In the traditional teaching method, students have to attend classes in an institute at a stipulated time. This is also known as face-to-face mode, but with time education has been revolutionized. Educational courses are no longer conducted only through the offline mode. Remote assessments are assignments that are set by teachers for students enrolled in online courses.
The popularity of online courses is apparent in today’s world. Students get the opportunity to learn from anywhere. The flexibility offered by online teaching is a vital factor that is increasing the enrolment percentage of students for virtual courses.
How Teachers Conduct the Remote Assessment?
Hence, in place of classroom tests, the teachers send assessments through the virtual interface. The remote assessments are completed and submitted by the students on the same virtual platform.
The remote assessments help in gauging the progress of the student. However, since the classroom environment is not there it becomes challenging for the teacher to evaluate the students based on the examinations, or the assessment.
Therefore, the online educators can set a deadline for the academic paper submission as part of the remote assessment. On the other hand, teachers can design tests that students have to complete and submit. These examinations have to be taken by logging into the system.
The tests are often time-bound, and the responses of the students are automatically saved. With the aid of LMS platforms, it has become easier to conduct classes online. However, maintaining the integrity of online teaching is a concerning factor for online educators.
Steps to conduct Remote Assessments
Remote assessments seem easy, but in the virtual field, the chances of malpractices increase considerably. While teaching students online, there are a few challenges that teachers have to face.
In face-to-face teaching, teachers can directly preside over the students during the examination. But in the case of remote learning, adequate monitoring becomes a challenge. The ease offered by the online mode of teaching is often misused by online learners. It is not uncommon for students enrolled in online courses to indulge in unfair practices like cheating.
However, some measures help curb unethical practices during remote assessments. A few actions that can be taken by online educators for ensuring fair Remote Assessments are enlisted below:
Build a Feedback System:
During online teaching, it is impossible to ascertain the students’ reactions. Until students voice their queries it is pretty challenging to know the difficulties that the students are facing.
Sometimes, due to a lack of confidence, students cannot verbally articulate their problems during the online class. The scope of getting questions answered in an online class depends on internet connectivity to a great extent. Therefore, to ensure that students are not left with confusing material, teachers need to build a better feedback system.
The feedback can be collected in the form of a document that students can submit after a class. They can think about the problems they face during the lecture. Accordingly, send a written note to their teacher. Periodic feedback regarding the quality of the classes is also important so that students can point out some overall shortcomings of the online sessions.
Vary the Test Material:
The test on a subject depends on the students’ understanding of the learning material. The use of the same question paper for all the students leaves a broad scope for cheating. The teacher should prepare multiple sets of questions on the same subject.
So that students cannot simply copy answers from another fellow student. It is also vital to ensure that the difficulty level of the question papers remains the same. Changing difficulty level makes it unfair for the students who get the difficult question paper on a topic.
Know the Pathways of Online Cheating:
It is vital to know the new methods of cheating emerging in the virtual field. There are essay mills and paraphrasing tools that help in generating content for completing assignments. As an online educator, it is essential to check the students do not indulge in any such practices during remote assessments.
Use Multiple Assessment Formats:
Educators should ensure that the students are aptly coping up with this educational procedure. Using multiple assignments helps to ensure that the student is coping with the pace of the online course. Hence, the teachers use multiple examination formats, from long answers to choice-based answers. It helps them to not just prevent cheating but also examine the student’s progress.
Importance of Plagiarism Checker for Scanning Remote Assessments
Cheating among students submitting assignments is not a new occurrence. However, with online education, the percentage of projects containing plagiarized content is increasing exponentially. The lack of unique content in a research paper is often a result of poor research skills.
It is sensible to use a sophisticated plagiarism detection system to avoid plagiarism in higher education. The detection software is accessible to both the teachers and the students.
Students can use these plagiarism checkers for checking their assignments. Online teachers need to make students aware of plagiarism checking of assignments. So that online course takers are not inclined to submit plagiarized work under their name.
- Plagiarism can be unintentional too.
Apart from the intentional use, there are plagiarism issues that occur due to a lack of knowledge. Students need to know how to avoid plagiarism by using proper citations. Unintentional plagiarism can tarnish a scholar’s reputation because it reveals a lack of attention.
Students can use an online plagiarism checker for scanning academic papers to maintain their peace of mind. Hence, to keep plagiarism problems from hampering the project, it is wise to check for plagiarism with a plagiarism scanner that can quickly detect plagiarized content.
Online learning is a robust field, and more students are opting for this form of teaching. The integrity and quality of education can be maintained by examination proctoring and plagiarism checking of remote assignments with anti-plagiarism software. Hence, online teachers have to use sophisticated software technology to ensure that students do not get an opportunity to use unfair means during remote assessments.