Literature review of e-assessment.

Abstract

The purpose of this report is: • to assert the centrality of assessment in education systems • to identify ‘drivers’ of assessment, and their likely impact on assessment, and thence on education systems • to describe current, radical plans for increased use of high-stakes e-assessment in the UK • to describe and exemplify current uses of ICT in assessment • to explore the potential of new technologies for enhancing current assessment (and pedagogic) practices • to identify opportunities and to suggest ways forward • to ‘drip feed’ criteria for good assessment throughout (set out explicitly in an appendix). This report has been designed to: present key findings on research in assessment; describe current UK government plans, and likely future developments; provide links to interesting examples of e-assessment; offer speculations on possible future developments; and to stimulate a debate on the role of e-assessment in assessment, teaching, and learning.

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Literature Review
of E-assessment
REPORT 10:
FUTURELAB SERIES
Jim Ridgway and Sean McCusker, School of Education, University of Durham
Daniel Pead, School of Education, University of Nottingham

FOREWORD
I have to admit to being someone who for
many years has avoided thinking about
assessment – it somehow always seemed
distant from my interests, divorced from
my concerns about how children learn
with technologies and, to be honest, just a
little less interesting than other things I
was working on… In recent years, however,
working in the field of education and
technology, it has become clear that
anyone with an interest in how we create
equitable, engaging and relevant education
systems needs to think long and hard
about assessment. Futurelab’s conference
‘Beyond the Exam’ in November 2003
further highlighted this point, as committed
and engaged educators, software and
media developers came together to raise
a rallying cry for a rethink of our current
assessment practices.
What I and many others working in this
area have come to realise is that we can’t
just ignore assessment, or simply see it
as ‘someone else’s job’. Assessment
practices shape, possibly more than any
other factor, what is taught and how it is
taught in schools. At the same time,
these assessment practices serve as the
focus (perhaps the only focus in this day
and age) for a shared societal debate
about what we, as a society, think are the
core purposes and values of education.
If we wish to create an education system
that reflects and contributes to the
development of our changing world, then
we need to ask how we might change
assessment practices to achieve this.
The authors of this review provide a
compelling argument for the central role
of assessment in shaping educational
practice. They outline the challenges
and opportunities posed by the changing
global world around us, and the potential
role of technologies in our assessment
practices. Both optimistic and practical,
the review summarises existing research
and emergent practice, and provides a
blueprint for thinking about the risks and
potential that awaits us in this area.
We look forward to hearing your response
to this review.
Keri Facer, Director of Learning Research
Futurelab
research@futurelab.org.uk
1
CONTENTS:
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2
PURPOSE 4
SECTION 1
ASSESSMENT DRIVES
EDUCATION 5
SECTION 2
HOW AND WHERE MIGHT
ASSESSMENT BE DRIVEN? 11
SECTION 3
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT 17
SECTION 4
OPPORTUNITIES
AND CHALLENGES FOR
E-ASSESSMENT 29
GLOSSARY 40
BIBLIOGRAPHY 43
APPENDIX:
FUNDAMENTALS
OF ASSESSMENT 46
Literature Review
of E-assessment
REPORT 10:
FUTURELAB SERIES
Jim Ridgway and Sean McCusker, School of Education, University of Durham
Daniel Pead, School of Education, University of Nottingham

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
“E-assessment must not simply
invent new technologies which recycle
our current ineffective practices.”
Martin Ripley, QCA, 2004
Assessment is central to educational
practice. High-stakes assessments
exemplify curriculum ambitions, define
what is worth knowing, and drive
classroom practices. It is essential to
develop systems for assessment which
reflect our core educational goals, and
which reward students for developing
skills and attributes which will be of
long-term benefit to them and to society.
There is good research evidence to show
that well designed assessment systems
lead to improved student performance.
In contrast, the USA provides some
spectacular examples of systems where
narrowly focused high-stakes assessment
systems produce illusory student gains;
this ‘friendly fire’ results at best in lost
opportunities, and at worst in damaged
students, teachers and communities.
ICT provides a link between learning,
teaching and assessment. In school, ICT
is used to support learning. Currently,
we have bizarre assessment practices
where students use ICT tools such as
word processors and graphics calculators
as an integral part of learning, and are
then restricted to paper and pencil when
their ‘knowledge’ is assessed.
Assessment systems drive education, but
are themselves driven by a number of
factors, which sometimes are in conflict.
To understand likely developments in
assessment, we need to examine some of
these drivers of change. Implications
of technology, globalisation, the EU,
multinational companies, and the need
to defend democracy are discussed. All of
these influences are drivers for increased
uses of ICT in assessment. Many of the
developments require the assessment of
higher-order thinking. However, there is
a constant danger that assessment
systems are driven in undesirable ways,
where things that are easy to measure are
valued more highly than things that are
more important to learn (but harder to
assess). In order to satisfy educational
goals, we need to develop ways to make
important things easier to measure -
and ICT can help.
All is not well with education. The
Tomlinson Report (2004) identifies major
problems with current educational
provision at ages 14-19 years: there is a
plethora of qualifications; too few students
engage with education; the drop-out rate
is scandalously high; and the most able
students are not stretched by their studies.
Young people are not being equipped with
the generic skills, knowledge and personal
attributes they will need in the future.
A radical approach to qualifications is
suggested which (in our view) can only
be introduced if there is a widespread
adoption of e-assessment.
The UK government is committed to a
bold e-assessment strategy. Components
include: ICT support for current paper-
based assessment systems; some online,
on-demand testing; and the development
of radical, ICT-set and assessed tests of
ICT capability. Some good progress has
been made with these developments.
E-assessment can be justified in a number
of ways. It can help avoid the meltdown
of current paper-based systems; it can
assess valuable life skills; it can be better
2
assessment is
central to
educational
practice
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

for users – for example by providing on-
demand tests with immediate feedback,
and perhaps diagnostic feedback, and
more accurate results via adaptive testing;
it can help improve the technical quality of
tests by improving the reliability of scoring.
E-assessment can support current
educational goals. Paper and pencil tests
can be made more authentic by allowing
students to word process essays, or to use
spreadsheets, calculators or computer
algebra systems in paper-based
examinations. It can support current UK
examination processes by using Electronic
Data Exchange to smooth communications
between schools and examinations
authorities; current processes of training
markers and recording scores can be
improved. Systems where student work is
scanned then distributed have advantages
over conventional systems in terms of
logistics (posting and tracking large
volumes of paper, for example), and
continuous monitoring can ensure high
marker reliability. Current work is pushing
boundaries in areas such as text
comprehension, and automated analysis
of student processes and strategies.
E-assessment can be used to assess ‘new’
educational goals. Interactive displays
which show changes in variables over
time, microworlds and simulations,
interfaces that present complex data in
ways that are easy to control, all facilitate
the assessment of problem-solving and
process skills such as understanding
and representing problems, controlling
variables, generating and testing
hypotheses, and finding rules and
relationships. ICT facilitates new
representations, which can be powerful
aids to learning. Little is known about
the cognitive implications of these
representations; however, it seems likely
that complex ideas (notably in reasoning
from evidence of various sorts) will be
acquired better and earlier than they are
at present, and that the standards of
performance demanded of students will
rise dramatically. Here, we also explore
ways to assess important but ill-defined
goals such as the development of
metacognitive skills, creativity,
communication skills, and the ability
to work productively in groups.
A major problem with education policy and
practice in England is the separation of
‘academic’ and ‘practical’ subjects. In the
worst case, to be able to invent and create
something of value is taken to be a sure
sign of feeble-mindedness; where as to
opine on the work of others shows
towering intellectual power. A diet of
academic subjects with no opportunities to
act upon the world fails to equip students
with ways to deal with their environments;
a diet of practical subjects which do not
engage higher-order thinking throughout
the creative process equip students only to
become workers for others. Both streams
produce one-handed people, and polarised
societies. E-portfolios can provide working
environments and assessment frameworks
which support project-based work across
the curriculum, and can offer an escape
from one of the most pernicious historical
legacies in education. E-portfolios solve
problems of storing student work, and
make the activity of documenting the
process of creation and reflection relatively
easy. Reliable teacher assessment is
enabled. There is likely to be extensive use
of teacher assessment of those aspects of
performance best judged by humans
(including extended pieces of work
assembled into portfolios), and more
extensive use made of on-demand tests
3
e-assessment
can be used to
assess ‘new’
educational
goals
REPORT 10
LITERATURE REVIEW OF E-ASSESSMENT
JIM RIDGWAY AND SEAN MCCUSKER, SCHOOL OF EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF DURHAM
DANIEL PEAD, SCHOOL OF EDUCATION, UNIVERSITY OF NOTTINGHAM

