Qualitative Evaluations

High-Low Point

The High-Low Point procedure for evaluating a program starts from the assumption that you are looking at a general response to the program or unit.

You may focus this general response at particular times in the program, but you are not asking for specific responses.

Structure

The structure of the High-Low Point method lies in asking:

Tell me about your high point during the previous week of this subject.

Tell me about your high point during the previous week of this subject.

The form of the questions can vary:

What has been the best expereince you have had in the last week in this unit.

Or:

What happening stands out most in your mind when you think about this unit.

When

The experience in using High-Low Point evaluation suggests that this depends very much on what is happening in the program.

Analysis

From the data collection you will have a number of statements of varying degrees of complexity.

You will have defined a rational for initating a Hig-Low Point evaluation, so your task is to review the responses against that rationale.

Jim decided that the new unit he was running would have a wide range of difficulty levels within the various topics. He had not taught the unit before. He wanted to obtain the students' responses in terms of how difficult the unit might be. He chose High-Low Point because he did not want to colour the students' perceptions. To ask them how difficult the unit was would be asking them to think about it being difficult.

He used the High-Low questions at three points during the semester and did not us them in the end of semester evaluation.

Some example of what students had to say are:

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