Report on Assessing Collaborative Problem Solving in Higher Education

This report examines the assessment of collaborative problem-solving and group discussion skills in an educational context. It analyzes the importance of teamwork in the 21st century and the need for educational systems to adapt to employment demands. The report discusses methods for assessing these skills, including the OECD's approach to collaborative problem-solving in the PISA 2015 test, which involves evaluating students' ability to interact with computer agents. It also explores the assessment of group discussions, emphasizing the importance of established rules and effective communication. Furthermore, the report addresses the challenges of assessing 'hard to assess' skills and suggests the use of various assessment methods, such as exams, interactive tasks, and collaborative problem-solving tasks. The core argument is that these skills are essential for students' future growth and must be regularly assessed through various activities to ensure effective skill enhancement. The report also suggests rotating student groups to promote adaptability and offers the opportunity to contribute to Desklib for more educational resources.

Educational
Assessment

Table of Contents
Summary of Article..........................................................................................................................1
Assessing the collaborative problem solving.........................................................................1
Assessing group discussion....................................................................................................2
Assessment of 'Hard to assess' skill........................................................................................3
Comments:.......................................................................................................................................3

Summary of Article
Article written by Ayesha Ahmed is focusses toward developing skill
of team work and group collaboration within students for shaping up their
future. Working Collaboration is very crucial and highly demanded skill in
21st century. Hence education system must be improved as per the chances
anticipated in employment practices for teaching them skills related to
collaborative problem solving and group discussion. In order to improve
learning and teaching of these skills, monitoring as well as assessment must
be performed in order to determine what these skills meant, why these are
important and several methods to improve them. These questions will help in
identifying the ways in which these skills could be improve and up to what
extend these are required to improve. The assessment of these skills is
explained below:
Assessing the collaborative problem solving
The OECD has identified the significance of collaborative problem
solving and then it is assessed at PISA 2015 test for the first time where
children work together for solving problems along with computer agent. In
this Collaborative problem solving is defined as “the ability of a person to get
engaged with two or more agents for solving problem by sharing their
understanding and providing their mutual efforts for extracting solution”.
In these test computer agent as well as test taker will interact with one
another over chat box in which test taker will be assessed as per their
communication and collaboration they present over problem solving in front
of agent. This test will help in analysing the relatability as well as
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manageability of students related to collaborative problem solving among 11-
15 year old learner. This test will work over measuring the deductive as well
as inductive thinking skill which help in determining the knowledge of test-
taker.
Assessing group discussion
In order to perform effective group discussion rules that must be
followed by these people in order to conduct discussion. These rules will be
more beneficial to learning also help teachers and students in enhancing their
skills so that discussion will bring positive result because these rule will help
in providing a bases regarding the direction in which discussion should be
perform. As per the research it has been found that children must focuses
over improving their speech skill in order to perform effectively in group
discussion.
For improving the group discussion skills children must be sent to
perform in different groups so that they will be able to deal with different
situation. In these cases students must be scored as per the quality or outcome
of their performance in group on the bases of their role. In addition to this
student must be provided an opportunity to perform in different group over
different roles and then performance must be aggregate to determine the level
of performance. Apart from this students must also be encourage to perform
group activities within class which help in developing their skill of group
dynamics.
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Assessment of 'Hard to assess' skill
Children working collaboratively within group is not an easier task to
assess but these skills are very important for a child to leave school with now
a days. These skill will help them in enhancing their learning as well as in
preparing them for future challenges. So, for assessing these skills good
quality methods must be designed such as exams, interactive tasks,
collaborative problem solving tasks etc. These skills are harder to assess but
must be evaluate to prepare children for future growth as if it end up over a
thing that only things must be assess which is possible to assess then it may
skip up urgent matters.
Comments:
Collaborative problem solving and team work plays an essential role
within a child's life as well as their for future growth. So it must be improve
during their education year so that they will be able to develop it before
leaving school and entering into their career phase. These could be developed
by organising several activities so that they can learn how to work as a team
and solve issue by mutual understanding. But in order to improve them
effectively it is very essential to regularly assess the level of their skill
enhancement by taking test. In this particular situation could be given to
students and they must be asked to perform group discussion and then
provide a solution by their mutual understanding. In addition to this group of
students must be change on regular bases so that they will learn the ways to
deal with different situation and work with different group people.
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