e-Learning Ecologies MOOC’s Updates

Good News, Formative Assessment Opportunities for High School in Indonesia Based on New Policy

Case in Indonesia

Indonesia is one of the countries which has high visibility of summative assessment to determine pass-fail in the grading system. From 1950 to 2019 the education policy in Indonesia implements various terms that refer to the same method, it is the final test as a qualification to upgrade and graduate. This test usually consists of multiple choice and short answers to assess how good students remember subjects. Apparently, it took long years for the government to eliminate summative assessment in the ongoing system. In 2019, the Minister of Department of Education and Culture issued a regulation to obviate a high debated-but last long final summative assessment culture as the graduation requirement and replaced it with:

  1. Complete the entire learning program (6 years for elementary, 3 years for junior high, and 3 years for senior high);
  2. Obtain a minimum good attitude/behavior score; and
  3. Take exams organized by the institution.
  4. Student graduation is determined by the associated education unit/program
  5. Exams administered by the institution are carried out in the odd semester and/or even semester at the end of the education level (for high school is the third year)
  6. The forms of the exams are:
    - Portfolio;
    - Assignment;
    - Written test; and/or
    - Other forms of activity

3 Dimensions of Learning Assessment according to Department of Education and Culture of Indonesia:

Dimension Criteria
Attitude Have faith and devotion to God
  Honest and caring
  Responsible
  Lifelong learning
  Physically and mentally healthy
Knowledge Factual
  Conceptual
  Procedural
  Metacognitive
Skills Creative
  Productive
  Critical
  Independent
  Collaborative
  Communicative

Formative Assessment Opportunities in High School

If in previous years the assignment had only focused on memorizing, then based on the changes in the graduation requirements above, it can be seen that there is a hope of more interaction between students and teachers during the 3-year learning agenda at the high school level both online and onsite. Aiming to achieve scores above the passing standard on exams, schools can apply formative assessment as a learning strategy in which students practice making portfolios, assignments, written tests, and/or other forms of activity supported by feedback from peers and teachers, a constitutive assessment.

So there is a fundamental shift from memorizing to creating pedagogical artifacts.

Formative Assessment

Understanding the complexity of learning assessment is vitally important for designing instruction. One of the assessment techniques, the formative assessment, which gained increasing prominence in education policy practice, refers to the idea of using evaluation as a tool for improving curricular programs (Cronbach, 1963). Formative assessment is defined as the process of gathering evidence of student learning, providing feedback to students, and adjusting instructional and learning strategies (McMillan, 2016), however, its implementation is not without challenges.

Barriers in Formative Assessment

OECD has identified two major barriers in the wider practice of formative assessment as elaborated below:

  1. The tension between classroom-based formative assessments of student learning, and high visibility summative tests. Too often, highly visible summative tests used to hold schools accountable for student achievement drive what happens in classrooms.
  2. A lack of connection between systemic, school and classroom approaches to assessment and evaluation. Too often, information gathered through national or regional monitoring systems, or even in school-based evaluations, is seen as irrelevant or unhelpful to the business of teaching. Too often, information gathered in classrooms is seen as irrelevant to the business of policymaking. 

Proposed Methods of Peer-to-peer Feedback Within Online Learning to Overcome Barriers in the Formative Assessment 

1. Use Likert Scale based feedback along with written opinions

source: Author

2. Apply self-reflection with the same criteria for peer-to-peer feedback and compare both scores to support metacognition one's awareness of his/her capability to learn.

