End-of-term exams and summative quizzes are unfavourable to many in the Southern Cross Model. However, external accreditation and professional and statutory bodies might require students to have appropriate levels of competence across a domain of study, demonstrated via a final exam. Similarly, quizzes can be advantageous by assessing student comprehension of a subset of content not covered by other assessments. However, in a post-COVID world of online non-invigilated exams/quizzes, we have had to rethink assessment design. Some argue that exams do not accurately or fairly assess learning due to reasons such as stress on the student and perceptions about rote learning. When poorly designed, online exams/quizzes can be one of the assessment types most likely to allow opportunities for collusion and cheating. On the other hand, peer-reviewed literature touts summative quizzes as a real-world assessment that can help students to become work-ready in certain industries. Further, quizzes offer unit assessors a high-quality assessment tool to balance against longer assessment items.
We overview the pros and cons of summative quizzes in tertiary education and draw on new data from multiple units across two faculties at SCU. Our analysis begins with an exploration of the value of practice quizzes as a formative tool to improve student learning. We discuss data and case studies on the performance of students who cheat on non-proctored tests. Lastly, we present the elements of good and poor quiz questions and offer an array of techniques for preparing questions and quiz settings to foster authentic assessment in the Southern Cross Model. Strategies can be adopted so that quizzes address real-world scenarios and assess students understanding and synthesis of unit content.?
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