of those aspects of performance which
can be done easily by computer, or which
are done best by computer.
The issue for e-assessment is not if it will
happen, but rather, what, when and how it
will happen. E-assessment is a stimulus
for rethinking the whole curriculum, as
well as all current assessment systems.
New educational goals continue to
emerge, and the process of critical
reflection on what is important to learn,
and how this might be assessed
authentically, needs to be institutionalised
into curriculum planning.
E-assessment is certain to play a major
role in defining and implementing
curriculum change in the UK. There is a
strong government commitment to high
quality e-assessment, and good initial
progress has been made; nevertheless,
there is a need to be vigilant that the
design of assessment systems is not
driven by considerations of cost.
Major challenges of ‘going to scale’ have
yet to be faced. A good deal of innovative
work is needed, coupled with a grounded
approach to system-wide implementation.
PURPOSE
The purpose of this report is:
• to assert the centrality of assessment
in education systems
• to identify ‘drivers’ of assessment,
and their likely impact on assessment,
and thence on education systems
• to describe current, radical plans
for increased use of high-stakes
e-assessment in the UK
• to describe and exemplify current
uses of ICT in assessment
• to explore the potential of new
technologies for enhancing current
assessment (and pedagogic) practices
• to identify opportunities and to
suggest ways forward
• to ‘drip feed’ criteria for good
assessment throughout (set out
explicitly in an appendix).
This report has been designed to: present
key findings on research in assessment;
describe current UK government plans,
and likely future developments; provide
links to interesting examples of
e-assessment; offer speculations on
possible future developments; and to
stimulate a debate on the role of
e-assessment in assessment, teaching,
and learning.
The key findings and implications of
the report are presented within the
Executive Summary.
4
e-assessment is
a stimulus for
rethinking the
whole
curriculum

1ASSESSMENT DRIVES EDUCATION
Assessment is an integral part of being.
We all make myriads of assessments in
the course of everyday life. Is Jane a good
friend? Which Rachel Whiteread do I like
best? Does my bum look big in this? The
questions we ask, and the referents, give
an insight into the way we see ourselves
and the world (eg Groucho Marx’s “Please
accept my resignation. I don’t want to
belong to any club that will accept me as
a member”). For aspects of our lives that
are goal-directed (getting promoted, going
shopping), assessment is essential to
progress. To be effective, it is necessary
to know something of the intended goal;
in well-defined situations, this will be
relatively easy, and goals will be specified
clearly. In ill-defined situations, such as
creative acts, and research, the goals
themselves might not be well specified,
but the criteria for assessing products
and processes may well be.
1.1 ASSESSMENT AND EDUCATION
Assessment is central to the practice of
education. For students, good performance
on ‘high-stakes’ assessment gives access
to further educational opportunities and
employment. For teachers and schools,
it provides evidence of success as
individuals and organisations. Cultures
of accountability drive everyone to be
‘instrumental’ – how do I demonstrate
success (without compromising my deep
values)? Assessment systems provide
the ways to measure individual and
organisational success, and so can have
a profound driving influence on systems
they were designed to serve.
There is an intimate association between
teaching, learning and assessment,
illustrated in Fig 1. Robitaille et al (1993)
distinguish three components of the
curriculum: the intended curriculum (set
out in policy statements), the implemented
curriculum (which can only be known by
studying classroom practices) and the
attained curriculum (which is what
students can do at the end of a course of
study). The links between these three
aspects of the curriculum are not
straightforward. The ‘top down’ ambitions
of some policy makers are hostages to a
number of other factors. The assessment
system – tests and scoring guides -
provides a far clearer definition of what
is to be learned than does any verbal
description (and perhaps provides the only
clear definition), and so is a far better
basis for curriculum planning at
classroom level than are grand statements
of educational ambitions. Teachers’ values
and competences also mediate policy and
attainment; however, the assessment
system is the most potent driver of
classroom practice.
5
the assessment
system is the
most potent
driver of
classroom
practice
SECTION 1
ASSESSMENT DRIVES EDUCATION
Fig 1: Adapted from Pellegrino, Chudowski
and Glaser (2001)
Learning
Assessment Pedagogy

In the UK, there is a long-standing belief
(eg Cockcroft 1982) that assessment
systems have a direct effect on curriculum
and on classroom practices. In Australia,
Barnes, Clarke and Stevens (2000) traced
the effects of changing a high-stakes
assessment on classroom practice, and
claimed evidence for a direct causal link.
Mathews (1985) traced the distorting
effects on the whole school curriculum of
formal examinations for university
entrance (now A-levels), introduced when
the university sector expanded beyond
Cambridge, Durham and Oxford – to
accommodate as much as 5% of the
population. There was a perceived need
for entrance tests to pre-university
courses (O-levels) – designed for about
20% of the population - followed by a
perceived need to align all certification in
the education system (notably O-levels
and CSE). This linkage between
assessment for university admission and
the assessment of low-attaining students
had a direct and often damaging impact
on courses of study for lower attaining
students (Cockcroft 1982).
Ill-conceived assessment can damage
educational systems. Klein, Hamilton,
McCaffrey and Stecher (2000) present
evidence on the ‘Texas Miracle’. Here,
scores on a rather narrow test designed by
the State of Texas showed very large gains
over a period of just four years. This test is
used to determine the funding received by
individual schools. Unfortunately, scores
on a national test which supposedly
measured the same sort of student
attainment were largely unchanged in
the same time interval. So scores on
narrow tests can rise, even when
underlying student attainment does not.
The ‘Texas Miracle’ was used in the
election campaign of President Bush,
as evidence of his effectiveness as a
governor in raising educational standards.
Linn (2000) points to an underhand
method sometimes used by incoming
superintendents of school districts to show
the effectiveness of their leadership. Most
commercially available multiple choice
tests of educational attainment have a
number of ‘parallel test forms’, designed
to measure the same knowledge and skills
in the same way, but with slightly different
formats (so ‘12 men take six days, how
long will six men take?’ becomes ‘12 men
take six days, how long will four men
take?’). These tests are designed in such a
way that student scores on two parallel
forms would be the same (plus or minus
measurement error). Test designers do
this so that school districts can change the
test form every year, in order that tests
measure the underlying knowledge and
skills, not the ability to memorise the
answers to specific questions. Linn (2000)
gives an example where an incoming
Superintendent decides to use a new test
form and also chooses to use this same
test form in successive years. The result is
a steady increase in student scores simply
because of poor test security – students
are taught to memorise answers. It
appears that the superintendent has
worked miracles with student attainment,
because scores have gone up so much.
However, when students are tested on a
new parallel form, and have to work out
the answers and not rely on memory,
then scores plummet. So the high
reputation for increasing student
performance is built upon deliberate
deceit. This is bad for teachers and
students, and bad for public morality.
High-stakes assessment systems define
what is rewarded by a culture, and
6
ill-conceived
assessment can
damage
educational
systems
SECTION 1
ASSESSMENT DRIVES EDUCATION

