Computer science guide

Assessment

Internal assessment

Purpose of internal assessment

Internal assessment is an integral part of the course and is compulsory for both SL and HL students. It enables students to demonstrate the application of their skills and knowledge, and to pursue their personal interests, without the time limitations and other constraints that are associated with written examinations. The internal assessment should, as far as possible, be woven into normal classroom teaching and not be a separate activity conducted after a course has been taught.

The internal assessment requirements at SL and at HL are the same. However, these requirements contribute to a different percentage of the overall mark. Students are required to produce a solution that consists of a cover page, the product and the documentation. The focus of the solution is on providing either an original product or additional functionality to an existing product for a client.

The internal assessment component (solution), as well as being practical and productive, forms an important part of the assessment of the computer science course. It is imperative, therefore, that the teacher provides appropriate guidance to students.

Guidance and authenticity

The solution submitted for internal assessment must be the student’s own work. However, it is not the intention that students should decide upon a title or topic and be left to work on the internal assessment component without any further support from the teacher. The teacher should play an important role during both the planning stage and the period when the student is working on the internally assessed work. It is the responsibility of the teacher to ensure that students are familiar with:

• the requirements of the type of work to be internally assessed

• the ethical guidelines mentioned in the “Requirements and recommendations” section of this document

• the assessment criteria; students must understand that the work submitted for assessment must address these criteria effectively.

Teachers and students must discuss the internally assessed work. Students should be encouraged to initiate discussions with the teacher to obtain advice and information, and students must not be penalized for seeking guidance. However, if a student could not have completed the work without substantial support from the teacher, this should be recorded on the appropriate form. from the Handbook of procedures for the Diploma Programme.

It is the responsibility of teachers to ensure that all students understand the basic meaning and significance of concepts that relate to academic honesty, especially authenticity and intellectual property. Teachers must ensure that all student work for assessment is prepared according to the requirements and must explain clearly to students that the internally assessed work must be entirely their own.

As part of the learning process, teachers can give advice to students on a first draft of the internally assessed work. This advice should be in terms of the way the work could be improved, but this first draft must not be heavily annotated or edited by the teacher. The next version handed to the teacher after the first draft must be the final one.

All work submitted to the IB for moderation or assessment must be authenticated by a teacher, and must not include any known instances of suspected or confirmed malpractice. Each student must sign the coversheet for internal assessment to confirm that the work is his or her authentic work and constitutes the final version of that work. Once a student has officially submitted the final version of the work to a teacher (or the coordinator) for internal assessment, together with the signed coversheet, it cannot be retracted.

Authenticity may be checked by discussion with the student on the content of the work, and scrutiny of one or more of the following:

• the student’s initial proposal

• the first draft of the written work

• the references cited

• the style. of writing compared with work known to be that of the student.

The requirement for teachers and students to sign the coversheet for internal assessment applies to the work of all students, not just the sample work that will be submitted to an examiner for the purpose of moderation. If the teacher and student sign a coversheet, but there is a comment to the effect that the work may not be authentic, the student will not be eligible for a mark in that component and no grade will be awarded. For further details refer to the IB publication Academic honesty and the relevant articles in the General regulations: Diploma Programme.

The same piece of work cannot be submitted to meet the requirements of both the internal assessment and the extended essay.

Group work

The development of the solution must be undertaken by the student on an individual basis. Collaborative or group work may not be undertaken by students.

Time allocation

It is recommended that a total of approximately 30 teaching hours for both SL and HL should be allocated to the work.

This should include:

• time for the teacher to explain to students the requirements of the internal assessment, including codes of ethical behaviour and confidentiality

• class time for students to work on the internal assessment

• time spent by the student making arrangements to collect data as appropriate

• time for consultation between the teacher and each student

• time to review and monitor progress, and to check authenticity.

Additional time may be needed outside normal class time for students to work independently, such as acquiring additional skills required for the project and consulting with other people.

Requirements and recommendations

Teachers and students will need to discuss issues relating to the design of the product, the collection of data and consultations with others. Students should be encouraged to initiate discussions with the teacher to obtain advice and information, and will not be penalized for seeking advice.

Ethical guidelines for internal assessment

Given the nature of the project, students must take into account ethical problems and implications for undertaking research and developing the solution, for example, ensuring the confidentiality and security of data. Wherever possible, original data should be used or be collected by the student.

The following guidelines must be applied.

• Consent must be obtained from people who will be involved in the development of the solution before any investigation is begun.

• All data collected must be stored securely in order to maintain confidentiality.

• Only the data collected for the solution can be used. It must not be used for any other purpose without explicit permission.

Teachers should refer to the Ethical practice in the Diploma Programme poster for further guidance.

Health and safety guidelines

Schools are advised to follow local best practice in health and safety for research linked to the development of the solution. Each school is ultimately responsible for the health and safety of students.

Word count

Students must produce a solution that includes supporting documentation up to a maximum of 2,000 words. If the word limit is exceeded, the teacher’s assessment of the documentation must be based on the first 2,000 words.

Work that falls significantly beneath the stated word count is unlikely to fully meet the stated requirements of the task and is likely to receive low marks.

Using assessment criteria for internal assessment

For internal assessment, a number of assessment criteria have been identified. Each assessment criterion has level descriptors describing specific levels of achievement together with an appropriate range of marks. The level descriptors concentrate on positive achievement, although for the lower levels failure to achieve may be included in the description.

Teachers must judge the internally assessed work at SL and at HL against the criteria using the level descriptors.

• The same assessment criteria are provided for SL and HL.

• The aim is to find, for each criterion, the descriptor that conveys most accurately the level attained by the student, using the best-fit model. A best-fit approach means that compensation should be made when a piece of work matches different aspects of a criterion at different levels. The mark awarded should be one that most fairly reflects the balance of achievement against the criterion. It is not necessary for every single aspect of a level descriptor to be met for that mark to be awarded.

• When assessing a student’s work, teachers should read the level descriptors for each criterion until they reach a descriptor that most appropriately describes the level of the work being assessed. If a piece of work seems to fall between two descriptors, both descriptors should be read again and the one that more appropriately describes the student’s work should be chosen.

• Where there are two or more marks available within a level, teachers should award the upper marks if the student’s work demonstrates the qualities described to a great extent. Teachers should award the lower marks if the student’s work demonstrates the qualities described to a lesser extent.

• Only whole numbers should be recorded; partial marks, that is fractions and decimals, are not acceptable.

• Teachers should not think in terms of a pass or fail boundary, but should concentrate on identifying the appropriate descriptor for each assessment criterion.

• The highest level descriptors do not imply faultless performance but should be achievable by a student. Teachers should not hesitate to use the extremes if they are appropriate descriptions of the work being assessed.

• A student who attains a high achievement level in relation to one criterion will not necessarily attain high achievement levels in relation to the other criteria. Similarly, a student who attains a low level of achievement for one criterion will not necessarily attain low achievement levels for the other criteria. Teachers should not assume that the overall assessment of the students will produce any particular distribution of marks.

• It is recommended that the assessment criteria be made available to students.