There have been a growing number of concerns over recent years as to how educators in higher education can assess students and provide them with meaningful knowledge and skills to better develop students’ learning ability. Literature highlights that most teachers view the process of teaching, learning, and assessment as separate tasks which entails that the curriculum must be taught, learnt, and then assessed. However, authentic learning which is “learning by doing,” visualizes teaching, learning, and assessment as on-going activities that happen at the same time and which influence each other. Consequently, in this study, we sought to improve students’ learning experience through designing authentic assessment tasks (mini projects) that were given to Extended curriculum students in 2018 for a period of two months. A total number of 190 students were divided in groups in their respective modules (Foundation Biology and Foundation Information Technology). Here, students were required to make use of Information Technology skills during the research reports and presentations of their project. In this study we administered semi-structured questionnaires to explore the firstyear students’ experience of authentic assessment. It was found that students enjoyed the assessment tasks – although they found them complex because of multiple skills and knowledge required to complete the projects. The findings also indicated that the introduction of authentic assessment tasks resulted in better pass rates, and that students enjoyed the learning experience more when it emulates the real-world experience.

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