therefore the knowledge that is valuable.
It is unsurprising that high-stakes
assessment has a profound effect on both
learning and teaching. Decisions about
assessment systems are not made in a
vacuum; the educational community in the
UK (but not universally) is involved in the
design of assessment systems, and these
decisions are usually grounded in
discussions on what is worth knowing, and
in the practicalities of teaching different
concepts and techniques to students of
different ages.
1.2 THE IMPACT OF ASSESSMENT
ON ATTAINMENT
An extensive literature review by Black and
Wiliam (2002) showed that well designed
formative assessment is associated with
major gains in student attainment on a
wide range of conventional measures of
attainment. This result was found across
all ages and all subject disciplines.
Topping (1998) reviewed the impact of peer
assessment between students in higher
education on writing, and found large
positive effects. A major literature review
commissioned by the EPPI Centre (2002)
showed that regular summative
assessment had a large negative effect on
the attainment of low-attaining students,
but did little harm to high-attaining
students. These studies provide strong
evidence that good assessment practices
produce large performance gains. These
gains are amongst the largest gains found
in any educational ‘treatments’. Similarly,
poor assessment systems have negative –
not neutral – effects on the performance of
weak students. It follows that when we
consider the introduction of e-assessment,
we should be aware that we are working
with a very sharp sword.
1.3 ICT AND ASSESSMENT
ICT perturbs the links between learning,
teaching and assessment in a number of
distinct ways:
1 ICT has changed the ways that research
is conducted in most disciplines.
Linguists analyse large corpuses of text;
geographers use GIS systems; scientists
and engineers use modelling packages.
Everyone uses word processors,
databases and spreadsheets. Students
should use contemporary research
methods; if they do not, school-based
learning will become increasingly
irrelevant to understanding
developments in knowledge.
Assessment should reinforce good
curriculum practice. We are
approaching a bizarre situation where
students use powerful and appropriate
tools to support learning and solve
problems in class, but are then denied
access to these tools when their
‘knowledge’ is assessed.
2 ICT can support educational goals that
have been judged to be desirable for a
long time, but hard to achieve via
conventional teaching methods. In
particular, ICT can support the
development of higher-order thinking
skills such as critiquing, reflection on
cognitive processes, and ‘learning to
learn’, and can facilitate group work,
and engagement with extended projects;
ICT competence is itself a (moving)
target for assessment.
3 New technologies raise an important
set of questions about what is worth
learning in an ICT-rich environment;
what can be taught, given new
pedagogic tools; and how assessment
7
well designed
formative
assessment is
associated with
major gains in
student
attainment

systems can be designed which put
pressure on educational systems to help
students achieve these new goals. If we
ignore these important questions, we
run the risk that e-assessment will be
designed on the basis of convenience,
with disastrous consequences for
educational practice.
1.4 ON THE NATURE OF SUMMATIVE
AND FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT
We should distinguish between summative
and formative assessment, which are
different in conception and function. In
principle, it is easy to distinguish between
them. Summative assessment takes place
at the end of some course of study, and is
designed to summarise performance and
attainment at the time of testing; high-
stakes, end of schooling assessment
such as GCSE provides a good example.
Formative assessment takes place in
mid-course, and is intended to enhance
students’ final performance; comments
on the first draft of an essay provide
an example.
Summative and formative assessments
differ on a number of dimensions. These
include:
Consequences: summative assessment is
often highly significant for the student and
teacher, whereas formative assessments
need not be.
Exchange value: summative assessments
often have a value outside the classroom -
for certification, access to further courses,
and careers; formative assessment usually
has no currency outside a small group.
Audience: summative evaluations often
have a large audience; the student and
teacher, parent, school, employer and
educational system. Formative evaluation
can have a small audience; perhaps just
the student and teacher (and parent in
younger years).
Mendacity quotient: in summative
assessment, students are advised to focus
on things they do best and hide areas of
ignorance; in formative assessment, it is
more sensible for students to focus on
things they understand least well.
Agency: summative assessment is often
done to students, perhaps without their
willing participation. Formative
assessment is often actively sought out by
the student; good formative feedback
depends on student engagement in the
process of revision.
Validation methods: summative
assessment is often judged in terms of
predictive validity - are students who got
A grades more likely to get top grades in
college (but see Messick 1995)??
Formative assessment might be judged
in terms of its usefulness in undoing
predictive validity – what feedback can we
give to students with C grades, so that they
perform as well in college as anyone else?
Quality of the assessment: for summative
assessment, the assessment method
should achieve appropriately high
standards of reliability and validity; for
formative assessment, ‘reliability and
validity’ are negotiable between teacher
and student.
Resources required: the nature of
summative assessment can be influenced
by considerations of cost and time. In
8
SECTION 1
ASSESSMENT DRIVES EDUCATION

terms of cost, the estimation of the cost of
testing is often done very badly, especially
in the USA. There, it is common for ‘cost’
to be equated with the money paid for the
test and its scoring, not the real cost,
which is the opportunity cost, measured in
terms of the reduction in time spent
learning which has been diverted to
useless ‘test prep’. Formative evaluation
should be an integral part of the work of
teaching, so estimation of cost focuses
naturally on opportunity costs – just what
is an effective allocation of teaching and
learning time to formative evaluation? In
terms of time, for summative assessment
time is easy to measure (so long as
useless ‘test prep’ is counted in); again,
formative assessment is an integral part
of teaching.
Knowledge and the knowledge
community: summative assessment is
explicit about what is being assessed, and
ideas about the nature of knowledge are
shared within a wide community; with
formative evaluation, ideas about the
nature of knowledge might be negotiated
by just two people.
Status of the assessment: in summative
assessment, the assessment can be
ignored by the student; formative
assessment simply isn’t formative
assessment unless the student does
something with it to improve performance.
Focal domain: it is useful to distinguish
between cognitive, social and emotional
aspects of performance. Summative
assessment commonly focuses on
cognitive performance; formative
assessment can run wild in the social and
affective domains.
Theory dependence: summative
assessment rarely rests on theory;
formative assessment is likely to be
‘theory-genic’ as participants discuss
progress, what is known, how to learn and
remember things, and how best to use
evidence.
Tool types: summative assessment
commonly uses timed written
assessments where the structure is
specified in advance, and which is scored
using a common set of rules. Tests are
often designed to discriminate between
students, and to put them into a rank order
in terms of performance. Formative
assessment commonly uses a variety of
methods such as portfolios of work,
student draft work, student annotations of
their work, concept mapping tools,
diagnostic interviews and diagnostic tests.
Each student is their own referent –
comparison with other students may not
be useful, and is often harmful to learning.
1.4.1 Reflecting on summative
and formative assessment
Despite the differences highlighted here,
the two sorts of assessment have many
areas of overlap:
• a student can change their study
methods on the basis of an end-of-year
examination result (summative
assessment used for formative purposes)
• summative evaluation of students
can provide formative evaluation for
teachers, schools and educational
systems
• formative assessment always rests on
some sort of summative assessment –
feedback and discussion must rest
9

on some assessment of the current
state of knowledge
• some summative assessment should
include the ability to benefit from
formative assessment – learning to
learn is an important educational goal,
and should be assessed, formally
• summative assessment (eg of student
teachers) should include the ability to
provide formative assessment.
1.5 SUMMARY OF SECTION 1
Assessment lies at the heart of education.
Assessment systems exemplify the goals
and values of education systems. High-
stakes assessment systems have a direct
influence on classroom practices. Any
discussion of assessment raises important
questions about what is worth knowing,
the extent to which such knowledge can be
taught, and the best ways to support
knowledge acquisition.
Well designed assessment systems are
associated with large increases in student
performances; frequent testing and
reporting of scores damages weaker
students. Badly designed high-stakes
assessment systems can have strong
negative consequences for students,
communities and societies.
In this section, we distinguish between
summative assessment (assessment of
learning) and formative assessment
(assessment for learning), and compare
their characteristics.
ICT has changed the ways that academic
work is done; this should be reflected in
the tools used in education for both
learning and assessment. Bizarre current
practices where ICT is an integral part of
learning, but where students are denied
access to technology during assessment,
must be reformed as a matter of urgency.
Skills in ICT are essential for much
modern living, and so should be a target
for assessment.
10
frequent testing
and reporting of
scores damages
weaker students
SECTION 1
ASSESSMENT DRIVES EDUCATION

