Community Learning Development Resource 102 – 04
ASSESSMENT ISSUES WITHIN CAPACITY-BUILDING LEARNING EXPERIENCES IN THE COMMUNITY
SUMMARY
To assess the learning gains made by learners within capacity-building activities, we need to find and use the most appropriate and effective assessment strategy and methods.
What is the learning, which has built the capacity – how can we see the gains, capture them and measure them?
- Almost certainly we can’t use formal and academic testing tools – examinations and tests are likely to be inappropriate for many of our learners and for the circumstances in which the learning gains become apparent.
The assessment of learning within individual and community capacity-building should not be an academic ‘classroom-based’ exercise.
- It is difficult to measure the learning within capacity-building as fixed and measurable gains in knowledge, understanding. Assessing learning success within individual and collective capacity-building is more about measuring how the learning gains have enabled the learner to change their feelings, behaviour and actions, within the reality of their lives – beyond any ‘classroom’.
We may need to evaluate the application, use and impact of the changed behaviour of a learner within their life or the lives of those around them, and then work backwards to find out what part their learning gains played in their actions.
- There is a powerful argument, which suggests that for any learning within capacity-building to be measured successfully there must be some tangible outcomes, which impact beyond the learner. The successful transfer (use and application) of learning to drive change, improvement and actions, to the benefit of the learner and those around them, may be the real way of measuring learning gains and achievements.
- The challenge for us is to work out effective assessment activities, which will deliver for us, and our learners, clear and valid evidence of learning gains within capacity building and engagement in regeneration. This is not an area of learning where assessment schemes and processes can be easily ‘picked-up off the education and training shelf’.
- It will be difficult for us to provide quantitative evidence of learning success for ourselves, for our organisations and funders. This is a problem for us, when so much assessment within education and training relies on the generation of numerical scores and grades. For example, how can we ‘deliver marks-out-of-ten’ for learning success, which changes an individuals’ behaviour and results in them making a difference to the benefit of their community. We will need to work hard to establish and demonstrate the validity of the ways in which we seek to assess learning, within our field of work.
SOME PRACTICAL TIPS ABOUT ASSESSING LEARNING
- It is particularly important for learners with low self-esteem and self-confidence to have positive feelings about their ability to learn and their use of their learning
- Celebrating learning success and giving positive assessment feedback, confirm and endorse someone’s development as a learner, and makes them feel good
- Learners should be encouraged to reflect on their learning gains and their progress, rather than on their learning failures
- If a worker recognises the learning achievements of a learner, a key task may be how to enable the learner to recognise and value what they have achieved
- It will be important to recognise and assess the contributions of individual learners within collective capacity-building and regeneration activities – the individual contributions may have directly resulted from successful individual learning
- It is better to assess the learning of a learner on the basis of their own individual learning journey and the progress that they are making, rather than comparatively in relation to broad criteria across a learning group. Individualise learning success so that within a collective situation ‘’one learners’ success does not become another’s put-down’’
- The link between learning and use of learning confirms the importance of learning needing to be relevant and useful to the learner.
Purposeful learning which is successfully used is likely to be more valued by the learner
- We need to understand the evidence trail, which connects learning inputs with the learner, through to their application and use of learning, in making changes and improvements within their lives. We need to establish the connections and understand how these work, and what can be evidenced and assessed with validity.
PROMPTS FOR REFLECTION AND DISCUSSION
- What does your work with learners seek to deliver in the way of outcomes and impact? From this can you identify criteria, by which you could assess their learning success?
- Think of two learners that you have engaged with in your work and identify any differences between them in terms of what you would focus on to assess their learning.