Process and product

You may find that you want to change the learning objectives so that they focus more strongly on the process of skill and knowledge acquisition, rather than the completion of a product. This will mean further discussion within the department, since the course plan may need to be changed. You could also adjust your grading criteria to focus more on process.

For example, suppose your examination had this learning outcome:

At the end of this course, you will be able to analyse electrical engineering problems in industrial settings.

There are many ways to test this kind of learning outcome: you could use a controlled test where students are given unfamiliar examples, or they could be given short multiple-choice questions which cover a wide range of different situations, or they could write a report over the semester based on a real company or case study. The first two of these examples are easy to control by holding the examination in a particular room at a particular time, but the report is more likely to be something the student will be asked to do as a professional, and gives them the opportunity to cover more possibilities and contexts. Think about what you really want students to be able to do in their examination.

Grading criteria for the examination will take into account the short period to complete the work, and are likely to focus on technical knowledge, comprehension of the examples provided in the test, with some grades for the likely effectiveness and suitability of the solutions, which of course cannot be tested. The multiple-choice questions would probably be designed to cover a wide range of situations and knowledge, with points allocated according to the number of correct answers, perhaps with higher marks for more complex questions. For a take-home report, knowing that GAI tools are available, you might want to ask the students to add notes about how they did the work, or share a journal, or have an oral presentation, and allocate some grades for this kind of reflection on process.

It is difficult to cover the full range of possible learning outcomes in a resource like this one, so if you find it difficult to review yours, please contact me or colleagues at one of the pedagogical units to discuss your particular case and help you to work through the options.

Summary: As you probably learned in your initial teacher education, learning outcomes are key to successful course planning. It is a good idea to review these now that you know a little more about GAI tools and how they work,