Making assessment promote effective learning practices: An example of ipsative assessment from the School of Psychology at UEL

Abstract

There is a wealth of literature that attests to the benefits of retrieval practice in the long term retention of academic material (see Roediger & Butler, 2011 for a review). Unfortunately, there is also evidence indicating that students rarely report using this method of study (e.g. Karpicke, Butler, Roediger, 2009). The authors have piloted the use of an Ipsative format of assessment that imposes the use of retrieval practice via self-administered testing in the virtual learning environment Moodle. The purpose of this paper is to identify the rationale for the use of Ipsative Assessment in a programme’s pedagogical repertoire and to briefly overview the implementation of this format of assessment.