Experiences in Learning and Assessment

As I explained in previous blogs, I am very used to competency based learning, and as a consequence, to competency assessment.

I teach three majors at Universidad Privada del Norte, each of them with different kinds of competencies, which represent, at the same time, different kinds of assessment:

• For Microeconomics, which is located in the second year, and is a basic level course, I use case studies, because it enables students’ problem-solving techniques and underlying knowledge as they respond to real-world scenarios or situations.
• For Corporate Finance, which is located in the third year, and Investment Finance, which is located in the four year, I use journals to assess intermediate competency, because students reflect on and draw conclusions about their learning activities, skills, and knowledge gained through a series of targeted writing prompts, at the same time I use simulations because they replicate field and/or workplace performances by giving students the opportunity to demonstrate competencies in simulated real-world experiences; and for the final competency I use essay writing because it allow students to demonstrate knowledge of competencies, communication skills, and analytical skills through writing, combined with oral presentations in order to assess students’ abilities to synthesize information and present it in a manner that is clear and understandable to others.

My experience in learning and assessment through the past five year improve my understanding of the methodologies for teaching in-deep courses, and to innovate in the continuous development of assessment instruments in order to keep students interest in they own learning process. At the same time, I had improved the rubrics and check list for every assessment instrument I designed.

What I found interested is when I review the competency assessment literature, I was able to find examples that generates new ideas for designing rubrics, checklist and observation guides for new assessment instruments that I would like to introduce in my courses.