Assessment Validation Overview: Steps to Validate Assessments
Assessment Validation Overview: Steps to Validate Assessments
Blog Article
Upon receiving registration, RTOs must manage various responsibilities like annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and marketing compliance, with validation being a notably arduous task.
We have numerous articles on validation, but let's go back to the term itself. ASQA defines validation as a quality review of the assessment process.
Validation is essentially about verifying the accuracy of parts of an RTO's assessment process and spotting areas needing improvement. Understanding its key components can make it 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 mandate two types of validation.
The primary validation type ensures compliance with the training package requirements for your RTO's assessments.
The following validation type ensures that assessments follow the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.
This implies that we validate both prior to and following the assessment. The focus of this article is on the first type: assessment tool validation.
Breaking Down the Two Types of Assessment Validation
Understanding Assessment Validation
As previously discussed in our blogs, validation involves two processes: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.
Pre-assessment validation, also referred to as assessment tool validation, is related to the first part of the clause, ensuring all unit requirements are addressed and workbooks are entirely compliant.
On the other side, post-assessment validation pertains to the implementation, requiring Registered Training Organisations to adhere to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.
This article will focus on assessment tool validation.
Steps for Conducting Assessment Tool Validation
Having distinguished between the two types of validation, let’s dive into the details of assessment tool validation.
Timing of Assessment Tool Validation
Assessment tool validation aims to verify that all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are covered by your assessment tools.
This means that whenever new learning resources are acquired, you must perform assessment tool validation before student use.
No need to wait for the next validation schedule in your 5-year cycle. Validate new resources immediately to ensure they’re suitable for students.
However, this isn't the only instance to conduct this type of validation. Perform assessment tool validation when you:
- resources are updated
- you add new training products on scope
- review your course against training product updates
- identifying your learning resources as a risk during your risk assessment
The Australian Skills Quality Authority's risk-based approach means RTOs should carry out regular risk assessments. If students complain about learning resources, it's an ideal time for assessment tool validation.
How to Choose Training Products for Validation
Keep in mind, this validation ensures that all learning resources comply before use. All RTOs must validate resources for each unit.
Starting Assessment Tool Validation: What You Need
Course Materials
To conduct assessment tool validation, you will need the entire suite of your learning resources:
Mapping tool – the first document you should look at. It highlights which assessment items meet unit requirements, accelerating validation.
Learner/student workbook – check its suitability for use as an assessment tool. Verify clear instructions and sufficient answer fields. This is often a gap.
Assessor guide/marking guide – check that instructions for assessors are adequate and that there are clear benchmarks for each assessment item. Clear benchmarks are essential for reliable assessment outcomes.
Other related resources – these could be checklists, registers, and templates created separately from the workbook and marking guide. Validate them to confirm they fit the assessment task and meet unit requirements.
Validation Board
Clause 1.11 describes the requirements for validation panel members, indicating that validation can be performed by one or more persons. RTOs often require all trainers and assessors to attend, and sometimes industry experts are invited.
Collectively, your validation panel must have:
Vocational competencies and current industry skills relevant to the unit being validated
Current knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning
One of these training and assessment qualifications:
TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or its successor
Assessment validation form/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.
Having a validation tool helps in both the validation process and documentation. It makes it simpler to see 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.
Simultaneously, it can serve as proof that you have validated your resources before they are used by students.
ASQA does not specify a required template for assessment tool validation, but many templates are accessible online. These tools usually have validators review the tools as a whole to ensure they meet the principles of assessment.
Assessment Principles Form Yes/No/Partially Comments
1. Fair
2. Flexible
3. Valid
4. Reliable
While templates like these make validation easier, they also allow for judgment errors since there is little room for commenting on each assessment item.
We recommend a more detailed template to inspect each unit requirement and the assessment items that correspond to them. Here is an example:
Element Performance Criteria Assessment Directions Benchmarks Assessment Tools Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What Should Be Inspected?
As mentioned in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, it’s crucial that your assessment tools enable trainers to follow assessment principles and evidence rules.
Key Principles of Assessment
Fairness – Are equal opportunities and access offered to everyone in the assessment process?
Flexibility – Are multiple options available in the assessment to demonstrate competence based on different needs and preferences?
Validity – Is the assessment evaluating what it is intended to evaluate? Is it a valid tool for assessing the required skill or knowledge?
Reliability – Will the assessment achieve the same results every time, regardless of who conducts the training? Will different assessors consistently make decisions on skill competence?
Rules of Evidence
Validity – Is the evidence demonstrating 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 there adequate evidence to confirm the learner has the required skills and knowledge?
Authenticity – Is the assessment tool ensuring that the work is the candidate’s own?
Currency – Are the assessment tools updated to reflect current units of competency and industry practices?
Even though these are often covered in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, many tools still struggle with these requirements.
To prevent using learning resources that fail to address some unit requirements, ensure you follow these guidelines:
Demonstrate What You Teach
Focus on the verbs used in the unit requirements and make sure they are addressed by the assessment item. For example, in the unit CHCECE032 Nurture babies and toddlers, one performance evidence requirement requires students to:
Complete 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 according to service and regulatory requirements:
nappy change
prepare bottles, feed babies from bottles, and clean equipment
prepare solid foods and feed infants
appropriately respond to infant signs and cues
settle babies for sleep and prepare them
monitor and encourage physical exploration and gross motor skills suitable for the age
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.
Notice 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.
Notice the numbers. In the 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 doesn’t meet the requirement.
Total or Not Competent
Pay attention to lists. As illustrated above, if students perform only 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?
Can You Clarify Further?
Every assessment item needs clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on student competence. Thus, ensure your instructions are not confusing for students or assessors. For example:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What details can be included in a work package?
The answer can include:
Essential resources
Related costs
Time assigned for activities
Assigned roles and responsibilities
When an assessment item demands multiple answers, indicate the number of answers a student must provide. This ensures your assessment is reliable, and the evidence collected 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 click here hierarchy.
Answers can 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, engineering, administration
Structural hazards – substituting, isolation, engineering controls
Chemical hazards – isolation, engineering, administrative controls
Equipment or machinery – isolation, engineering, administration
Steering clear of double-barrelled questions makes it simpler for students to respond and for assessors to judge competence accurately.
Considering these requirements, you might think, “Don’t learning resource developers have audit guarantees?” But such guarantees require you to wait for an audit before rectifying noncompliance. This affects your compliance history, so it’s better to take a safe and compliant route.