abstract: This research focuses on assessing the impact of various process mapping activities aimed at improving students' abilities to plan for Building Information Modeling (BIM). During the various educational activities, students were tasked with generating process maps to illustrate plans for hypothetical construction projects. Several different educational approaches for developing process maps were used, beginning in the Fall 2015 semester. In all iterations of the learning activity, students were asked to create level 1 (project-specific) and level 2 (BIM use-specific) process maps based on a previously published BIM Project Execution Planning Guide. In Fall 2015, a peer review activity was conducted. In Spring 2016, a collaborative activity was conducted. Beginning in the Fall 2016 and Spring 2017 semesters, an additional process mapping activity was conducted aimed at separating process mapping and BIM planning into separate activities. In Fall 2016, the BIM activity was conducted in groups of three whereas in Spring 2017, the students were asked to create individual process maps for the given BIM use. To understand the impact of the activity on students' perception of their own knowledge, a pre-and post-activity questionnaire was developed. It covered questions related to: (i) students' ability to create a process map, (ii) students' perception about the importance of a process map and (iii) students' perception about their own knowledge of the BIM execution process. The process maps were analyzed using a grading rubric developed by the author. The grading rubric is the major contribution of the work as there is no existing rubric to assess a BIM process map. The grading rubric divides each process map into five sections, including: core activity; activities preceding the core activity; activities following the core activity; loop/iteration; and communication across the swim lanes. The rubric consist of two parts that evaluate (i) the ability of students to demonstrate each section and (ii) the quality of demonstration of each section. The author conducted an inter-rater reliability index to validate the rubric. This inter-rater reliability index compares the scores students’ process maps were when assessed by graduate students, faculty, and industry practitioners. The reviewers graded the same set of twelve process maps. The inter-rater reliability index was found to be 0.21, which indicates a fair agreement between the graders. The non-BIM activity approach was perceived as the most impactful approach by the students. The assessment of the process maps with the rubric indicated that the non-BIM approach was the most impactful approach for enabling students to demonstrate their ability to create a process map. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Construction 2017

Objective. To develop and establish validity for a grading rubric to evaluate diabetes subjective, objective, assessment, plan (SOAP) note writing on primary care (PC) advanced pharmacy practice experiences (APPEs), and to assess reliability and student perceptions of the rubric. Methods. Ten PC APPE faculty members collaborated to develop a rubric to provide formative and summative feedback on three written SOAP notes per APPE student over a 10-month period. Correlation analyses were conducted between rubric scores and three criterion variables to assess criterion-related validity: APPE grades, Pharmaceutical Care Ability Profile Scores, and Global Impression Scores. Inter-rater and intra-rater reliability testing were completed using Cohen's kappa and Intraclass Correlation Coefficients (ICC). Student perceptions were assessed through an anonymous student survey. Results. Fifty-one students and 167 SOAP notes were evaluated using the final rubric. The mean score significantly increased from the first to second SOAP note and from the first to third SOAP note. Statistically significant positive correlations were found between final rubric scores and criterion variables. The ICC for inter-rater reliability was fair (.59) for final rubric scores and excellent for intra-rater reliability (.98 to1.00). Students responded that the rubric improved their ability (84.9%) and confidence (92.4%) to write SOAP notes. Conclusion. The rubric may be used to make valid decisions about students' SOAP note writing ability and may increase their confidence in this area. The use of the rubric allows for greater reliability among multiple graders, supporting grading consistency.

Post-editing machine translation has become more common in recent years due to the increase in materials requiring translation and the effectiveness of machine translation systems. This project presents a system for formalizing structured translation specifications that facilitates the assessment of the performance of a post-editor. This report provides details concerning two software applications: the Ruqual Specifications Writer, which aids in the authoring of post-editing project specifications, and the Ruqual Rubric Viewer which provides a graphical user interface for filling out a machine readable rubric file. The project as a whole relies on a definition of translation quality based on the specification approach. In order to test whether potential evaluators are able to reliably assess the quality of post-edited translations, a user study was conducted that utilized the Specifications Writer and Rubric Viewer. The specifications developed for the project were based on actual post-editing data provided by Ray Flournoy of Adobe. The study involved simulating the work of five post-editors, which consisted of developing texts and scenarios. 17 non-expert graders rated the work of the five fictional post-editors, and an Intraclass Correlation of the graders responses shows that they are reliable to a high degree. The groundwork laid by this project should help in the development of other applications that assist in the assessment of translation projects in terms of a specification approach to quality.