2HOW AND WHERE MIGHT
ASSESSMENT BE DRIVEN?
There is a comforting belief that decisions
about education and education systems
are made within those systems, and that
outside agents – notably foreign outside
agents – have little or no influence on
internal affairs. This has been true in the
UK for a long time, but has not been true
in countries which (for example) make use
of UK examinations to certify students.
If we are to explore plausible scenarios
about the future impact of ICT on
assessment, it is necessary to take
account of ‘drivers of change’. Here, we
consider technology, globalisation, the rise
of mass education, problems of political
stability, current government plans, and
likely government plans, as drivers of
educational change and, in parallel, of
likely changes in assessment systems.
2.1 TECHNOLOGY AS DRIVER OF
SOCIAL CHANGE
Technology is a key driver of social change.
Technology has transformed the ways we
work, our leisure activities, and the ways
we interact with each other. The use of the
web is growing at an extraordinary rate,
and people increasingly have access to rich
sources of information. Metcalfe’s law
states that the value of a network rises
dramatically as more people join in – its
value doesn’t just increase steadily. The
capability of computer hardware and
software continues to improve, and
features are being added (such as high
quality video) which make computer use
increasingly attractive, and well suited to
supporting human-human interactions.
The web is an increasingly valuable
resource which is becoming progressively
easier to use, and is attracting users at an
increasing rate. Technology is ubiquitous:
as well as computers in the form of
desktops and laptops, there has been an
explosion of distributed computer power in
the form of mobile phones which are also
fully functioning personal digital assistants
(PDAs), containing features such as a
spreadsheet, database and word
processor. It has been estimated that
there are over three billion mobile phones
worldwide (Bennett 2002); as before,
this number is growing very fast, and
new phones are manufactured with an
increasing range of features. Technology
as a driver has a number of likely effects
on assessment. New skills (and so new
assessments) are needed for work and
social functioning, which require fluent
use of ICT; technology has had a profound
effect on many labour intensive work
practices, many of which resemble
educational assessment. The use of ICT
for assessment has hardly begun, and
some new technologies such as mobile
phones offer great promise not only
because of their ubiquity (which might
solve a current problem of access which
has restricted widespread use of ICT in
assessment in the past), but also because
new technologies have become a natural
form of communication for very many
young people.
2.2 GLOBALISATION
Globalisation is probably the most obvious
driver of change. Significant features for
the current discussion are: the mobility
of capital, employment opportunities
(jobs), and people. Cooperation between
countries (eg in the European Union), and
the pervasive influence of multinational
companies also have profound social effects.
11
the use of ICT
for assessment
has hardly begun
SECTION 2
HOW AND WHERE MIGHT
ASSESSMENT BE DRIVEN?

The mobility of capital and jobs has
changed the profile of the job market,
with new kinds of jobs being created (eg
in ICT) and old ones disappearing (eg in
manufacturing industries). It is very easy to
export jobs and capital from the developed
world to the developing world (eg by
relocating telephone call centres, or by
establishing factories in countries with low
wage costs). For people (and economies)
to be successful, they must continue to
learn new skills, and to adapt to change.
Retraining will often require re-
certification of competence, with the
obvious consequence of further
assessment, and the need to design
assessment systems appropriate to the
new needs of employment. These are
pressures for more, and effective, systems
of competence-based assessment.
Migration for work and education raises
similar issues. The developed world has a
need to import highly skilled workers;
universities worldwide seek international
students. In both cases, there is a need to
certify the competence of applicants, and
to reject those least likely to be effective
workers, or to complete courses
successfully (because of a lack of fluency
in the language of instruction, for
example). Financial considerations make
it impractical for testing to take place in
the target country, and so a good deal
of testing takes place in the country
supplying workers or students. Again, it is
common to use competence tests which
are externally mandated and designed.
Language testing provides a good example;
a computer-based version of the Test of
English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL)
has been developed which adjusts the
difficulty level of the questions in the light
of the performance of the candidate on the
test (see www.ets.org/toefl).
For developed economies to maintain
their global dominance, their economies
must be geared to ‘adding value’ to raw
materials (or to creating value from
nothing, as in the entertainment and
finance industries). This requires changes
in the education system which encourage
creative activities, and good problem-
solving ability. Employment in a post-
industrial society is likely to depend on
higher-order thinking skills, such as
‘learning to learn’. This requires that
these thinking skills be exemplified
and assessed, if they are to receive
appropriate attention in school.
The effects of cooperation between
countries in Europe will have an effect on
assessment systems. Currently, there is
a problem that qualifications in different
member states (‘architect’, ‘engineer’)
are gained after rather different amounts
of training, and equip people for quite
different levels of professional
responsibility. This makes job mobility
very difficult. The Bologna Accord is an
agreement between EU member states
that all universities will adopt the same
pattern of professional training (typically a
three-year undergraduate degree followed
by a two-year professional qualification) in
order to make qualifications in different
member states more comparable.
Convergence of course structure is likely
to lead to a convergence of assessment
systems, in line with the desire to increase
mobility (see www.engc.org.uk/
international/bologna.asp for an analysis of
the impact of the Bologna, Washington and
Sidney Accords on engineering).
Globalisation is having a profound effect on
educational systems worldwide. In higher
education, Slaughter and Leslie (1997)
describe the response of universities in
12
cooperation
between
countries in
Europe will have
an effect on
assessment
systems
SECTION 2
HOW AND WHERE MIGHT
ASSESSMENT BE DRIVEN?

several countries to ‘academic capitalism’
– a global trend to view knowledge as a
‘product’ to be created and controlled, and
to see universities as organisations which
produce knowledge and more
knowledgeable people as efficiently as
possible. They document the changes in
university structures and functioning which
have been a response to such pressures;
these include greater collaboration on
teaching between universities, and mutual
accreditation of courses. Again, the need
for comparability of course difficulty and
student attainment will lead to a careful
re-examination of assessment systems,
and some homogenisation.
Multinational companies also drive
changes in assessment practices. These
companies are successful in part because
of their emphasis on uniform standards;
one is unlikely to get a badly cooked
hamburger in Macdonalds, or a copy of
Excel that functions worse than other
copies. This emphasis on quality control
extends to job qualifications, and to
standards required of workers. In fast
changing markets such as technology
provision, retraining workers and checking
their competence to use, install or repair
new equipment or software requires
appropriate assessment of competence.
The needs of employers for large numbers
of staff who are able to use ICT effectively
as part of their job has lead to trans-
national qualifications such as the
European Computer Driving Licence
(www.ecdl.co.uk). Such examples are
interesting because they are set by
international organisations, or commercial
organisations, and in some cases (eg the
Microsoft Academy programme -
www.microsoft.com/education/
msitacademy/ITAPApplyOnline.aspx),
state-funded educational organisations
must submit themselves for examination
by a commercial company before they are
allowed to certify student competence.
The scale on which such examinations are
taken is impressive. Bennett (2002)
describes the National Computer Rank
Examination, China, which is a proficiency
exam to assess knowledge of computer
science and the ability to use it; two
million examinations were taken in 2002.
Tests for the European Computer Driving
Licence have been taken by more than a
million people.
2.3 MASS EDUCATION
Mass education has developed rapidly and
recently. In the last 30 years, the
percentage of the UK population being
educated at university has risen from
about 5% to about 40%. This puts
pressures on academic systems to develop
efficient assessment systems.
There is now a great deal of distance
education. China plans to have five million
students in 50-100 online colleges by 2005.
At least 35 US states have virtual
universities (Bennett 2002). (The recent
failure of the E-university in the UK -
www.parliament.uk/post/pn200.pdf - and
of the US Open University, shows that such
ventures are not always successful!) A
great deal of curriculum material is
delivered via a variety of technologies (the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
is in the process of putting all its course
material online, for example – see
http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html). Over
3,000 textbooks are freely available
online at the National Academy Press
(www.nap.edu). The use of technology in
the assessment process is a logical
consequence of these developments.
13
multinational
companies also
drive changes in
assessment
practices

