Assessing post-graduate students’ readiness for the module

Abstract

This article emanates from one of the assignments that was given to the students who were registered for the Honours programme in 2018 (NQF Level Eight). They were 12 registered students. To assess students' readiness for the module, they were given an article entitled: “Results from the young children, new media, and library survey: what did we learn?” by Mills, Romeljin-Stout, Campbell and Koester (2015). Then each was required to identify a public library that one can visit to do informal research in order to be able to contextualize library services in line with the given statements:The influence of mass media on library services to children and young people’s learning opportunities. Method of assessment entailed the writing of essay about the topic given and also do a brief class presentation of about 20 minutes. The total mark for the essay-type question was 30 and class presentation was 20. Rubric for the peer assessment entailed the assessment of introduction, clarity of presentation, public speaking confidence and conclusion. Patterns of reporting indicated that students had background knowledge on how to structure their assignment subtopics and do class presentations. The majority of assignments showed coherence of facts, good analytical skills. One even narrated the informal interview he/she had with the Children’s Librarian. Generally, it can be concluded that students showed an acceptable level of competencies in line with the Colvin-Keene Model, Bloom’s taxonomy of cognitive learning objectives and the NQF level 8 learning outcome requirements. However, it was notable that two students showed poor sentence construction, but relayed good ideas. It is important to build on the already existing information and knowledge management competencies. In addition, to encourage students continue to use IL support systems provided by the university.