3. "You can't track progress unless you have moments of noting how performance is evolving" (eLearning ecology online class)

Measure other aspects as below:

Honesty and Caring

% Plagiarism on the first submission

% Assignment use proper referencing

% Giving proper feedback (give fair feedback whether for best friend or not, avoid destructive, unstructured feedback, avoid racism in giving feedback)

% Students who give feedback at the determined minimum number

Responsibility

% Ontime assignment submission

% Ontime peer-to-peer feedback submission

% Students comply with given criteria in submitting assignment

% Students complete watching/reading learning content

% Students with watch/read completion above 90%

% Ontime attendance on live webinar

% Attendance rate on live webinar

# Peers reviewed

Productivity

# Average time to finish assignment (in hours)

# Average number of refinements of task after complete feedback received

# Average hours for one assignment to get minimum number of feedbacks

Collaboration

# Interaction in live discussion

# Average feedback per each assignment

% Peer satisfaction with group members in collaborative work

4. Measurements above are the monitoring method to answer "lack of connection between systemic, school and classroom approaches to assessment and evaluation."

5. Strong digital infrastructure is needed to generate measurements above.

Further Work

There needs to be a more comprehensive integration to frame the 3 dimensions of learning assessment through the indicators mentioned above. However, the new policy established is a good start to create more collaborative intelligence within the instructional context. When students are accustomed to making 4 forms of exams as described above, there is a high probability that students will graduate with outputs above the standard.

References:

  • McMillan, J. H. (2016), Classroom Assessment: Principles and Practice that Enhance Student Learning and Motivation, available at: https://www.pearson.com/store/p/classroom-assessment-principles-and-practice-that-enhance-student-learning-and-motivation-/P100001434302
  • Cronbach (1963), Course improvement through evaluation. Teacher’s College Record 64.8: 672–683, available at: https://avys.omu.edu.tr/storage/app/public/ismailgelen/116687/14.PDF
  • Brookhart, S. M. (2010), Formative Assessment Strategies for Every Classroom: An ASCD Action Tool, 2nd Edition, available at: https://shop.ascd.org/PersonifyEbusiness/Store/Product-Details/ProductId/2869
  • Quipper (2016), Jangan Hanya Ikut UN Saja! Yuk Ketahui Sejarah Ujian Nasional dari Awal Pelaksanaan Hingga Sekarang!, available at: https://www.quipper.com/id/blog/un/informasi-un/jangan-hanya-ikut-un-saja-yuk-ketahui-sejarah-ujian-nasional-dari-awal-pelaksanaan-hingga-sekarang/
  • Kementerian Pendidikan Dan Kebudayaan Indonesia (2014), Konsep dan Implementasi Kurikulum 2013, available at: https://www.kemdikbud.go.id/kemdikbud/dokumen/Paparan/Paparan%20Wamendik.pdf
  • Kementerian Pendidikan Dan Kebudayaan Indonesia (2018), Peraturan Menteri Pendidikan Dan Kebudayaan Republik Indonesia Nomor 36 Tahun 2018 Tentang Perubahan Atas Peraturan Menteri Pendidikan Dan Kebudayaan Nomor 59 Tahun 2014 Tentang Kurikulum 2013 Sekolah Menengah Atas/Madrasah Aliyah, available at: http://luk.tsipil.ugm.ac.id/atur/bsnp/Permendikbud36-2018K13SMA-MALengkap.pdf
  • Kementerian Pendidikan Dan Kebudayaan Indonesia (2019), Peraturan Menteri Pendidikan Dan Kebudayaan Republik Indonesia Nomor 43 Tahun 2019 Tentang Penyelenggaraan Ujian Yang Diselenggarakan Satuan Pendidikan Dan Ujian Nasional, available at: https://pendidikan.kulonprogokab.go.id/files/Permendikbud%20No%2043%20Tahun%202019.pdf
  • Kementerian Pendidikan Dan Kebudayaan Indonesia (2016), Salinan Lampiran Peraturan Menteri Pendidikan Dan Kebudayaan Nomor 20 Tahun 2016 Tentang Standar Kompetensi Lulusan Pendidikan Dasar Dan Menengah, available at: https://bsnp-indonesia.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/Permendikbud_Tahun2016_Nomor020_Lampiran.pdf
 
  • Cassandra Clark