Key Insights into Assessment Validation and Validating Assessments
Key Insights into Assessment Validation and Validating Assessments
Blog Article
With registration, RTOs must juggle many responsibilities like annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and marketing compliance, where validation often causes the most anxiety.
Although we've written about validation many times, let’s redefine it. ASQA refers to validation as a quality review of the assessment process.
Put simply, validation checks which parts of an RTO's assessment process are accurate and spots areas for enhancement. A proper understanding of its main elements can make validation less daunting.
According to Clause 1.8 of the SRTOs 2015, RTOs must ensure their assessment systems, including RPL, comply with the training package requirements and are conducted according to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.
The standards necessitate conducting two types of validation.
The initial assessment validation ensures your RTO's assessments comply with the training package requirements.
The second validation ensures assessments are conducted according to the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.
Thus, we understand that validation is done before and after the assessment. This article highlights the first type: assessment tool validation.
Understanding the Two Types of Assessment Validation
Assessment Validation: An Explanation
As mentioned earlier and in our earlier blog entries, validation is divided into two parts: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.
Assessment tool validation, also called pre-assessment validation, pertains to ensuring all unit requirements are addressed, as outlined in the first part of the clause, ensuring total workbook compliance.
Post-assessment validation, by contrast, focuses on implementation, ensuring Registered Training Organisations conduct assessments in line with the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.
Our focus in this article will be on assessment tool validation.
Steps for Conducting Assessment Tool Validation
Now that we understand the two types of validation, let’s explore the details of assessment tool validation.
Best Times to Conduct Assessment Tool Validation
Assessment tool validation ensures that all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are addressed by your assessment tools.
Therefore, any time you obtain new learning resources, assessment tool validation should be completed before students use them.
There's no need to wait for your next 5-year cycle validation schedule. Validate new resources immediately to ensure they are suitable for student use.
Nevertheless, this isn't the only occasion for this type of validation. Conduct assessment tool validation when you:
- you update resources
- you add new training products on scope
- you review your course against training product updates
- identify your learning resources as a risk during your risk assessment
The risk-based regulatory approach of ASQA requires RTOs to perform regular risk assessments. Student complaints about learning resources indicate it's time for assessment tool validation.
Training Products to Validate
Keep in mind, this validation ensures compliance of all learning resources before use. All RTOs must validate resources for each unit.
Getting Started with Assessment Tool Validation: Resources Needed
Training Materials
To conduct assessment tool validation, you will need the entire suite of your learning resources:
Mapping tool – the first document to check. It indicates which assessment items align with unit requirements, making validation faster.
Learner/student workbook – ensure it's appropriate for use as an assessment tool. Check if instructions are clear and answer fields are sufficient. This is a frequent gap.
Assessor guide/marking guide – confirm that instructions for assessors are adequate and clear benchmarks for each assessment item exist. Clear benchmarks are crucial for reliable assessment outcomes.
Other related resources – may include checklists, registers, and templates developed separately from the workbook and marking guide. Validate these to ensure they suit the assessment task and address unit requirements.
Team for Validation
Clause 1.11 specifies the criteria for validation panel members, indicating that validation can involve one or more persons. RTOs usually require all trainers and assessors to participate, sometimes including industry experts.
Together, your validation panel should possess:
Up-to-date vocational competencies and industry skills pertinent to the unit being validated
Recent knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning
Any one of the following training and assessment qualifications:
TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or the equivalent successor
Validation document/template
Having a validation tool helps you with both the validation process and documentation. Using a validation tool makes it easier to look at how each assessment item maps against each unit requirement.
A validation tool assists with the validation process and documentation. It makes it easier to view how each assessment item aligns with each unit requirement.
At the same time, it can serve as your document evidence that you have validated your resources before letting the students use them.
It can also serve as proof that you have validated your resources before allowing students to use them.
ASQA does not specify a recommended or required template for assessment tool validation, but many templates are accessible online. These tools usually have validators review the tools in their entirety to ensure they meet the principles of assessment.
Principles of Assessment Form Yes/No/Partially Comments
1. Fair
2. Flexible
3. Valid
4. Reliable
Although such templates ease validation, they can cause judgment errors since there’s minimal space for comments on each assessment item.
