ASSESSMENT SCHEDULE

Types of assessment

Fairness in Assessment

Assessment tasks are prepared by staff teams at the start of each academic year. Staff check assessments for clarity before submitting them to our External Examiners who, in turn, will check that they are good assessment tasks, clearly written, set at a level that is equivalent to that on other similar courses across the UK and will help you meet the unit’s intended learning outcomes.

Formative Assessment

Formative assessments are assessment tasks that do not count towards your final unit grade, however they are a great way for you to gauge whether you are keeping on top of your studies. The goal of formative assessment is to monitor your learning to provide ongoing feedback and is used by staff to improve their teaching, and by you to improve your learning. More specifically, formative assessments:

− Help you identify your strengths and weaknesses and target areas that need work. − Help the teaching team recognise your academic challenges, where you might be struggling and offer support in a timely fashion − Help prepare you for summative assessments.

For example, • Draw a concept map in class to represent your understanding of a topic. • Complete a quiz that tests your understanding of the unit so far. • Take part in a ‘mock’ assessment. • Submit a research proposal for early feedback.

Summative Assessment

The goal of summative assessment is to evaluate your learning, during or at the end of a unit, comparing it against agreed standards or benchmarks both within the university and externally. Summative assessments do count towards your final unit grade and are often high stakes, which means that they have a high point value. For example,

• An end of year practical assessment. • A written assignment. • An end of year written examination. • A presentation.

Completing your assessment

Planning for your assessments

By making sure you have identified your submission dates from the assessment schedules, you will be able to develop a study timetable to complete your assignments in a timely manner. You need to work backwards from the submission date, to build in time in the library or online, accessing suitable resources, and to do a thorough proof read and check your referencing is correct. If you are doing a group assessment, you will need to establish a