Authentic assessment: an oral pitch

Outcomes of the assessment

• Argue a point to a specified audience using appropriate verbal skills
• Present a clearly constructed solution to a problem 
• Review, analyse and reflect upon the success of a presentation through feedback, to inform future opportunities

Suitable for

This can be an individual or group assessment task. It is adaptable to any discipline where a persuasive, short, oral presentation is required.

Assessment type

The assessment can be either formative or summative. It can stand alone but equally scaffold into a larger assessment piece such as a project, a report, a design, a model or prototype, or another larger presentation. A pitch can be an individual, pair or a group assessment. It can be presented face to face, synchronously through Zoom or Teams or asynchronously, using video.

When to introduce

Early in the semester as it can easily scaffold into other more developed assessments.

Time required

Build	Teach	Assess
1 hour	2-4 hours	Number dependent

What tools you can use

• Kaltura
• Canvas Rich Content Editor
• Presentation tools (MS PowerPoint, Prezi, Canva, Slide Bot) with voice over
• Video recording (Zoom)

A pitch can be videoed using Kaltura and then uploaded into Canvas.
A poster design or a visual storyboard can enhance a pitch. Powerpoint, Prezi, Canva, Slide Bot can all be used to enhance your visuals. However, the technology should never distract from the presenter and the clear message.

Guiding principles

• Authentic assessment
• Active learning
• Practice-oriented learning

Attribution

IML, UTS Business School

Creating an oral pitch

A pitch is a short, persuasive, intentional presentation of an innovative idea, problem solution, prototype or business proposition directed at a specific audience. Think “Shark Tank” (a reality television program where entrepreneurs pitched their business models to investors).
The objective of the pitch is to sway the audience or in essence win them over to; applaud, agree with or invest in your idea.

Preparing a pitch involves thorough understanding of the audience, deliberate framing of the problem and solution, the resources required (the “ask”), and the method by which all of this will be communicated.

(Neck, Neck, & Murray, 2020)

Why it’s authentic

The pitch gives students a real-world opportunity to demonstrate a technique that is used widely in the business sector to reach potential investors and to convince an audience of a solution to a real-world problem.

Different types of pitch

Some popular pitches include: 

• the elevator pitch, a brief, persuasive speech that you use to spark interest in a project, product, idea or yourself an elevator pitch can be utilised in any genre but it’s intended to take as long as an elevator ride, 20-30 seconds; 
• the rocket pitch, a three-minute entrepreneurial pitch with slides about an idea with instant audience feedback;  
• the Pixar pitch, based upon the successful animation company of the same name, utilises the narrative of a story (with a guiding framework) that draws the listeners in and continues to engage them as they follow a storyline; 
• The question pitch elicits an active response, engages listeners and encourages them to agree with premise.

Length

A pitch should be brief. Depending on the type of pitch, the length varies from 20-30 seconds (elevator pitch) to 3-5 minutes (Pixar pitch).

Where to include the pitch as an assessment task

• Project-based learning across disciplines
• Business studies for example marketing and advertising
• Innovation and Entrepreneurship subjects
• Career development tasks
• Digital communications subjects
• Problem-solving activities across faculties
• Pitching a book or article idea

Students

How students have responded

Feedback collected from research undertaken in the UK by Smith in 2012 reflected that students enjoyed the pitch as an assessment offering, largely because it addressed a variety of learning styles that were often unaccommodated by regular assessments. Students found the skills and learning experiences undertaken related to and positioned them well for their future careers.

Tips for students

Ensure that your students:

• Rehearse the pitch
• Speak to the listeners(eye contact); avoid reading
• Speak clearly and evenly paced
• Pause for effect and breath
• Make the pitch personable/relatable or use humour
• Create a narrative the listeners can follow and engage them fully.
• Use rhetorical questions
• Leave the audience with a call to action (a quote, a return to your original premise, something to do or think about, a question)

Assessing the oral pitch

Depending on the discipline, the objective of the pitch should be outlined to ensure students understand the expectations of the facilitator. There are two main components in the pitch: content and delivery. Here is a sample marking guide. This could be fleshed out to create a specific marking rubric.

Marking criteria example

Criterion	Content/Delivery	100%
Fundamental/Conceptual Meeting the brief Completeness Appropriateness Creativity and innovation	Content	40%
Technical Accuracy of content Analysis Use of technologies/media	Content	15%
Structure Pitch components were evident and clear Team coherence(for group work) Professionalism	Delivery	15%
Presentation Communication of message Eye contact Clarity Coherence Pace Volume Persuasive language Consistency across speakers(for group work)	Delivery	40%

UTS MBA case study

Advanced MBA 21949 Challenge/Opportunity Discovery and Bachelor of Management/Business 21643 Innovation Lab

This professionally integrated subject equips students with the skills, theoretical and analytical knowledge necessary; to examine and solve authentic real-world problems that impact upon industry and society. Students conceive innovative and digital strategies, identify megatrends and potentially provide solutions that transform organisations. Students are encouraged to collaborate creatively. The pitch as a formative assessment task is used in an authentic way whereby students are challenged to convincingly present their solutions, take on feedback and polish their pitch in a final presentation to industry judges, colleagues and mentors.

Interim Oral Pitch (formative assessment)

Challenge: Pitch a solution to a real world problem in groups.
Each team gave an ‘elevator pitch’ – 2minutes – addressing two dimensions:

1. How desirable is the solution – how much impact would it have?
2. How easy to implement – what does it take to make it happen?
   The lecturer/tutor made a whiteboard matrix, and each participant could put their judgement of where the pitch sat in terms of each dimension. Every team then got instant feedback and an idea of where it was positioned. It was easier to set up, to see and to manage due to the instant feedback tool.

Then in breakout rooms – 2 buddy teams in each – had to play devil’s advocate with each other to really get in-depth feedback – why this idea will fail – how to improve – what worked really well –
Students really enjoyed the smaller group feedback and also socially overcame some fatigue as they met new people from random breakout allocation. The lecturer/tutor and mentors popped in to assist.

Shark Tank-style group pitch

Students tend to have very good outcomes from this industry-style pitch, having had feedback from the elevator pitch and learned and developed good pitching presentation skills.

The final group pitch is held as a shark tank style pitch in teams. There are three industry judges, and experts and mentors are able to complete an online poll and use the chat to give instant feedback. As well as the judge’s decision, a people’s choice award is given. Tutors are upskilled to teach students effective pitching skills. This ensures innovative and creative pitch presentations from all groups.

What research tells us

…engaging and worthy problems or questions of importance, in which students must use knowledge to fashion performances effectively and creatively. The tasks are either replicas of or analogous to the kinds of problems faced by adult citizens and consumers or professionals in the field.

(Wiggins 1993)

Increasingly students need to feel relevance and connectivity to learning activities and assessment tasks. Authentic assessment enables students to identify a context and recognise that theoretical knowledge has a more complex application when applied to scenarios. As they draw together their knowledge and skills to engage productively and solve problems, their behaviour clearly shows, both to staff and themselves, the level of capacity or competency they have gained. Authenticity is a fundamental characteristic of good assessment practice, and students usually value it highly.

References

Citation and attribution

Wehr, D., Randhawa, K (2020). “Authentic assessment: An Oral Pitch ” in Adaptable Resources for Teaching with Technology, LX.Lab, Institute for Interactive Media & Learning, University of Technology, Sydney.

“Authentic assessment: An Oral Pitch” by Dimity Wehr, and Krithika Randhawa, in
Adaptable Resources for Teaching with Technology by Institute for Interactive Media & Learning, University of Technology, Sydney. Available under Creative Commons Licence Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International

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