012

Institutions are equipped toimprove higher-order skills

when they connectteaching, learning, and assessment

through authentic,performance-based practices.

(a) William Shakespeare(b) John Updike

(c) Ernest Hemingway(d) None of the above

Rewards content regurgitationFails to gauge transferability

Contentknowledge

Contentskills

Generalknowledge

Generalskills

Contentknowledge

The provision of transferrable skills is

as important as the provision of content.

The top ten in-demand jobs in 2010 did not exist in 2004. We are

currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using

technologies that have not yet been invented in order to solve

problems that we don’t even know are problems yet.

SO WHAT?

SO WHAT?

Academically adriftLimited learning on college campuses

Proportion of employers who say colleges should place MORE emphasis than they do on selected

learning outcomes

•The ability to effectively communicate orally and in writing

•Critical thinking and analytic reasoning skills

•The ability to apply knowledge and skills to real-world settings

•The ability to analyze and solve complex problems

89%

81%

79%

75%

AAC&U | 2008 | aacu.org/leap/public_opinion_research.cfm

Okay, enough.What is the [cla]?

bias

small sample

quantitative reasoning

appropriate comparison

group

correlation vs. causation

incorrect (improper?) use of data

ability to filter

metrics

Unadjusted performance

adjusted performance

adjusted performance

moving beyondassessment and

accountability

Females

Males

Writing Ability

Problem Solving

48% 52% 40% 60% 32% 67% 48% 53%

aligning teaching,learning &

assessment:faculty

development

What is authentic assessment?

How does effective teaching support that (and vice versa)?

What are the higher-order skills we value? Why?

How are those skills demonstrated in student responses?

What are the components of a Performance Task?

How do we effectively build them?

Working | Sharing | Feedback

what does thismean for Ontario?

9 piloting institutionsFanshawe College Humber College*

McMaster University Mohawk College (w/ McMaster)

Queen’s University Sheridan College

University of Guelph University of Windsor*

York University*

*to begin next academic year

What can be learned from Ireland?

http://bit.ly/HeILCS

There is a statistically significant increase in test performance between first and final year groups.

CAO points score, which is a measure of learner’s secondary school performance, is correlated with CLA.

Observed mean CLA scores are higher in four year level 8 programs than in three year level 8 programs.

What can be learned from Ireland?

http://bit.ly/HeILCS

Observed mean CLA scores for first and final years are significantly lower than the corresponding means from the US, but their improvement is comparable and slightly higher.

What can be learned from Ireland?

http://bit.ly/HeILCS

The absolute validity of the tests needs further analysis because the scores may (possibly) include cultural and native-language dependencies. Nevertheless, the tests are still useful as they stand because the change in performance either between first and final year or between institutions is presumably less susceptible to such dependencies.

On the Performance Tasks, there was no main effect for task, which indicates that students in Ireland scored about the same on each task (on average).

There was a main effect for MA “America is the land of opportunity.” This same effect exists in the United States.

There was a main effect for CA “Lawyers,” which references the American Bar Association. This same effect exists in the United States.

As expected, Irish graduating students performed significantly better than entering students. In some cases, this growth was greater than observed in the United States.

Next StepsRun similar analyses for the cohort of HEQCO institutions piloting use of the CLA

Convene a panel of Canadian “experts” to suggest modifications to existing CLA tasks

chris jackson212.217.0845

cjackson@cae.org@cla_beat

collegiatelearningassessment.org/clapresentations