Module #7 Course Evaluation Rubric

When I teach children, I enjoy using story books as a teaching material. Teaching materials include anything which can be used to facilitate the learning of a language. They can be linguistic, visual, auditory or kinesthetic, and they can be presented in print, through live performance or display, or on cassette, CD-ROM, DVD or the internet (Tomlinson, 2001, p. 66). Tomlinson(2001) also mentioned that teachers should have needs and wants to be satisfied too. Personally, I am very interested in designing lesson plans using WebQuest.

Tom(2004) mentioned in his article “The Learning Power of WebQuest” that WebQuest is inquiry oriented cooperative learning activities through internet resources. There should be no reinforcing what students already know. Web Quest can break authentic problems and tasks into small steps. So the lesson format should be well organized including knowing, comprehending, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and evaluating. In a real Web Quest, new information need for transformation within learners themselves.

When developing criteria for material evaluation, Tomlinson(2001) suggested that it is extremely useful to develop a set of formal criteria for use on a particular evaluation and them to use that set as a basis for developing subsequent context-specific sets. One way of developing a set of criteria is as follows:

 1. Brainstorm a list of universal criteria
 2. Subdivide some of the criteria
 3. Monitor and revise the list of universal criteria
 4. Categorize the list
 5. Develop media-specific criteria
 6. Develop content-specific criteria
 7. Develop age-specific criteria
 8. Develop local criteria (p. 31)

Before making rubrics for grading the material, I would like to mention briefly what is material evaluation. Material evaluation is a procedure that involves measuring the value of a set of learning materials ( Tomlinson, 2001, p.15). When we evaluate the course, we need to take some aspects into considerations such as who evaluate the course, what can be evaluated, why evaluate the course, how can you evaluate it, when can you evaluate it, what is done with the results of evaluation(Graves, 2000, p.214). Graves(2000) also explains seven criterion which are to be evaluated and I would like to use them when I make rubrics.

 1. The goals and objectives
 2. The course content
 3. The needs assessment
 4. The way the course is organized
 5. The materials and methods
 6. The learning assessment plan
 7. The course evaluation plan (p.214)

Now, I would like to evaluate teaching material based on the information what I learned from the course. I found very interesting WebQuest and the URL is
http://questgarden.com/author/create/preview.php?u=72601&l=93105-091206131201.

This WebQuest is designed for 1st grade of elementary school by Ana Castillo who is working at elementary school. She used the story of “ The Little Red Hen.” Through this WebQuest, she wanted students to enjoy listening to a story, completing art/crafts activities, speaking, coloring and writing.



Evaluation result



There are additional information regarding the most effective way of conducting an material evaluation by Tomlinson (2001).

 1. Make sure that there is more than one evaluator.
 2. Discuss the criteria to make sure there is equivalence of interpretation;
 3. Answer the criteria independently and in isolation from the other evaluators.
 4. Focus in a large evaluation on a typical unit for each level.
 5. Give a score for each criterion.
 6. Write comments at the end of each category.
 7. At the end of the evaluation aggregate each evaluator’s scores for each criterion, category of criteria and set of criteria and then average the scores.
 8. Record the comments shared by the evaluators.
 9. Write a joint report (p.32)

Tomlinson(2001) mentioned that material evaluation is initially a time-consuming and difficult undertaking. However, doing evaluations formally can contribute to the development of an ability to conduct principled informal evaluations quickly and effectively when the occasion demands. Also, I hope to be more open-minded what criteria I need to satisfy when I write the course book or activity book for children someday.

References
Graves, K. (2001). Designing language courses. Boston,MA: Heinle.
March, T. (2004). The Learning power of webquest. New Needs, New Curriculum, 61(4), 42-47.
Tomlinson, B. (2001). Are Materials development?. What is material development, 2(3), 1-40.