Online Assessment Strategies

After reading a couple of articles on online assessments and cheating, I feel like I do a pretty good job on keeping wandering eyes at bay.

All of my formal assessments are taken online. I use USATesprep.com when taking assessments. This online program allows me to create standard-based questions. Last year all of my assessments were on paper. It created a lot of wasted paper and was a pain to keep up with filing. This also was an issue with keeping the tests secure.

With the online program, I can create assessments ahead of time and assign the test. Students cannot take the test ahead of time. I have to activate the test for students to be able take it. I can also deactivate the test at the end of the day. This dissuades students from being able to finish it when they get home. I can also see what students are not finished at the end of the hour. I can keep a pretty good eye on their tests.

When students take the test, they are not allowed to start until I activate the tests. Students take the test on their personal chromebook. Our school has a monitoring system through Google call Hapara. I am able to keep track of what students have open on their chromebook. This helps me to make sure students stay on tasks. I do occasionally have students try to play games on their chromebook. I can easily close out the tab they are currently on. It's a lot of fun to see their reaction when their tab is no longer opened. The monitoring systems also allows me to watch students who leave my room. I have some students who have 504s or IEPs who test in other rooms. I am able to make sure they are working on what they need to do.

For the actual assessment, I have the ability to shuffle questions and their multiple choice answers. This helps with keeping students from cheating since no two students are ever on the same question at the same time. I also do not allow students to view the questions and the correct answers after the test. Students can view the answers when we go over the test (once everyone is finished and their grades have been passed back).  I also do not allow students to retake the same test. I have a retake test that has different questions, so students cannot simply memorize the questions and answers to improve their grade.

Filtering

After researching on filtering and having the conference call, I have a better understanding of what filtering is and how it is used in schools.  While I think filtering has its purpose, I feel like it is a little extreme on what sites are allowed and what sites are blocked.  There are some sites that are blocked that would be useful in the classroom, but there are plenty of websites that I am glad are blocked.

  Again, the purpose of filtering is to keep students off of websites that aren’t intended for student view. Filtering is also used as a liability for schools. Schools can’t be held liable for students who get around the filter to view websites that aren’t appropriate for their age. Students are smarter than ever when it comes to bypassing filtering systems. Many figure out how to get around the filter by researching the sites IP addresses. Many website routinely change their IP addresses to allow students to use at schools. It’s hard for schools and filtering programs to keep up with all of the changes that occur daily with the hundreds of inappropriate sites found on the Web.  By using the alternative options that are available to assist the filtering systems, we must take a proactive approach to keep up to date with the ever-changing and always advancing digital world.

Reporting on the Securities Reports

What did you learn from these reports?
Most of the issues with security I was already aware of. The only issue I did not know much about was cyber terrorism. The report was well laid out, and very informative. I was able to read the report and understand how big of a threat cyber terrorism is for our country. 

What surprised me?
Reading about AUPs was something that I never really think about but are a great idea. We went one to one this year, and I hope the school required students to sign an AUP. I know students were told to not use their chromebooks for certain things, but having a contract that they have to abide by would make the "rules" more black and white. You don't follow the AUP, there will be consequences. 

Which of these problems would concern me more than others? 
I would say the cyber terrorism is the most concerning for me. Seeing how easy it is for someone to steal your private information is concerning enough, but to think of it being widespread for the entire country is scary. With the Internet, there is always a possibility of your information becoming compromised. I like to think that it is never going to be used against me, but that has already proved otherwise. Personally seeing the effects of what happens when your credit card information is taken and used, I can't imagine this as a wide spread situation. You must put your trust in the government. It's the only thing that is keeping our information safe.

How Private is the Internet?

When I researched my name on the Internet, the most interesting information I found wasn't even about myself. I found out there was a famous Canadian artist by the same name as myself. When I researched my maiden name, I was able to find some sites that showed my address, my age, and my relatives names. Its kind of scary to think that all of this information if free for the taking. I try hard to keep everything private, especially when students have such free access to the Internet.

It would be interesting to have this be an assignment for students to complete. Showing them how easy it is to find information on themselves and family members and how important it is not to post everything on the Internet.

Beware the Internet

My husband and I use the internet a lot for purchasing everyday items that we can't get easily.  By using the internet to make purchases online, we take the risk of compromising our credit card information. In the last couple of years we have had our credit card information stolen resulting in purchases that were not of our doing. One specific incident, our card information was used for a service that will write papers for a fee. The same individual also purchased a hotel room. 

Using the internet can be great when you can't get to the store, especially when many websites provide free shipping.  You take the risk, though, of someone taking your personal information and using for their own. You must decide, is it worth the risk?

Envisioning Web 3.0 in Education

I found a presentation on Prezi that helped me to envision how I would be able to Web 3.0 in the classroom. 

https://prezi.com/_pf9iya_-dfu/web-30-in-education/

Here is the citation for this presentation.

Hussien, H. (2012, October 15). Web 3.0 in Education [Prezi Presentation]. Retrieved from https://prezi.com/_pf9iya_-dfu/web-30-in-education/.

Forum Reviews

After reading some of the forum entries, it has given me some insight of what others think of some of the tools that are being used in the classroom and gave me some ideas of how to use these tools. 

I like the idea of using surveys to create a baseline at the beginning of the year to see where students are at. This then helps to figure out what students know and don't know. I also like the idea of using surveys to get to know the students. I started using this at the beginning of the year, but reading about what others do with it, it seems like something I might try. 

Reading some of the forum posts about Google Docs, has also shown some great ideas, but also some difficulties. It is such an easy tool to use, and allows you to connect with students much easier.  A couple issues I found after reading some posts include the limited features it has compared to Microsoft Office, and the requirement of the Internet to use it. besides these issues, it really is a useful tool to use in the classroom.

I have been able to get some great ideas by reading forum posts. I can take what I have read, tweak it to make it work for me, and make it my own to use in my classroom. Instead of creating something from scratch.