It is advisable to use a more detailed template to inspect each unit requirement and its corresponding assessment items. Below is an example:
Element Performance Criteria Assessment Instructions Benchmarks Assessment Tools Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What to Examine?
As highlighted in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, it is essential that your assessment tools enable trainers to adhere to assessment principles and evidence rules.
Core Principles of Assessment
Fairness – Is equal opportunity and access provided to everyone in the assessment process?
Flexibility – Does the assessment provide different options to demonstrate competence according to individual needs and preferences?
Validity – Does the assessment assess what it is intended to assess? Is it a valid tool for measuring the required skill or knowledge?
Reliability – Will the assessment produce the same results every time, regardless of who conducts the training? Will different assessors consistently decide on skill competence?
Evidence Core Rules
Validity – Is the evidence verifying that the candidate has the skills, knowledge, and attributes described in the unit of competency and associated assessment requirements?
Sufficiency – Is there enough evidence to ensure that the learner has the skills and knowledge required?
Sufficiency – Is the evidence adequate to ensure the learner has the required skills and knowledge?
Authenticity – Is the assessment tool verifying that the work belongs to the candidate?
Currency – Do the assessment tools mirror current units of competency and modern industry practices?
Although these are regularly covered in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, numerous tools still struggle to meet these requirements.
To prevent using learning resources that do not meet some unit requirements, make sure to follow these guidelines:
Walk the Talk
Observe the verbs in the unit requirements and ensure they are addressed by the assessment item. For instance, in the unit CHCECE032 Nurture babies and toddlers, one performance evidence requirement asks students to:
Carry out each of the following at least once with two different babies under 12 months old in a safe environment, using age-appropriate verbal and non-verbal communication as per service read more and regulatory requirements:
diapering
bottle preparation, feeding infants from bottles, and cleaning equipment
solid food preparation and feeding babies
respond to infant signs and cues appropriately
prepare infants for sleep and settle them
monitor and foster age-appropriate physical exploration and gross motor skills
Having students explain the process of nappy changing for babies under 12 months old doesn’t fulfill the unit requirement. Unless it’s intended to assess underpinning knowledge (i.e., knowledge evidence), students should be carrying out the tasks.
Mind the Plurals!
Pay attention to the numbers. In our example on one of the unit requirements of CHCECE032, this single unit requirement calls for the students to complete the tasks at least once on two different babies under 12 months of age. Having students complete the tasks listed twice on just 1 baby won’t cut it.
Mind the numbers. In our CHCECE032 example, one unit requirement requires students to complete the tasks at least once with two different babies under 12 months old. Doing the tasks twice with one baby isn’t sufficient.
Entire or Not Competent
Mind the lists. Again, if students perform just half the tasks listed, it’s non-compliant. Each assessment item must address all requirements, or the student is not yet competent and the assessment tool is non-compliant.
Can you be more specific?
Could You Be More Specific?
Each assessment item must include clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on the student’s competence. Hence, ensure your instructions are clear and not confusing for students or assessors. For instance:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What information might be included in a work package?
The answer can include:
Required resources
Applicable expenses
Time frame for activities
Appointed roles and responsibilities
If an assessment item demands multiple answers, specify the number of answers required from a student. This ensures your assessment is reliable, and the evidence obtained is valid.
This also applies to assessment items with double-barrelled questions or those that ask for multiple answers at once. These can confuse students and assessors, as shown in the sample question below:
Name a hazard and/or environmental concern in the work area and choose the most effective hazard control hierarchy.
Possible answers may include, but are not limited to:
Weather conditions – isolating the work area, engineering controls, PPE
Work area and ground conditions – elimination, isolating, engineering controls
People – isolation, use of engineering controls, administration
Structural hazards – substitution, isolation, engineering controls
Chemical hazards – isolation, engineering, administrative controls
Equipment or machinery – isolation, engineering controls, administration
Avoiding double-barrelled questions makes it simpler for students to respond and for assessors to accurately judge competence.
Seeing these requirements, you might wonder, “Don’t learning resource developers provide audit guarantees?” However, these guarantees mean you must wait for an audit to rectify noncompliance. This affects your compliance history, so it’s wiser to take a safe and compliant approach.