AUTHENTIC ASSESSMENT
Realistic and Practical Assessment of Learning
As a Career Counselor, I helped students and clients clearly identify their career-related challenge(s), reflect upon their past experience, identify their aspirational future roles, and develop plans to be marketable.
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Two assignments I created to help students reflect on their experience were the Ideal Job and Dream Resume. These were incorporated in classes or counseling sessions I led. There was always an experiential component as students' internships or past work experience served as the vehicle for learning and applying reflection to make future plans.
IDEAL JOB
The Ideal Job is an Authentic Assessment that helps students practice reading and dissecting a job description for future fit.
Their next step is applying this information to their future career goals and developing a plan to achieve them.
Students collect and study elements of actual job descriptions categorizing skills, accomplishments, and education required. Then, they create an ideal job they would like to have in the future.
A student completing this assessment is naturally using the Constructivist Learning Theory by constructing their own knowledge by reflecting, justifying, and exploring their past career and future career. Ideally, as their More Knowledgeable Other, I helped them learn within the Zone of Proximal Development by probing their reflection responses and helping them justify their fit within their ideal role.
Connectivism is also an important part of this activity and career development, in general, because knowledge about self and career fit greatly informed by learning from others in prospective fields and roles. ONet and job listing sites are critical for this assignment and the actual task of searching for real jobs.
This is also typically an assignment I use with adults, so I naturally apply several elements of Andragogy. Every assignment I give in a college course or counseling appointment comes with a certain element of motivating and informing the, "What's in it for Me," mentality. The learner very much steers this assignment into a personal direction by deciding on their own goals. The learner's experience is also one of the main elements of this assignment.
DREAM RESUME
The Dream Resume is an Authentic Assessment that guides a student through a reflection and planning exercise that organizes their past experience and applies the lens of their aspirational future plans.
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A student considers an ideal and realistic role within the path they are considering and is required to conduct occupational research and identify traits and skills they need to improve to be marketable.
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A student completing this assessment is naturally using the Constructivist Learning Theory by constructing their own knowledge by reflecting, justifying, and exploring their past career and future career. Ideally, as their More Knowledgeable Other, I helped them learn within the Zone of Proximal Development by probing their reflection responses and helping them justify their fit within their ideal role and marketability.
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Connectivism is also an important part of this activity and career development, in general, because knowledge about self and career fit greatly informed by learning from others in prospective fields and roles.
​
This is also typically an assignment I use with adults, so I naturally apply several elements of Andragogy. Every assignment I give in a college course or counseling appointment comes with a certain element of motivating and informing the, "What's in it for Me," mentality. The learner very much steers this assignment into a personal direction by deciding on their own goals. The learner's experience is also one of the main elements of this assignment.
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