Low Stakes Assignments
In reflecting on her spring 2020 experience, Michelle Miller, a faculty member at Northern Arizona University and author of Minds Online: Teaching effectively with Technology, writes that she plans to significantly reduce her reliance on high stakes assignments in favor of periodic, smaller assignments. "... I’m going to avoid anything that puts students in the position of cramming a lot of work in on a test or a project within a short time frame, just to satisfy a grade requirement. Such heavily weighted assignments turned out to be the worst ones to try to run with integrity in a virtual environment."
This page lists several options in Blackboard for implementing these types of low stakes assignments, depending on the question format and modality.
Type of Assignment | Tools | Details |
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Multiple choice (or true/false) reading quizzes or problems | Test option under Blackboard Assessments |
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Short answer or essay questions about readings or other materials- Option 1 | Test option under Blackboard Assessment |
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Short answer or essay questions about readings or other materials- Option 2 | Assignment option under Blackboard Assessments |
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Short answer or essay questions about readings or other materials- Option 3 | Discussion Board or Blog under Blackboard Tools |
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Handwritten problem sets, diagrams, designs, or other assignments | Assignment option under Blackboard Assessments |
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Pre- or post-class writing- Option 1 | Test option under Blackboard Assessments |
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Pre- or post-class writing- Option 2 | Assignment option under Blackboard Assessments |
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Pre- or post-class writing- Option 3 | Journal option under Blackboard Tools |
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Pre- or post-class writing- Option 4 | Discussion Board or Blog under Blackboard Tools |
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Grading and Feedback. Some low stakes assignments (e.g., Blackboard quizzes) are automatically graded, giving students immediate feedback on their learning and lightening the vrtual paper load on you. Others (e.g., discussion forum posts) could be evaluated with a very simple rubric or for completion, with either personalized feedback (more time consuming), or group-level feedback in the form of an instructor post or synthesizing/wrap-up commentary.