2.4 DEFENDING DEMOCRACY
Problems of potential political instability
provide another driver of change. The rise
of fundamentalism (both Christian and
Moslem) can be seen as a loss for
rationalism. Electoral apathy is a threat to
the democratic process. One problem for
politicians is to explain complex policies to
citizens. This is made difficult if citizens
understand little about modelling (such as
ideas of multiple causality, feedback in
systems, lead and lag times of effects etc).
Informed citizens need to understand
something about ways to describe and
model complex systems, in order that they
do not give up on democracy simply
because they do not understand the policy
arguments being made. Understanding
arguments about causality and some
experience of modelling systems via ICT
should be major educational goals. These
goals will need to be exemplified and
valued by high-stakes assessment
systems, if they are to become part of
students’ educational experiences.
Education for citizenship has received
increasing emphasis in the UK. Some of
the educational goals – such as
understanding different perspectives,
increased empathy, and community
engagement - seem intangible. However,
ICT can play a role in posing authentic
questions (for example via video) and
could play a role in formative assessment,
and perhaps in summative assessment
(using portfolios).
2.5 GOVERNMENT-LED REFORMS
IN CURRICULUM AND ASSESSMENT
Governments are responsive to global
pressures, and analyses of the limitations
of current national systems. Two current
UK initiatives are likely to lead to radical
changes in assessment practices, notably
to increase the use of e-assessment. One
is the DfES E-assessment Strategy
(www.dfes.gov.uk/elearningstrategy/
default.stm) which maps out a tight
timeline for change in current examination
systems; the other is the Tomlinson (2004)
Report 14-19 Curriculum And
Qualifications Reform, which proposes
radical changes in educational provision
itself (with direct consequences for
e-assessment).
The Tomlinson Report (2002) into A-level
standards argued that the examinations
system is operating at, or perhaps beyond,
capacity. According to Tomlinson (2002), in
2001, 24 million examination scripts and
coursework assignments were produced at
GCSE, AS and A level. In terms of the
number of students being assessed, in
2002 there were around six million GCSE
entries and nearly two million children sat
Key Stage tests. More students are
engaging in post-compulsory education;
the introduction of modular A-levels, and
the popularity of AS courses has resulted
in an increase in the number of
examinations taken (Tomlinson reports a
growth of 158% over a 20-year period).
There is an associated problem concerning
the supply of examiners, in terms of both
recruitment and training. Roan (2003)
estimated that about 50,000 examiners
were involved in the assessment of GCSEs,
GNVQs and A-levels. Continued expansion
of the current examination system without
some changes does not seem a viable
option. ICT support for current activities,
described later, might well be of benefit.
ICT-based assessment is now part of UK
government policy, and will be introduced
14
continued
expansion of the
current
examination
system without
some changes
does not seem a
viable option
SECTION 2
HOW AND WHERE MIGHT
ASSESSMENT BE DRIVEN?

progressively, but on a tight timescale.
The DfES E-learning Strategy will be
accompanied by radical changes to the
assessment process, for which the
Qualifications and Curriculum Authority
are responsible (www.qca.org.uk/
adultlearning/workforce/6877.html). Over
the next five years, the following activities
are planned:
“All new qualifications should include
assessment on-screen
Awarding bodies set up to accept and
assess e-portfolios
Most examinations should be available
optionally on-screen, where appropriate
National curriculum tests available
on-screen for those schools that want
to use them
The first on-demand GCSE examinations
are starting to be introduced
10 new qualifications specifically designed
for electronic delivery and assessment”
QCA Blueprint (2004)
The timescale for these changes is short.
For example, in 2005, 75% of basic and key
skills tests will be delivered on-screen; in
2006, each major examination board will
offer live GCSE examinations in two
subjects, and will pilot at least one
qualification, specifically designed for
electronic delivery and assessment; in
2007, 10% of GCSE examinations will be
administered on-screen; in 2008, there will
be on-demand testing for GCSEs in at
least two subjects.
Good progress has been made with these
developments. For example, Edexcel is
carrying out a pilot scheme for online
GCSEs in chemistry, biology, physics and
geography with 200 schools and colleges
across the West Midlands and the west of
England. AQA conducted a live trial in
March 2004 on 20,000 scripts (Adams and
Hudson 2004); in Summer 2004, about
500,000 marks (5% of the total) will be
collected; by 2007, 100% of marks will be
captured electronically.
The Tomlinson Report (2004, in prep)
will offer a more radical challenge to
assessment practices. The Interim Report
(Tomlinson 2004) identified a number of
problems with the existing system. These
include concerns about:
• excellence – the current system does
not stretch the most able young people
(in 2003, over 20% of A-level entries
resulted in grade A)
• vocational training – there is an historic
failure to provide high-quality vocational
courses that stretch young people and
prepare them for work
• vocational learning is often assessed by
external written examinations, not
practical and continuous assessment
• assessment - the burden on students
and teachers is too high
• disaffection - our high drop-out rates
are scandalous
• the plethora of qualifications – currently
around 4,000
• curricula - are often narrow, overfull,
and limit in-depth learning
• too few students develop high levels of
competence in mathematical skills,
communication, working with others, or
problem-solving
• failure to equip young people with the
generic skills, knowledge and personal
attributes they will need in the future.
15
the Tomlinson
Report will offer
a more radical
challenge to
assessment
practices

The Report proposes a single qualifications
framework, based on diplomas set at four
levels (Entry, Foundation, Intermediate and
Advanced). Students are expected to
progress at a pace appropriate to their
attainment, rather than their age. Each
diploma shares some common features.
These require students to demonstrate
evidence of:
• mathematical skills, communication
and ICT skills
• successful completion of an extended
project
• participation in activities based on
personal interest, contribution to the
community as active citizens, and
experience of employment
• personal planning, review and making
informed choices
• engagement in ‘main learning’- the
major part of the diploma – chosen by
the student in order to open access to
further opportunities (eg in employment
or education).
These recommendations are exciting and
very ambitious, but deeply problematic,
unless there are radical changes to
current assessment systems – notably in
the large-scale adoption of e-assessment.
We consider ways these recommendations
might be met, in Section 3.
2.6 SUMMARY OF SECTION 2
A number of ‘drivers’ are shaping both
assessment and ICT; these need to be
taken into account in any discussion of
future developments. These drivers provide
conflicting pressures. The drivers
considered here include the increasing
power and ubiquity of ICT, and the
explosion of its usefulness and use in
everyday life. These provide pressures for
more relevant skills to be assessed, and
also provide an assessment medium which
is largely unexplored. Demands for lifelong
learning, for people who can innovate and
create new ideas, and the needs for
informed citizenship are all pressures for
education (and associated assessment
systems) that rewards higher-order
thinking, and personal development.
Conversely, drivers such as the need to
retrain and recertify staff, to ensure
common standards across organisations
in different countries, and to allow access
to well-qualified migrants for jobs and
education, emphasise assessments which
transcend national boundaries and which
are based on well-defined competencies
(and where assessment design is
sometimes based on perceived
commercial imperatives). These drivers
require different approaches to
assessment, and all require new sorts of
assessments and assessment systems
to be developed.
In the UK, there are a number of problems
with current assessment systems. First,
they serve students very badly; second,
they might soon collapse under their own
weight. There is now the political will (and
a tight timescale) to develop pervasive,
high quality e-assessment on a tight
timeline, aligned with current and
emerging educational goals. There is also
an urgent need to invent and apply new
sorts of e-assessment on a large scale.
16
there is an
urgent need to
invent and apply
new sorts of e-
assessment on a
large scale
SECTION 2
HOW AND WHERE MIGHT
ASSESSMENT BE DRIVEN?

3CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT
The UK government has embarked on a
very ambitious project to extend the use of
e-assessment. The issue for education is
not if e-assessment will play a major role,
but when, what, and how. E-assessment
can take a number of forms, including
automating administrative procedures;
digitising paper-based systems, and online
testing - which extends from banal
multiple choice tests to interactive
assessments of problem-solving skills.
In this section, we focus on current
developments in e-assessment for
summative purposes that can be used
across the educational system. In Section
4 we address important but less well-
defined targets for e-assessment.
Before we begin this section exploring
different aspects of e-assessment, we
should remember some of the virtues of
paper-based tests, in order that we do
not become so enamoured of new
technologies that we lose sight of the
benefits of current assessment systems.
With paper:
• all stakeholders are familiar with all
aspects of the medium
• paper is robust – it can be dropped,
and it still functions
• there are rarely problems of legibility
• high resolution displays are readily
available
• students can take questions in any order
• users can input cursive script,
diagrams, graphs, tables
• a number of equity issues have been
solved – it is easy to create large fonts
and to solve other access problems
• paper-based testing systems are well
established - it is relatively easy to
prevent candidates from copying from
each other, for example
• paper is easy to distribute, and can be
used in most locations
• in extreme circumstances, it is possible
to copy an examination paper, and find
another desk
• human judgements are brought to bear
throughout the process, so the scope of
questions is unconstrained.
3.1 SOME MOTIVES FOR
COMPUTER-BASED TESTING
A number of justifications have been put
forward for computer-based testing, and
are set out below. Not all justifications
apply to every use of computers in
assessment.
Avoiding meltdown: it may well be
impossible to maintain existing paper-
based assessment systems in the face
of the current growth in the number of
students being tested. Scanning
technologies can help.
Valuable life skills: much of everyday life
(including professional life) requires people
to use computers. Not using computers
for assessment seems perverse.
Alignment of curriculum and assessment:
there is a danger of an emerging gap
between classroom practices and the
assessment system. It is very common for
students (and almost all professionals) to
use word processors when they write; in
mathematics and science, the use of
graphics calculators, spreadsheets,
computer algebra systems (CAS) and
17
the issue for
education is not
if e-assessment
will play a major
role, but when,
what, and how
SECTION 3
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT

modelling software is commonplace
(and universal in professional practice).
Assessment systems that do not allow
access to these tools are requiring
students to work in unfamiliar and
maladaptive ways. Non-ICT-based
assessment can be a drag on curriculum
reform, rather than a useful driver
(see Section 1.2).
On-demand testing: in many situations
(for example, students engaged in part-
time study; students taking courses
designed to develop competencies;
students on short courses) it is appropriate
to test students whenever they are judged
(or judge themselves) to be ready. City and
Guilds tests provide an illustration; 75,000
online tests have been taken, and
candidates book a test time that suits
them. Saturday is the third most popular
day for assessment (Ripley 2004).
Students progress at different rates:
currently, the UK examination system acts
as a force against differentiation in the
curriculum. Summative end-of-year tests
make it attractive to schools to teach year
groups together and to enter them in a
common set of examinations. On-demand
testing would enable students to take tests
such as GCSEs when they are ready, and
to progress through different academic
subjects at different rates. In the USA,
the Advanced Placement system allows
students to take university-level courses
in school, be tested, and to have success
rewarded by college credits – so a student
might enter the second year university
course, for example. The Tomlinson Report
(2004) argues for a more differentiated
curriculum.
Adaptive testing: in some circumstances,
the group to be tested is heterogeneous as
in the case of language testing, and
selection tests for employment. Systems
of assessment that change the tasks taken
in the light of progress so far can be useful
in such circumstances. The principle is
straightforward: candidates are presented
with tasks of intermediate difficulty; if
they are successful, the difficulty level
increases; if they are unsuccessful, it
decreases. This allows a more accurate
estimate of the level of attainment.
Adaptive tests can work well when there is
a single scale of difficulty – for example in
number skill, or vocabulary. They require
careful development when a number of
different factors affect performance (such
as technical as well as problem-solving
skills), and are unlikely to be useful where
extended responses are required, because
the adaptive system has too little to work
on. Examples in the school system can be
found in Victoria, Australia (AIM Online
2003), where adaptive tests of English and
mathematics are used.
Better immediate feedback: candidates
can often be given information immediately
about success, as is the case in the tests
that all trainee teachers are required to
take in English, mathematics and ICT
(Teacher Training Agency 2003). (This is not
necessarily an advantage, if this testing
method encourages an ‘instrumental’
approach, where students learn in order
to pass tests rather than to learn things.
It could also force assessment design
to focus on objective knowledge rather
than the development of process skills,
if immediate feedback became a
requirement for all testing.) In principle,
candidates could also be given diagnostic
information about those aspects of
performance most in need of improvement.
18
on-demand
testing would
enable students
to take tests
when they are
ready
SECTION 3
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT

Motivational gains: there are claims
(Richardson, Baird, Ridgway, Ripley,
Shorrocks-Taylor and Swan 2002; Ripley
2004) that students prefer e-assessment to
paper-based assessment, because the
users feel more in control; interfaces are
judged to be friendly; and because some
tests use games and simulations, which
resemble both learning environments and
recreational activities.
Better exemplification for students and
teachers: posting examples of work which
meets certain standards can be beneficial.
In South Australia, excellent student work
in technology is displayed on the web (see
www.ssabsa.sa.edu.au/tech/2004techsho/
index.htm).
Better ‘system’ feedback: having full sets
of response data from students available at
the time of Examiners’ Reports can
improve the quality of feedback. Details of
questions, and parts of questions, that
proved relatively difficult and easy should
improve the quality of Examiners’ Reports
(which are based currently on examiners’
experiences of a sample of scripts, and
rarely on candidate success on questions
and part-questions). This information will
be useful for both improving the quality of
questions, and in providing information to
teachers about topics that have not been
learned well.
Faster information for higher education:
universities need assessment results in a
timely fashion. UK universities receive
A-level results quite late in the academic
year, and engage in a frenetic process
to fill places with appropriately qualified
applicants when students do and do not
achieve the grades that were a condition
of entry. These pressures would be
eased if results were delivered earlier.
Better task design: it is easier for test
constructors to change tasks on the basis
of information during testing and pre-
testing, because of the immediacy of data
collection. This can range from the
rejection of items that do not function well
(for example items where students who
score well overall are likely to fail a
particular item) to improved test design
(for example, ensuring that there are a lot
of items set around critical cut-off points
– especially the pass/fail boundary – so
that the test is most reliable there).
Cost: it is common to claim that e-
assessment can save money – it is clear
that online multiple choice tests can be
cheap to administer and score. However,
if we are to exploit the potential of ICT to
improve assessment – for example by
presenting simulations or video as an
integral part of a test – then the costs of
testing are likely to increase.
3.2 USES OF E-ASSESSMENT TO
SUPPORT CURRENT EDUCATIONAL
GOALS
3.2.1 Using ICT to support
Multiple Choice Tests
This is a well-established technology,
particularly well suited to assessing
declarative knowledge (‘knowing that’) in
well-defined domains. Developing tasks to
identify student misconceptions is also
possible. It is harder to assess procedural
knowledge (‘knowing how’). MCT is
unsuited to eliciting student explanations,
or other open responses. MCT have the
great advantage that they can be very
cheap to create and use. Some of this
cheapness is illusory, because the costs
19

