Posterpräsentation als Prüfungsform
Wenn Studierende in einem Seminar ein eigenes Poster erstellen und abschließend präsentieren, können sie unterschiedliche Kompetenzen zeigen. Im Video-Interview berichten zwei Lehrende des Zentrums für Fremdsprachenausbildung (ZFA), Melissa Mariano und Kara Callahan, über ihre Erfahrungen mit Posterpräsentationen als Prüfungsform. Auch die Studierenden aus Studiengängen wie Lasers and Photonics, Biodiversität oder Psychologie schildern ihre Sichtweisen auf die Posterpräsentation und andere Prüfungsformate an der Universität.
Das Video enthält deutsch- und englischsprachige Untertitel.
Transkript zum Video (englisch)
How do you test your students?
[Melissa Mariano, ZFA] 0:00:15 – 0:00:59
Today the students are being tested on their oral performance, their oral production. The presentation should be really a summary of the whole poster, highlighting the key information, starting off with the problem that they were addressing or the question, the gap in the research fields.
Then they should take them through the significance of this topic: Why they’ve chosen this topic, why it’s relevant to them – and if the poster is based on a research, then they should talk about the results.
Some of the students are in their bachelor’s degree so they haven’t carried out any independent research yet.
So the poster is probably on a topic of interest, maybe a lecture they visited or a paper they’ve read.
What are the main competences you are testing?
[Melissa Mariano, ZFA] 0:01:07 – 0:01:46
We’re testing also their spoken interaction. The public will hopefully have questions for them. So that’s also part of the assessments, how they deal with this unrehearsed unprepared part of the presentation.
It’s important for them because this is a real-life situation for them.
They’re students at a university, at some point they’re going to have to communicate their research or what they’ve learned.
What are the advantages of the exam?
[Kara Callahan, ZFA] 0:01:47 – 0:02:04
The major advantage of this type of assessment is that it’s very authentic, that the students feel that they’re not only preparing to be assessed by the teacher, but they’re more focused on the audience that is listening, speaking and interacting with them and so it’s a bit more of a real situation for them to be in.
Student’s perspectives
[Raphael Herbers, student of Psychology] 0:02:04 – 0:02:34
I think it’s a pretty interesting concept of a English course, because rather than learning about contents you learn about competences.
And I think it’s much closer than what do you have in many other courses, because whether you’re in research and you’re at conferences where you have to present a poster, or whether you’re in business where you have to present: It’s much closer to real-life competences you need.
[Sonja Darschnik, student of Biodiversity] 0:02:34 – 0:02:54
I like it quite a lot, because it’s a practical experience that you can use for further work in science.
You will always have to present the poster at some point, so I like this very much because it gives me the opportunity to practice and this is quite important for studying.
[Farhad Aslani, student of Lasers and Photonics] 0:02:54 – 0:03:14
It’s like present your idea to somebody who is interested in the topic that you did research and so it’s really interesting if you can get your idea to somebody else, and have a discuss about your topic that you did research about.
What are the challenges you had to deal with?
[Kara Callahan, ZFA] 0:03:20 – 0:03:51
Patience is really necessary, because a lot of students aren’t used to this, I’d say, audience of a layperson perhaps.
They’re only used to students or faculty that are related to them in their same discipline and so it can be challenging to tone the language down to a layperson audience and so I’d say: Being patient with them reacting in a reasonable way to that is probably the most difficult.
Student’s perspectives
[Danial Naeem Joya, student of Lasers and Photonics] 0:03:51 – 0:04:08
It was my first time about the poster presentation. In poster presentation it’s like you have to manage everything in a single sheet so it tells you some management skills, how to organize your ideas in a thin sheet of paper.
If you compare the poster presentation to other exams at university, what do you think?
[Sonja Darschnik, student of Biodiversity] 0:04:13 – 0:04:39
I believe that we all are very excited for this, because no one ever did the presentation, or very few people did it before. And for me it’s a good way to to have an exam, because it’s practical, it’s easy to understand for people and you can talk more freely about the stuff that interests you the most. I like it.
How did you prepare your students for the exam?
[Melissa Mariano, ZFA] 0:04:39 – 05:39
We spend a lot of time, I’d say this half of the semester, actually developing the poster itself – the text and the visuals for the poster – and then we moved on to the oral presentation of their poster. And they have a lot of rehearsals, dress rehearsal as we call it, they can be filmed.
We do two feedback sessions, one is on the poster with post-it notes where the students write all of their their comments and suggestion or questions on the posters.
And they have a lot of feedback as well on their on their oral presentations.
So we practice constructive criticism, reflection.
So they are well prepared – as well prepared as they can be.