This study explores the weight of pronunciation in a speaking proficiency test at an English as a Second Language (ESL) Intensive English Program (IEP) in America. As an integral part of speaking, beliefs, practices, and research of pronunciation teaching have experienced shifts over the decades (Morley, 1991). Most studies concerning speaking have focused on intelligibility, comprehensibility, and accentedness of speaking, with attempting to address the role of pronunciation in oral communication. However, the degree to which pronunciation is weighed in determining speaking proficiency levels is unclear (Higgs & Clifford, 1982, Kang, 2013). In an effort to contribute to the understanding of this issue, the current study investigates the relationship between pronunciation and speaking proficiency ratings. The speaking proficiency ratings and pronunciation ratings in vowels, consonants, word stress, sentence stress, intonation, and rhythm of 226 speaking samples from English learners were collected at Brigham Young University's (BYU) English Language Center (ELC). The study confirms that suprasegmentals explain more variance than segmentals in English proficiency, and among those suprasegmental features, only the ratings of sentence stress increase incrementally with the proficiency levels without overlapping among proficiency levels.

No description available.

Faculty facing challenges of teaching students in a post-Katrina environment used learning-centered approaches to restore educational opportunities to its populations of hurricane-displaced students, the growing population of Hispanic students, and the business community. The study sought to determine if the faculty members had made progress toward implementing learning-centered activities and strategies into the classroom after attending seminars and workshops that covered the learning-centered principles. Additionally, the research sought to determine if there were differences among academic disciplines in the implementation of the learning-centered principles in the classroom at the college. The study used quantitative research methods. To collect the quantitative data, the researcher used a learning-centered rubric along with specialized worksheets. The rubric assessed the five learning-centered principles: (a) function of content, (b) role of the instructor, (c) responsibility for learning, (d) purpose and processes of assessment, and (e) balance of power. Participants had the option to assess themselves at four levels of implementation for each of the learning-centered principles. The four levels were (a) the use of learner-centered approaches, (b) higher level of transitioning, (c) lower level of transitioning, and (d) the use of instructor-centered approaches. The results of the study revealed that the majority of the faculty members were at the higher level of transitioning for four of the learning-centered principles. The study indicated that the majority of faculty members were at the lower level of transitioning in implementing the balance of power. The findings also indicated that there were differences in the way faculty members implemented the learning-centered principles across three disciplines.

Across the United States, higher education institutions increasingly employ a holistic review of prospective students’ application materials. In a holistic review process, admissions offices consider a student’s personal and academic context when reviewing applications for admission. A key feature of a holistic review is a student’s application essay, or personal statement. However, admissions offices rarely standardize their essay review process and very little research exists regarding whether student essays predict successful outcomes in college. This paper summarizes a quality improvement study conducted within the University of Vermont Admissions Office. It examines the extent to which non-cognitive student characteristics present in student admissions essays (e.g., grit, creativity, intrinsic motivation, leadership, community engagement, cultural fluency) are correlated with pre-admission factors and subsequent college outcomes. The study involved developing a new essay scoring rubric and evaluating the usefulness of this rubric by scoring 320 undergraduate admission essays. Findings suggest that the rubric is useful in identifying evidence of non-cognitive factors in student essays, but that overall scores do not strongly correlate with pre-admissions characteristics or first-fall college GPA. The study supports the practice of holistic review and provides insight into how admissions offices can begin to operationalize the review of essays and non-cognitive factors in their admissions processes.

