Evaluación Objetiva

ISBN 1-903815-10-X

LTSN Physical Sciences Practice Guide

Effective Practice in Objective Assessment

Alex Johnstone

Effective Practice in Objective Assessment
The Skills of Fixed Response Testing

Alex Johnstone

Published by the LTSN Physical Sciences Centre
The views expressed in this practice guide are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of theLTSN Physical Sciences Centre.

Introduction
Assessment forms an integral part of the teaching and learning process. It is applied during a course (formative assessment) to help students and teachers to take a realistic view of progress and to catch misunderstandings at a stage when they can be easily rectified. It is also applied at the end of a course (summative assessment) to ensurethat the student has not only learned the bits, but can also piece the bits together into a coherent whole. This guide is largely concerned with the form of assessment called Objective or Fixed- Response testing, but this is only part of the range of assessment tools available. It would be a mistake to think that this form of testing is useful or appropriate for the measurement of all theskills we hope to develop in our students. However, objective testing has clear advantages for the assessment of some skills, not least its ease of scoring. To clarify where these advantages lie, we shall have to consider the assessment process more widely in the early part of the guide. The bulk of the guide is devoted to the development of the expertise necessary to design questions, toconstruct papers and to handle the results. The effort expended to gain this expertise will pay off in terms of better and sharper assessment tools which will help our students to take a realistic view of their progress and which will keep us from self-delusion about our teaching. The examples of questions in the text have been purposely kept at a low content level to illustrate the method underdiscussion. This should not be taken to imply that fixed response testing is trivial or incapable of being used to test at all stages at tertiary level. Alex Johnstone formerly of The Centre for Science Education University of Glasgow December 2003

Contents SECTION 1: TALKING THE SAME LANGUAGE....................................................1 Assessment as a Measuring Device...........................................................................1 Comparing what with what? ......................................................................................5 SECTION 2: CONVENTIONAL QUESTION TYPES..............................................12 Types of fixed-response (objective) questions. .......................................................13 Other types offixed-response questions ..................................................................18 SECTION 3: CONSTRUCTING FIXED-RESPONSE QUESTIONS .......................24 The embryonic question: the conception .................................................................24 The embryonic question: the gestation ....................................................................25 Theembryonic question: the delivery......................................................................30 Suggested shredding sequence.................................................................................30 The check-list...........................................................................................................30 Questions in the Bank..............................................................................................31 SECTION 4: FIXED-RESPONSE QUESTIONS WITH A DIFFERENCE...............34 1. Interlinked True/False Questions.....................................................................35 2. Venn Diagrams ................................................................................................38 3. Structural Communication...