Applying to your context

When I first started using authentic assessments, there were some challenges for sure. One of the biggest challenges for me was finding ways to rationalize the choices I was making. I saw opportunities for students to do different types of end products or summative assessments that still meet the learning objectives of the course, but didn’t really fit the traditional mold that maybe both the students, and even institutions, or at least some of the institutions, were more comfortable with. So when I first started with this, the first place I wanted to address a challenge was in working with students and making students feel comfortable with authentic assessment, or this idea of choice.

One of the reasons this was a challenge for students, and perhaps created some anxiety, is students were very used to a different type of course, a type of course that was more traditional in the sense where it was having, you know, “Here’s some assignments, here’s an exam you may take,” for example. And students were very surprised when I said, “Well, first of all, we’re not going to do a lot of memorization in this class. You are gonna get to choose what you want to do and how you’re going to explain it.” So what I really encourage people who are interested in authentic assessment to do is to start out by being very transparent with your students. Why are you asking them to do this? In my case, I often say that I wanna know what you know and I want to know what you can do. Just showing that you care as a instructor, as a professor, and that you wanna see your students do something interesting, exciting, something they care about, can go a long ways. And so you really need to start with open conversation with the students about the whys, but also show some examples of the whats.

As you’re working on this, start collecting and asking students if you can use their work as examples. This often makes it a little easier for students to try something new when they can see some examples, but always encourage them to go beyond those examples and do something that fits them personally. Another place that we need to focus on when trying to situate authentic assessment within our own disciplines, within our own practices, is ensuring that we continue to keep high academic standards in our courses.

There is a misconception with authentic assessment that it can sometimes be less rigorous. And, with that term, it really isn’t less rigorous, in fact, it requires more of the student to be authentic. But that doesn’t necessarily mean it is harder, it is just different. And so I frame conversations with colleagues and others at the institution around this idea of, you know, what are our learning objectives? And are the students showing mastery of them, are they demonstrating their ability to do these? And, you know, the student learning is put at the front and center of a course focused around authentic assessment.

Another place where you might find some challenge, and admittedly at the beginning it could feel this way, is it’s going to feel like a lot of grading. Taking some of the tips I’ve already shared in terms of scaffolding assignments, creating universal rubrics are going to be very helpful in working through how you might do this work more efficiently. But I will tell you, the real secret about all this? Authentic assessments are fun to grade. I never thought I’d say something was fun to grade, but authentic assessments, you are seeing so many different things. I open up the assignment folder and I am playing a video game a student had designed, the next assignment is a short video a student is doing, and the next one is a policy proposal for new sidewalks in our local community, all connected to the learning of the course in some way, shape, or form.

Now, in this time in higher ed, where we are working with things such as artificial intelligence, and asynchronous classes, and how we might be working through and navigating this new world we’re in, I find authentic assessments as a great tool to implement into your practice. Because these are assignments that ask students not only to provide information, you know, the foundational knowledge piece, but they’re putting their work into practice somewhere.

The ability for artificial intelligence to replicate all the steps of an authentic assessment are not nearly as strong as they tend to be in other forms of assessment that we’ve seen and talked about in terms of, you know, can AI do certain types of writing, can it do things of that nature? And so I find this to be a great time to be considering using more authentic style assessments in your courses. Find ways to get the students to speak to and to think about the things that matter to them, and make it both personal, but also make it very local.