Experience of Administering Formative Assessment in an Online Course Using a Mid-term Course Evaluation Strategy: An Exploratory Case Study at a Nursing School
Abstract: Assessment is an essential component of teaching and instructional design. It becomes formative when the information is used to make necessary instructional adjustments during the instructional period to better meet learners’ needs. Published studies have demonstrated that administering formative assessments greatly benefit both the learner and instructors. Learners used formative assessment as an opportunity to provide feedback so that instructors could make informed decisions on revising instructional activities. Instructors gained a better understanding of the student learning experience and supported learner-centered classrooms through effective formative assessment strategies, for example, reflection paper, start-stop-continue, structured mid-semester evaluations, etc. Less attention was paid in the literature to the online instructor’s experience administering and implementing formative assessments. This case study proposes to investigate an instructor’s perspective of administering formative assessment in an online course by using a midterm course evaluation strategy at a nursing school in the United States. The findings may serve as the basis for further efforts to explore the online instructor’s experience administering formative assessments within and outside of higher education.