Limited access Past event
Economics Pedagogy Seminar Introducing and Developing Familiarity with Viva Voce Assessment in Undergraduate Economics Education
Speaker: Professor Fabio Aricò, University of East Anglia
Abstract: This presentation considers an innovation in assessment aimed at introducing viva voce exams in undergraduate economics education. In the first part of the presentation, we describe the steps we followed to implement oral exams in practice. We will discuss the pedagogy, the logistics, as well as issues related with compliance with quality assurance regulations. In the second part of the presentation, we report on the evaluation we conducted to test the effectiveness of our approach. In particular, we will focus on scaffolding mechanisms facilitating the development of students' familiarity with viva voce assessment. Our aim is to inform the design of oral exams that enhance student's self-efficacy as well as performance. Our research methodology grounds on a case-study developed at the School of Economics of the University of East Anglia through a mixed-methods approach. Preliminary results highlight that gradual exposure to increasingly challenging viva voce assessment tasks, combined with self-assessment and feed-forward practices, are highly effective at enhancing the student's experience with oral exams.