Abstract
Teaching practicum is an integral feature of any education-based program. Teaching competency, expertise, and quality are developed and refined during the practicum, as a form to assess these teachers to-be. Traditionally, it is conducted with the supervisors visiting the supervisees' schools for observations of the teaching and learning activities in class. Tapping on the advent of technology, researchers from USIM have innovated this practice through an online practicum supervision tool called electronic practicum assessment model (e-PRASMO). After undergoing two rounds of research and improvisation, e-PRASMO embodies the strengths of its innovation and practicality: cost effectiveness, stress-free environment, flexibility, technological enhancement, reflexivity, and accessibility. It also espouses the framework of the 3 P's model by Biggs, showing the amalgamation of both the online and traditional teaching practicum activities. With more uniqueness offered by e-PRASMO, it becomes a revolutionized innovation for practicum method and assessment aligned with the current era.
TopIntroduction
It has been argued that in the meta discourse of assessments, online assessments may reflect constructions of information on what learners’ integrate and produce (Helle, Trull, Widiger, Mullins-Sweatt, 2017). Assessments in online platforms flourish, perhaps, because most learning’s theoretical and practical applications are taken virtually; students, teachers, instructors, teacher-trainees, curriculum developers, faculty members, and teaching supervisors gain better access to online assessment repositories once higher education institutions make these available, and the subsequent development in online assessments have sparked further interest in them. However, this shift that spans trajectory for novel approaches to online assessment reflects not only concerns on student engagement and motivation, but also the intersection of recency, usefulness, meaningfulness, and real-world applications, just to name a few, within the demanding and challenging strands of industry, employers, rankings, quality accreditation bodies, and diverse student learning needs (Hazelkorn, 2015; Leiber, Stensaker & Harvey, 2015). Bearing these in mind, previous research on assessment in online settings, for example, have been carried out by scholars of education focusing on issues of written feedback, peer feedback and English as a Second Language learners (ESL learners), flipped classrooms, critique reception, audio feedback, nursing curriculum, distance learning, competency-based education, and adolescence (see for instance Auer & Griffiths, 2017; de Bruin & Meijer, 2017; Delante, 2017; Guardado & Shi, 2007; Halawa, Sharma, Bridson, Lyon, Prescott, Guha, & Taylor, 2017; Jones, Young, Munro, Miller, Brelsford, Aronsson, Goodman, & Peters, 2017; Nguyen, Garncarz, Ng, Dabbish, & Dow, 2017; Parkes & Fletcher, 2017; Tekian, Watling, Roberts, Steinert, & Norcini, 2017; Thai, De Wever & Valcke, 2017), highlighting a tangible link that exists between what happens inside and outside classroom and the ways in which these interactions are assessed. As such emphasis grows strong, the need to draw upon online assessments and its significance in education is all the more urgent.
One of the feasible ways of doing so is through examining how feedback to teaching is given through an online approach. This chapter specifically aims at exploring this issue regarding providing feedback through an electronic platform for teaching practicum assessment (e-PRASMO), with the focus of studying continuous response assessments, in particular to administering effective guided feedback. It describes aspects of feedback-giving, drawn from our unique off- and online experiences, which explain the interdependence between education and acts of providing feedback. e-PRASMO portrays feedback as an integral activity, where both immaterial objects (including online and feedback) and material objects (teacher-trainees and faculty members) are involved. Varied forms of feedback-giving characterise e-PRASMO such as continuous feedback and repository exchange, and teaching practice assessment exchange. e-PRASMO, whose existence is evoked as assessment novelty, can be seen in the light of alternative assessment as it presents insights into “curriculum (that) actually being implemented,” “information on strengths and weaknesses,” and “student progress” (Coombe, Folse, & Hubley, 2007, p.27). Teacher-trainees, traditionally, are co opted into teaching system which sees teacher-trainees being supervised by a faculty member who pays visits to classroom, observing teacher-trainees conducting lessons as one of the ways of informing teacher-trainees about their strengths, weaknesses, and ways of overcoming classroom challenges. e-PRASMO instead will reveal that assessment on teaching practicum is noticeable primarily through providing students with assessment opportunities that reflect cornerstones to teaching observation online, irrespective of time and place.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Goals: It stands for global open access learning system. It is a university learning management system which is a platform for blended and online learning courses offered by the university.
Reflexivity: Interactions between supervisor and supervisee done via an online forum on GOALS. The interactions begin with firstly, consultation for teaching and learning (TnL) activities where they discuss the lesson plan and the preparation made, and secondly, post TnL where supervisor provides feedback on TnL and ideas to make the next TnL better.
Supervisor: An academic member of the faculty who is responsible to guide the teacher trainee who is undergoing his/her teaching practicum in a school.
e-PRASMO: It stands for electronic practicum assessment model. It is a platform for repository of information needed for the teaching practicum where there are notes and links to videos of best practices. Furthermore, it is also a medium of assessment where the teacher trainees upload the video of their teaching and learning (TnL) activities on the online forum and supervisors can assess the video and give marks based on the marking scheme which is provided online.
Scaleable: It means that e-PRASMO can be scaled up or scaled down. It is a trait of e-PRASMO which allows the practicum or any work-based learning to cater to any number of users and at any duration.
Supervisee: A Teacher trainee who is undergoing his or her teaching practicum in a school.
Traditional Teaching Practicum: Traditionally, teaching practicum has always been done face-to-face where supervisor goes to supervisee’s school to do in-class observation. Usually, in-class observations are done two (2) or three (3) times.
Work-based learning: A curriculum designed to allow tertiary students to do attachment with relevant industries for a year (3U1I - 3 years university and 1-year industry) or two years (2U2I).
Teaching Practicum Assessment: It includes in-class observations conducted by the supervisors. Traditionally, it is done with the supervisor being present at the supervisee’s school. However, with e-PRASMO, the latter just records his/her teaching and uploads it on the forum together with the lesson plan in word document or pdf format.
Teaching Practicum: It is a training where teacher trainees go to school to teach and take up the responsibilities of real teachers for a certain duration.