Assessment

Area of Study 1: Business foundations

Outcome 1

On completion of this unit the student should be able to analyse the key characteristics of businesses, their stakeholders, management styles and management skills, and corporate culture.

Step 1: Look at Outcome 1 and its key knowledge and key skills. Note any other relevant points from the area of study, such as a given context.

Step 2: Decide on the type of assessment task. Choose the task type from the range of options listed in the study design (page 21). [For this task: structured questions.]

Step 3: Decide on the conditions under which the task will be conducted.

Given that this outcome is worth 20 marks out of the 100 marks available for school-assessed coursework in Unit 3, it may be decided to have students complete only one task.

Test conditions: no notes or textbooks allowed and students will be supervised.

Time: 50 minutes to complete the task. This allows 10 minutes reading time, then 40 minutes to write the answers to the structured questions.

Step 4: Design the task

• Consider the nine key knowledge points. Students need to familiarise themselves with a variety of terms and concepts in Area of Study 1 related to the key characteristics of businesses, their stakeholders, management styles and management skills, and corporate culture.
• Students should be able to apply their knowledge, make decisions about appropriate business choices, and justify management strategies.
• The first key skill requires students to ‘apply business management concepts and terms’, and the third skill requires students to ‘analyse case studies and contemporary examples of business management’. One way to do this is to write stimulus material about one or more business(es). The structured questions should relate to the situation(s) described in the stimulus material.
• Keep in mind that the VCE Business Management Study Design incorporates all sizes of businesses and also includes government business enterprises and social enterprises.
• Writing stimulus material that includes examples of decisions made by owners and / or managers allows students to demonstrate their abilities to apply the key knowledge and key skills.
• The resources list for VCE Business Management provides teachers with suggestions for sourcing these examples.

Step 5: Identify the nature and sequence of teaching and learning activities to cover the key knowledge and key skills outlined in the area of study and provide for different learning styles. The teaching and learning activities for Unit 3 Outcome 1 provide a range of teaching activities that account for different learning styles and will allow students to build and consolidate their knowledge. The detailed example on conducting an investigation into a business will give them the ability to apply their theory to a contemporary example as they will be required to do in their assessment task.

Step 6: Conduct the assessment task

Step 7: Mark the task

The marking scheme used to assess a student’s level of performance should reflect the relevant aspects of the performance descriptors and be explained to students before they commence the task.
With structured questions, it may be appropriate to allocate marks for each answer. However, the marks allocated should reflect the degree of difficulty or complexity required by task words. These, in turn, should be based on the key skills listed for the outcome.

Authentication

Authentication issues can be minimised if students complete an assessment task of structured questions conducted under test conditions and the stimulus material is new for that cohort of students.

Outcome 2

On completion of this unit the student should be able to discuss the importance of effective management strategies and leadership in relation to change, evaluate the effectiveness of a variety of strategies used by managers to implement change, and discuss the effect of change on the stakeholders of a business.

Step 1: Look at Unit 4 Outcome 2 and its key knowledge and key skills. Note any other relevant points from the area of study such as a given context.

Step 2: Decide on the type of assessment task. Choose the task type from the range of options listed in the study design (page 25). [For this task: a case study.]

Step 3: Decide on the conditions under which the task will be conducted.

• This outcome is worth 50 marks of the 100 marks available for School-assessed Coursework in Unit 4. In this example it has been decided to develop one task.
• Test conditions: no notes or textbooks allowed and students will be supervised. (Note that an option would be to allow students to have access to the case study material, but not the questions, ahead of time.)
• Time: 100 minutes to complete the task. This allows 10 minutes reading time, then 90 minutes to write the responses to the case study questions.

Please note that in the introduction to the area of study it specifies that students use a contemporary business case study from the past four years to evaluate business practice against theory with a consideration of how corporate social responsibility can be incorporated into the change process.

Step 4: Write the assessment task

• Locate an example of a business that has undergone change within the past four years. While there are no restrictions on the sizes of the businesses that students study, the example for the case study should be sufficiently complex and there should be sufficient information available to allow students to relate many of the key knowledge and key skills from this area of study, thereby demonstrating their understanding of the concepts.
• Consider the ten key knowledge points for this outcome. Students are required to know generic business terms as well as Senge’s Learning Organisation theory and Lewin’s Three Step Change Model. This has implications for the nature of the assessment task. If a real business example of the change process is used, it may be hard to find evidence of all the theories being applied. However, students could be asked to explain how the theories could have been applied, or the potential benefits of the application of said theories.
• Use the key knowledge and key skills to inform the questions that are written for the case study.
  

Step 5: Identify the nature and sequence of teaching and learning activities to cover the key knowledge and key skills outlined in the area of study and provide for different learning styles. The teaching and learning activities for Unit 4 Outcome 2 provide a range of teaching activities that account for different learning styles and will allow students to build and consolidate their knowledge. The detailed example of a problem-solving scenario for a hypothetical business case study will give them the ability to apply their theory to an example as they will be required to do in their assessment task.

For Unit 4 Outcome 2, students consolidate many of the terms and concepts learned in previous areas of study in the context of change management.

Given that students need to be able to apply their knowledge to a range of business sizes and types, exposing students to a number of examples is appropriate. The resources list for VCE Business Management provides teachers with suggestions to source these examples.

Internet searches will also reveal possible examples to demonstrate particular concepts. For example, the annual reports of publicly listed companies and government business enterprises will often state the goals / objectives that the business established, then provide statistics that show how well the business actually performed. It is also common to find information regarding actions and practices undertaken by the business throughout the preceding year in an attempt to achieve their objectives. The interpretation and analysis of this information can be useful to assist students to understand many of the key knowledge points in this area of study.

Step 6: Conduct the assessment task

Step 7: Mark the assessment task

• The marking scheme used to assess a student’s level of performance should reflect the relevant aspects of the performance descriptors and be explained to students before they commence the task.
• With case study questions, it can be appropriate to allocate marks for each answer. The marks allocated, however, should reflect the degree of difficulty or complexity required by task words. These, in turn, should be based on the key skills listed for the outcome.
• Many of the key knowledge points relate to strategies that can be undertaken in business in response to key performance indicator data. It may be appropriate to provide students with a number of key performance indicators from the business featured in the case study to allow students to more effectively evaluate the strategies that were undertaken, or could have been undertaken.

Authentication

The performance descriptors are advisory and designed to support teacher judgments in making holistic assessments of students' demonstration of the key knowledge and key skills for each outcome. They provide a way for teachers to differentiate between levels of student achievement. Teachers may use their professional judgement to customise the performance descriptors in line with the VCE and VCAL Administrative Handbook and the VCE assessment principles.

• Unit 3, Outcome 1
  
• Unit 3, Outcome 2
  
• Unit 3, Outcome 3
  
• Unit 4, Outcome 1
  
• Unit 4, Outcome 2