of designing good items can be high.
Over-use of MCT can be very expensive, if
it leads to a distortion of the curriculum in
favour of atomised declarative knowledge,
divorced from conceptual structures that
students can use to work on the world,
effectively. MCT are used extensively in the
USA for high-stakes assessment, and are
presented increasingly via the web. For
example, web-based high-stakes State
tests are available in Dakota and Georgia;
the Graduate Record Examination (GRE),
used by many colleges to determine
access to Graduate School in many US
colleges, is available online.
3.2.2 Creating more authentic paper
and pencil tests
It makes sense to allow students access to
the tools they use in class, such as word
processors, and that professionals use
at work, such as graphing tools and
modelling packages, during testing. It
makes no sense at all to always forbid
students to use ‘tools of the trade’ when
being assessed. E-learning changes
the nature of the skills required. E-
assessment allows examiners to focus
more on conceptual understanding of what
needs to be done to solve problems, and
less on telling students what to do, then
assessing them on their competence in
using the manual techniques required to
get the answer. In Australia, the State of
Victoria (www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/prep10) has a
system for essay marking where students
key in their responses to questions, which
are then distributed electronically and
marked by human markers. Computer
Algebra Systems (CAS) can be used in the
Baccalauréat Général Mathématiques
examination in France; the International
Baccalaureate Organisation (IBO) is
running a CAS pilot for its Higher Level
Mathematics Diploma from September
2004. In the USA, CAS can be used when
taking the College Board’s Advanced
Placement Calculus test.
3.2.3 Using ICT to support current
UK examination processes
A number of ways in which ICT can
improve current examination practices
are set out below.
Better school-examination board
communication: Tomlinson (2002) points
to existing extensive use of ICT by awarding
bodies in the examination process, and
argues for more use of Electronic Data
Interchange (EDI) systems, which enable
schools and colleges to submit
examination entries and information about
candidates online and to receive results
automatically.
Supporting the current marking and
moderation process: a challenge faced by
large-scale tests that require human
markers is to ensure the comparability of
standards across markers, and over time
for all markers during the grading process.
Chief examiners create scoring rubrics to
guide other markers, and there is usually a
process of standardisation where markers
use the scoring rubrics to score a sample
of scripts, and attend a standardising
meeting where standards are compared,
discrepancies are discussed, and the
rubric is tuned. Once markers have
reached an appropriate level of marking
accuracy, they mark examinations
independently. Systems vary in terms of
the extent of the moderation used. In some
systems, scripts are sampled by chief
examiners, and serious deviation from the
20
it makes sense
to allow students
access to the
tools they use in
class, during
testing
SECTION 3
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT

rubric can lead to the remarking of all the
scripts sent to a particular examiner. ICT
can be used to support this process.
Sample scripts typical of different
categories of student work can be put
online, for easy reference by markers.
Entry of marks can be done via templates
that ensure that markers complete every
section, and the tedious process of
aggregating marks from different parts of
the script is done automatically and
without error. Data is collected in a way
that facilitates rapid and detailed analysis,
at the level of responses to different parts
of questions, whole questions, and the
distribution of test scores.
Replacing paper: in the USA (and
increasingly in the UK), there is
widespread use of systems where students
take paper-based examinations, and the
scripts are scanned electronically (this is
analogous to Optical Mark Recognition for
multiple choice tests that has been
available for many years). Once in this
format, the documents can be sent
electronically to markers, who can be
working almost anywhere. These systems
have a number of advantages over paper-
based systems. First, there are
considerable problems in tracking the
distribution and return of large volumes of
paper to and from markers; there are
security issues sending examination
papers by post, and scripts can get lost.
Second, moderation of the quality of
scoring can be done easily. Pre-scored
‘anchor’ papers can be sent to markers
during the course of their marking, to
ensure they are maintaining standards;
markers who do not perform adequately
can be told to take a break, or can be
removed from the pool of markers. The
whole process can be monitored in terms
of the rate at which scripts are being
marked. There is flexibility in the ways
that scoring is done. Markers can be
asked to score whole scripts, or individual
questions. So a newly appointed marker
might be sent questions judged to be
easy to mark, and more experienced
markers might be sent questions which
require deeper subject knowledge. The
reliability of scoring can be increased.
Scripts judged to be around key
borderlines on first marking can be sent
to other markers; scripts judged to be
well away from boundaries need be
scored only once. Online support can be
provided; markers can ask for help with
specific student responses. Data is
captured in a form suitable for a number
of subsequent analyses.
An interesting variant of this approach that
obviates the need for scanning would be to
require candidates to use ‘intelligent pens’.
These pens have two distinct functions.
The first is to write like a conventional pen.
The second is to record its movements
(exactly) on the page. This is done by using
specially prepared stationery. Imagine you
could see a small square area of a
banknote. The pattern across the whole
surface is never repeated, so that, given
sufficient time, you could find exactly
where the square is located on the note.
The pen works in a similar way, to record
its position on the page over the course of
the examination. The pen is then
connected to a computer, and all the data
is downloaded. The whole student
response can then be reconstructed.
Clearly, this approach would have to be
subjected to extensive trialling before any
widespread adoption.
21

3.2.4 Online assessment: turning
a GCSE paper into ‘computer-only’
e-assessment
An interesting challenge is to devise
ways to replace paper-based tests with
ICT-based tests, and to score them
automatically. Some virtues of paper-
based tests are unlikely to be replicated for
a number of reasons, so setting tests on-
screen is likely to bring about changes in
the nature of what is assessed. Here, we
consider one specimen GCSE mathematics
paper to illustrate the problems.
Measuring and drawing: about 10% of the
marks in the paper-based assessment
required the use of actual ‘instruments’
(ruler, protractor, compasses). One
approach for translation onto screen would
be to simulate the physical instruments,
eg to provide a virtual protractor that can
be dragged around the screen and rotated.
Another is to provide CAD or interactive
geometry packages. The latter would
require a substantial change to the
syllabus, but could provide real benefits in
terms of student learning.
Mathematical expressions: about 20% of
the marks required the student to write
down answers that could not be keyed in,
using a standard keyboard. These included
fractions, division expressions, and powers.
Rough work and partial credit: almost
every question in the paper format
included space for rough work, and about
30% of the total marks potentially could be
awarded based on this work, in the form of
partial credit awarded where the final
answer is incorrect (these marks are
usually awarded in full if the final answer
is correct). There are two distinct problems
in translating this to a digital format – first
capturing the rough work, and second,
allocating partial credit. Computer capture
is very difficult, given current interfaces;
the rules for allocating partial credit would
have to be specified in very fine detail for
them to be used as part of an automatic
scoring routine.
3.2.5 Scoring of open responses
GCSE questions often require students to
answer questions in their own way, and to
explain things – scoring these responses
automatically is inherently difficult.
Automated scoring of open student
responses is the focus of a good deal of
ongoing work. A number of approaches
have been taken to the problem of
automatic scoring. One is based on the
analysis of the surface features of the
response (Cohen, Ben-Simon and Hovav
2003), such as the number of characters
entered, the number of sentences,
sentence length, the number of low-
frequency words used, and the like. The
success of such methods can be judged by
comparing the correlation between
computer and human judges, and the
correlation between scores given by two
sets of human judges. Cohen, Ben-Simon
and Hovav (2003) looked at the scoring of a
range of essay types by humans and
computer, and report that the correlation
between the number of characters keyed
by the student, and the scores given by
human judges are as high as the
correlation between scores given by
human judges. Nevertheless, these
scoring systems do not provide a panacea.
In the USA, double marking is used to
ensure reliability (this is rarely done in the
UK). ICT can be used to moderate human
markers (and save money) – if the
computer and the human disagree, the
22
ICT can be used
to moderate
human markers
SECTION 3
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT

