The most effective assessments serve as motivational tools, promote learning, and can be graded using explicit criteria and standards (rubrics) (Walvoord & Anderson, 1998). Creating assessments can be easy, all one needs is a little confidence and the right tools. It is important when designing assessments that educators truly think about how much information they need to know and what the best way to fairly check the student's understanding. Also, teachers need to be aware of the strengths and weaknesses of their students. If one student is not great at explaining their understanding through written word, adapt the assessment to meet the need of the student. When this is done, it opens up more ways to track progress. Teachers can do the traditional quizzes and tests, or have students create a video using a recording device and the internet, demonstrate specific skills in a practicum, or designing some kind of project.
Within my Moodle LMS I also designed a quiz, which was a demonstration of my syllabus scavenger hunt. I had about five questions, pertaining to the syllabus, I wanted them to have read. I think it is not necessary to have a syllabus scavenger hunt if the students are going to be in class for most of the learning. However, if students are participating in a fully online synchronous or asynchronous learning environment, they will need that extra reminder of where most of their questions can be answered. In the future, I would create small quizzes like this to help gauge where the student is headed, and what information they might still be missing.