After a long day of lots of playing and some bacteria, I sat down and played the last recorded session of the Instructional Strategies asynchronous group of the 2021 Lilly Conference Online. The session “Best Practices for Use of Exemplars for Assignment Completion” was presented by Jennifer Summers from the University of St. Augustine for Health Science. Summers is an occupational specialist, instructor, and faculty development specialist. Summers focused on what are exemplars and discussing best practices with exemplars and how to apply them. I didn’t realize there was a debate about the use of exemplars! Summers showed some responses from those supporting exemplars. These examples included clarity with good/bad, learning from peers to find mistakes and identify the criteria, and it can be the start of student reflection of learning, according to the examples from faculty shared by Summers. Some of the reasons to avoid exemplars according to the faculty discussions Summers had mention exemplars reduce creativity, there is. the temptation for academic dishonesty, “culture of coddling”, and they support a culture of copying. Additionally, summers explained that some think the use of exemplars reduces critical thinking and potential. Summers used the analogy of a car with ice on the windshield: an example to give more clarity.
The benefits of using exemplars as described by Summers are:
- exemplars reduce student anxiety
- exemplars provide a starting point for creativity
- exemplars help students develop depth of learnign in terms of Bloom’s taxonomy
Summers then suggested that instructors should consider the purpose of the exemplar, who writes the exemplars (students or instructors?), and the type of exemplar (good/bad, single exemplar/multiple, annotated exemplar/ full). If using a student example, Summers makes it a habit to request their permission. Summers also emphasizes that there are errors in the exemplar. This transparency has the intention of starting discussions. Summers mentioned something that is worth considering: there are structured approaches, guided discovery approaches, and dialogic.
- Structured approach. Use the exemplar as a teaching method/guide and the dialog is controlled by the instructor.
- Guided discovey approach. The exemplar is a resource and not necessarily a model. The conversations between students and instructor helps refine.
- Dialogic approach. Exemplars spark discussion because the criteria are negotiable.
Summers provided examples for the different approaches in the courses they teach. Summers also stressed who writes the exemplar and how to highlight the objectives for the assignment are key considerations for the use of exemplars. According to Summers, exemplars should be associated with the objectives and why they are exemplars. This was an informative session because I had not considered exemplars from the perspectives you can take to implement and use them effectively. It seems that there are different uses for exemplars depending on how the instructor will share the guidelines and use of the exemplars. I would love to have exemplars of cases and reflections from students for the BIT 295 course and create a module about why we are using exemplars.
