Topic A3.5: Instructional Design

Evaluation - The Final Phase
This phase, although listed last, takes place throughout the instructional design process, so it’s not really the final phase in sequence. The two primary types of evaluation are formative and summative. Many colleges and universities routinely evaluate their courses and faculty in such a manner. For example, the Instructional Evaluation Questionnaire (IEQ) used at the College of Southern Maryland helps record and assess student perceptions of the effectiveness of the courses they take. The questionnaire is used to formally evaluate an instructor’s performance (click here to download a Word version of the IEQ).

Formative evaluation occurs as you progress throughout the ISD process by testing the relevancy of the content material. It is considered a reiterative process because you’re never really completely finished with one phase of the ADDIE model when you enter into the next. Also, at any time in the ISD process you may need to repeat some or all of a given phase if the project is off track. This is not a bad thing! It is much better to rework a small section of your course now than to continue down the wrong path, designing and developing content that in the end has to be thrown out because it does not meet your needs.

The goal of formative evaluation is to determine how well students have mastered the material presented so you can determine the direction to proceed. During formative evaluation, you may determine what still needs to be learned. You may also look for alternative learning approaches to maximize the various learning styles present in your students.

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