Assessing oral communication skills
Assessment of oral communication skills occurs where students are required to orally present findings or knowledge.
One component of an oral communication assessment is the required knowledge, or outcome. However, a significant component is the assessment of oral communications skills themselves.
Assessment of oral communication lends itself to 'authentic' employability-based tasks. It is also one way of addressing different student learning preferences.
One challenge for examiners wishing to assess oral communication at USQ is that many of our students study in distance mode.
You can design for flexibility and equity by allowing students to use a variety of technologies to record the accompaniment to their presentation slides. These include:
-
Wimba classroom for live student presentations
- Wimba voice board, Study Desk activity (log an ICT request to have this activated in your course)
- Video podcasting, using freeware such as Audacity
- Record an MP3 sound file, and embed each PowerPoint slide
- Create a single MP3 file with audio cues for each PowerPoint slide
- Skype and video camera or Skype audio presentation
- telephone presentation with audio cues in presentation notes
Resources
Guide to Technology Enhanced Learning and Teaching (PDF*234kb)
'Developing Oral Communication Skills'. Moodle community site on USQStudyDesk designed to support students. USQ login required.