How do you make sure students master their basic knowledge early? Frederik van Dam uses Cerego and sees results.
Frederik van Dam, lecturer of the text analysis component of the course ‘Analysis of music, text and image’, originally came to us for help with the development of a multiple-choice exam. The goal was to reduce assessment load. We concluded that he mainly wanted to spend a larger portion of the contact hours on practice. Cerego allows Frederik to spend more time on analysing texts and discussing complicated subject matter with his students.
In the first year, Frederik and a student assistant made sets in Cerego with the key elements from his course. At first, he chose the Flash Cards, later he added Application items. He updated Cerego with new subjects corresponding to the weekly classes. The use of Cerego was voluntary. The first time, about 50% of the students used Cerego during the course. The other 50% only used Cerego to study for the exam. The following year Frederik explained more about Cerego in the beginning of the course, which increased the participation significantly.
In the teacher dashboard Frederik could see the students’ results on the subjects. This created a clear overview of the students’ prior knowledge. Frederik used this information in his class schedule by spending more time on the subjects that were deemed more difficult in the Cerego sets. Students indicated that Cerego is great for studying the material and preparing for the exam. The practice sets on Cerego remain accessible for students, so they can refresh their memory for their Bachelor thesis if they’re interested. Some premaster students already used the sets with preparing for their thesis and they were positive about the experience.
Update: After a very positive experience with Cerego, Frederik has updated his use of Cerego in his classes: in his 2.0 version, he has turned the sets from concept lists into a self-containing digital course reader. At Radboud Education Days 2021 he presented his second version:
Within the Faculty of Arts this model has received attention: in combination with Knowledge Clips it is perfect for hybrid education. Because of the amount of independent work, it is also perfect for students who follow the course as a minor.
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How do you make sure students master their basic knowledge early? Frederik van Dam uses Cerego and sees results.
Frederik van Dam, lecturer of the text analysis component of the course ‘Analysis of music, text and image’, originally came to us for help with the development of a multiple-choice exam. The goal was to reduce the amount of work to assess. When we talked about it some more, we concluded that he mainly wanted to spend a larger portion of the contact hours on practice. Cerego makes it possible for Frederik to spend more time on analysing texts and discussing the materials students have difficulties with.
During the first year, Frederik and a student assistant turned the key concepts of the components of his course into sets in Cerego. He first opted for the so-called flash cards, and later he also added application items to the sets. Every week, he made the concepts that related to that week’s class available for the participants. Using Cerego was voluntary. The first time about half of the students used the tool during the course. The other half only used it in preparation for the exam. The next year, he explained more about the how and why behind Cerego, leading to a strong increase of users.
The teacher dashboard showed Frederik the items that caused trouble for multiple students. This created a better picture about the previous knowledge students had. The lecturer made use of this by spending more time on the subjects that were deemed difficult during class. Students have said that they think Cerego is a useful support when studying the material and preparing for the exam. The practice sets will remain accessible for students, so they are able to refresh their basic knowledge when they start their Bachelor thesis. Premaster students have used it for this purpose and were positive.
Update: Frederik is enthusiastic about Cerego, and sees an ambitious but very interesting intensification ahead: in his 2.0 version, he has turned the sets from concept lists into a self-containing digital course reader. The original training question then serve more of a scaffolding role. Within the Faculty of Arts this model has received attention: in combination with Knowledge Clips it serves as a solid base for hybrid education in corona times. Furthermore, it suits the minor structure due to the independent nature of the method.