This study is an investigation of the relationship between assessment and learning in education, and specifically, in the context of Australian secondary students studying English. The purpose of this research is to contribute to change in the way assessment of learning is conducted in view of the shift of educational values from content based towards a more goal-orientated process. Therefore, we begin this study with the premise that educational values should not only inform assessment in terms of outcomes and accountability as specified in national guidelines. They should also support a pedagogic process which helps to develop in students a heightened sense of the value of their own contributions to the community, academic and otherwise. The intellectual context of this study begins with an overview of most prominent educational theories. We illustrate John Dewey’s view that education should not only prepare one for life, but should also be an integral part of life itself. Dewey insisted that education was based in experience and that educational institutions should therefore honour and build on students� experiences. Piaget believed that children are quite sophisticated, active thinkers and theorists. Vygotsky saw all learning, knowledge, and experience had a social basis. Together these three theorists emphasize the active role of students as individuals (Dewey and Piaget) or a group (Vygotsky). Further, as society’s values shift from the Industrial Age to an Information Age, there is a growing expectation for individuals to be active and informed citizens, with the ability to exercise judgment and the capacity to make sense of their world. In response to these issues, we conclude that the teaching and assessment processes must support these kinds of requirements. We examine literature related to learning theories and assessment with the objective of ascertaining and illustrating aspects which they share and which, in our view, hamper the development of learning environments enabling exploratory and critical learning. We argue that when assessment criteria predetermine the learning outcomes, this results in teaching models where students’ learning needs are also predetermined. This process alienates students from their sociocultural context which shapes them and from which they derive their identify and the sense of their own value. Consequently, students become an object of pedagogic tools, rather than rightful participants in the lives of their various communities. Against the background of these reflections, we set out in this study to investigate how learning and assessment can be linked together. To this end, we develop the concept of an Exploratory Learning Environment. In order to articulate the framework of such an environment, we draw on a number of principals generally associated with humanist/constructivist/postmodern approaches to learning and assessment. In the course of this work we argue that students’ ways of knowing, and how they learn, cannot be divorced from their individual, and yet socially (interactively) constructed (negotiated), cultural experiences (terms of reference). The philosophy of the Exploratory Learning Environment can be described as promoting engagement and construction, thus supporting learning through experience, inquiry,experimentation and critical reflection. Consequently, in the Exploratory Learning Environment we seek to integrate pedagogic task construction and students’ expectations. To this end, we concentrate our research on strategies, or tools, enhancing students’ critical forms of engagement in their community. We aim for the academic knowledge, which they construct as a result, not to serve arbitrarily constructed performance indicators, but the students themselves and the community which they engage. Regarding assessment, our objective is to ascertain the diversity of conflict-generating concerns which students take into account in order to motivate the kinds of socially responsible solutions that they create and, as a result, the kinds of relationships which they want to establish. This approach to assessment allows us to focus students’ learning on developing critical thinking skills whose validation comes from students’ own evaluation, rather than from an abstract source of authority. This arrangement of creating learning environments rich in tools enhancing students’ critical forms of engagement we carry out using two classes of Year 10 and one class of Year 8 students in two secondary schools. Results from the study demonstrate significant advantages that can be gained when assessment is not limited to the measure of a ‘product’, but is based in pedagogy enabling critical negotiation. For example, students developed a sense of ownership of their learning task, felt motivated to explore conflicting issues, and, interestingly, valued the assessment process and looked forward to learning about the quality of their performance. In summary, the theoretical reflections conducted in this study and the experiment conducted within the Exploratory Learning Environment model, together, provide valuable and reliable evidence supporting the need for a critical evaluation of the currently existing relationship between teaching and assessment. Further, this thesis offers examples of solutions in which this link can be fostered. It demonstrates that, when students are empowered to learn by critically linking academic and other forms of knowledge residing in their community, the assessment process become a meaningful tool to them and they become involved in their assessment. At the same time, teachers learn to reduce the grip they hold on the learning and assessment processes. They do so by adopting the role of a facilitator of the students’ negotiation process. This is very different from the traditional teaching practices where the learning process is restricted, rather than enhanced, by assessment.

It is a well-known fact among the foreign language teachers that the assessment of speaking is one of the most challenging tasks in the teaching methodology. The reason for that is the lack of proper concepts of the notion &lsquo / good speaking skills&rsquo / and the assessment tasks that would evaluate the learner&rsquo / s ability to communicate efficiently in the real context. The purpose of this study is to investigate the teachers&rsquo / and learners&rsquo / perceptions and challenges they face when dealing with speaking skills. Data were gathered via four stages &ndash / open-ended and Likert scale questionnaires and two semi-structured interviews that were offered to the academics and the students of Middle East Technical University, Hacettepe University and Gazi University. Another aim is to develop a speaking rubric which would generalize the criteria academics and their students consider to be the most important while evaluating oral performance. Both qualitative and quantitative data was analyzed. The Microsoft Excel program was used for analyzing learners&rsquo / perceptions about the assessment of speaking in the form of the questionnaire, while content analysis was used in order to analyze the data elicited from the teachers and students through open-ended questionnaire and semi-structured interview.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate a Theatre For Young Audiences (TYA) paper and multimedia study guide and to investigate teachers' perceptions of study guides created for TYA. It used current literature surrounding TYA performances, supplemental materials for the elementary classroom, and multimedia in performance and education, to glean critical elements for creating a useful TYA study guide. These elements provided the framework for creating a rubric to evaluate a TYA study guide's potential success in the classroom. The mixed methods study then used the created rubric to evaluate etc . . .'s (Educational Theatre Company) 2005 Hey Diddle Diddle! The Rhymes and Rhythms of Mother Goose study guide. This data was combined with surveys administered to elementary teachers. The study guide rated high on the rubric and teachers' perceptions were generally positive. Overall the analysis yielded information useful for the creation of future guides and research.