Creative Ideas For Teaching Evaluation

In 1976, the first session on the teaching of evaluation was held at an annual meeting of evaluators. A few hardy souls gathered to exchange ideas on improving the teaching of evaluation. At subsequent annual meetings, these informal sessions attracted more and more participants, eager to talk about common teaching interests and to exchange reading lists, syllabuses, assignments, and paper topics. The ses­ sions were irreverent, innovative, lively, and unpredictable. Eventually the group for­ malized itself with the American Evaluation Association as the Topical Interest Group in the Teaching of Evaluation (TIG: TOE). As word of TIG: TOE's activities spread, instructors from all over the country clamored for assistance and advice. It became apparent that a handbook was need­ ed, a practical interdisciplinary guide to the teaching of evaluation. Donna M. Mertens, a long-standing member of TIG: TOE and an accomplished teacher of evaluation, volunteered to edit the book, and her skills, sensitivity, and experience in the craft of teaching are apparent throughout.

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Introduction: Practical and Theoretical Framework.- I Conceptualizing and Planning an Evaluation.- 1 Constructing an Operational Evaluation Design.- 2 Conceptualizing Evaluation: The Key Evaluation Checklist.- 3 Journal Writing in Evaluation.- 4 Field Experiences in Evaluation Courses.- 5 Identifying the Evaluation and Its Usefulness.- 6 Evaluability Assessment.- 7 Evaluation Questions and Methods.- 8 Alternative Evaluation Data Collection Techniques.- 9 Establishing Evaluation Boundaries.- 10 Alternative Models for Evaluation.- 11 Planning a Discrepancy-Based Evaluation.- II Qualitative Methods in Evaluation.- 12 Naturalistic Interviewing.- 13 Critical Issues in Participant Observation.- 14 Naturalistic Data Collection: Case Study Discussion.- 15 "Trustworthiness" in Naturalistic Inquiry: Audit Trails.- 16 Qualitative Data Analysis and Interpretation.- 17 Writing and Interpreting Ethnographic Protocols.- 18 The Computer-Assisted Analysis of Qualitative Data.- 19 Understanding Content Analysis Through the Sunday Comics.- 20 Using Case Records.- III Needs Assessment.- 21 Collection Techniques for Needs Assessment.- 22 A Quick Look at the Nominal Group Technique.- 23 Developing Focus Group Questions for Needs Assessment.- IV Proposal Writing.- 24 Proposal Writing in Early Childhood Special Education.- 25 Responding to an Informal Request to Evaluate: Writing a Proposal.- V Personnel Evaluation.- 26 A Hands-On Experience in Clinical Supervision.- 27 Tensions and Accommodations Among Administrators and Teachers about Staff Appraisal.- VI Issues in Evaluation: Reporting, Utilization, and Ethics.- 28 Information Portrayal and Use.- 29 Ethics and Evaluation: Problems, Issues and Usefulness.- VII Policy Analysis.- 30 Policy/Goal Percentaging.- VIII The Evaluator's Tools: Statistics, Measurement, and Computers.- 31 Statistical Software Expert System.- 32 Charting Student Progress.- 33 Activities for Teaching Regression to the Mean.- 34 Using Microcomputer Database Management Software to Solve Evaluation Data Management Problems.