Devising a standards model for assessing design work in education
Document Type
Conference Proceeding
Faculty
Faculty of Education and Arts
School
School of Communications and Arts
RAS ID
8760
Abstract
The paper reports on a project currently being undertaken by the School of Communications and Arts at Edith Cowan University and The Curriculum Council of Western Australia to support a standards based assessment system for design work in education. The research rests on the premise that a standards based assessment system for design education has two functions; to provide feedback to modify the teaching and learning activities in which teachers and students are engaged (Black and William, 1998) and to increase the potential for learning by giving students greater insight into the assessment process itself (McDowell and Sambell, 1999). The paper situates the research in the context of reflexive assessment strategies, describes the practicalities of compiling and presenting authentic samples that might contribute to setting comparable standards across design disciplines at a secondary level, and raises the implications for design education in the tertiary sector. These samples to include examples of a variety of two dimensional design work, including graphic design and technical graphics. The project commenced in February 2009 and is planned to end in December 2009. Stages completed so far include the recruitment of teachers within the state to provide student exemplars; following up with students and parents to receive ’permission to use’ forms; establishment of a storage database; review of samples; recruiting students at two universities to provide samples. Future work includes selection of a matrix of 100 or more samples, demonstrating a variety of abilities; ranking of samples using a ‘pairwise’ method; distribution of outcomes to stakeholders; in December a symposium for design educators to demonstrate and further discuss outcomes.
Comments
Price, A., & Crouch, C. (2009). Devising A Standards Model For Assessing Design Work In Education. In Proceedings of the Cumulus 38 South: Hemispheric Shifts across Learning, Teaching and Research. Melbourne: Swinburne University.