This is one that I haven’t used yet, but I’m convinced that it will be an invaluable process to follow when I’m eventually required to carry out an evaluation.
The B628 course book goes into a lot of detail about evaluations, describing how they are an iterative four-staged process.
In brief, the stages are as follows:
- Asking questions
- Answering questions
- Drawing conclusions
- Making necessary changes
In practice, the stages are not always clearly distinguished, and evaluations are rarely as neat as the above list suggests, but when considered as an iterative process – i.e. one where each of the stages can feed back into preceding stages – it becomes a little more realistic.
The section on evaluation in Chapter 4 goes into a lot of detail about different types of evaluation and specific quesions that might be asked. There is also a comprehensive guide to designing a formal evaluation – well worth referring to when the time comes!