paper is re-marked by a human. Machine-
only scoring is unlikely to be useful in UK
contexts, for two reasons. First is that the
UK culture requires that scoring schemes
be described in ways that are useful to
teachers and students. Second is that the
consequential validity of such scoring
systems would be dire – the advice to
students would be to improve their scores
simply by using more keystrokes. A second
approach which could improve the quality
of scoring and reduce costs is being used
to assess student responses on tasks in
contexts where the range of acceptable
responses can be well defined, such as in
short answer science tasks (eg Sukkarieh,
Pulman and Raikes 2003). Here,
appropriate (‘the Earth rotates around the
sun’) and inappropriate (‘the sun rotates
around the Earth’) responses are defined.
Lists of synonyms are generated for nouns
(‘our globe’) and verbs (‘circles’), and
alternative grammatical forms are defined,
based on analyses of large numbers of
student responses. Student responses are
parsed using techniques borrowed from
Natural Language Processing, and are
compared with stored appropriate and
inappropriate responses, using a variety of
Information Extraction techniques (see
Cowie and Lehnert 1996). Mitchell,
Aldridge, Williamson and Broomhead
(2003) describe work at The Dundee
Medical School. Here, all students take the
same examination at the end of every year.
Academics are presented with all the
responses to the same question, with the
computer’s judgement on the correctness
or otherwise of the answer, and an
estimate of the confidence of the
judgement. Human scoring time is
dramatically reduced, and staff report
positive benefits in terms of the quality of
the questions they ask, both in terms of
rewriting ambiguous questions (which
produce student responses that are
difficult to score) and in terms of writing
questions which highlight student
misconceptions. This approach requires a
good deal of work prior to live testing, so
is well suited to situations where tasks
will be used repeatedly.
In the USA, the Graduate Management
Aptitude Test (GMAT) - used to determine
access to business schools - uses
automated scoring of text. Here again, the
test is scored by both human and machine,
to offer some sort of reliability check for
the human marker.
3.3 ICT SUPPORT FOR CURRENT
‘NEW’ EDUCATIONAL GOALS
There is an emerging consensus
worldwide on ‘new’ educational goals,
focused on problem solving using
mathematics and science, supported by an
increased use of information technology
(compare, for example, UK developments
with those in New Zealand
www.minedu.govt.nz; and Singapore
www1.moe.edu.sg/iteducation). These new
goals involve the development of higher-
order thinking, and a range of social skills
such as communication, and working in
groups. There is an honourable tradition of
assessing problem solving via the use of
extended tasks, such as those developed
by the APU (eg Archenhold, Bell, Donnelly,
Johnson and Welford 1988). However, the
computer offers some unique features in
terms of representation, interaction, and
its support for modelling. Here, we
describe some recent developments which
make use of these unique features.
23
new goals involve
the development
of higher-order
thinking, and a
range of social
skills

3.3.1 The development of
World Class Tests
Tests were designed to identify high-
attaining students in problem solving in
mathematics, science and technology
at ages 9 and 13 years, as part of
the work on the World Class Arena
(www.worldclassarena.org). Computers
make it easy to present new sorts of tasks,
for example tasks where dynamic displays
show changes in several variables over
time, or which present video of a situation
which students must model. A wide variety
of representations can be supported, and
students can be asked to switch between
them. The interactive properties of
computers make them well suited to
the assessment of process skills.
Using computers to give students control
over how data is presented allows them to
work with complex data sets of a sort that
would be very difficult to work with on
paper. Tasks can be set in realistic
contexts, using realistic data to address
problems of considerable complexity, using
resources and methods that are familiar to
professionals working in the relevant field.
Two examples are presented here: Oxygen
and Bean Lab.
Further examples of tasks can be found
in Ridgway and McCusker (2003). Skills
assessed include:
Understanding and representing
problems: traditional educational goals
such as the ability to interpret tables and
graphs, and to translate information coded
in one representation into information
coded in another representation continue
to be vital skills for mathematical and
scientific literacy. Computers allow fast
and reversible transformations of
information from one representation to
another, and students can be asked to
explain the relationships between them.
Assessing process skills in science
and mathematics: the desire to assess
process skills is not new. Traditionally,
students would be presented with tasks in
laboratories, or would be required to keep
logs and portfolios of their laboratory
work. However, the laboratory setting can
introduce elements which reduce the
reliability of the assessment, such as
instruments which fail to function properly,
or materials whose properties are less
than ideal. Students are required to
physically manipulate apparatus – chance
differences between students in terms of
24
the interactive
properties
of computers
make them well
suited to the
assessment of
process skills
SECTION 3
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT

their previous exposure to particular
equipment can both reduce reliability,
and add an extra cognitive load to the
intellectual task being performed. In some
situations, issues of health and safety
arise. Some education systems are
unwilling to accept teacher ratings of
students for the purposes of high-stakes
testing, with the result that process skills
in science are not assessed at all.
Computer-based assessment permits the
assessment of these valuable aspects of
learning science, at modest cost. A range
of different process skills can be identified,
which include:
• working systematically (for example,
choosing tests systematically,
controlling variables and recording
results systematically)
• generating and testing hypotheses
• finding rules and relationships
• handling complex data
• testing solutions
• seeking completeness and rigour (in
many real-world situations, exemplified
by diagnosis and remediation in spheres
such as medicine and industrial process
control, it is important to find all of the
faults in a system).
Five sets of live tests have been
administered in the UK and elsewhere,
each of which was preceded by extensive
pre-testing. A notable result was the ease
with which students interacted with
computers. The affective response from
students was very strong – they really
enjoy working on these tasks. This might
be related to the sustained challenge the
tasks present, which is similar to the
reported reasons why they like computer-
based games (Kirriemuir and
McFarlane 2004).
Students performed better on some tasks
than one might expect – notably tasks that
require them to reason from complex data
sets (eg data with two independent
variables and one dependent variable at
age 9 years). We take this as a very positive
sign that computers can play a leading role
in the development of the skills which
constitute the new educational agenda.
In many aspects, student performance was
poor - work characterised by guessing,
too little use of systematic methods,
poor hypothesis generation, and poor
generalisation. On many tasks, students
were able to show evidence of good
reasoning skills; however, explanations
were often weak. Given the earlier
discussion of the impact of assessment on
the curriculum, it is to be hoped that the
use of e-assessment of process skills will
lead to better student performance on a
range of important activities.
World Class Tests focused on summative
assessment in science, mathematics and
technology, and used a variety of contexts,
including geography and economics, as
well as biology, physics, and engineering.
The ideas are generic, and can be applied
to many curriculum areas. On the basis of
analyses of student performance on WCT,
teaching modules for whole class use have
been developed, targeted on weak process
skills. These teaching modules provide a
good deal of formative assessment, and
require students to engage in reflective
activities such as critiquing student work,
and explaining their own solution strategies.
We discuss ‘new’ educational goals
that are less amenable to summative
assessment – such as the ability to work
in groups, to communicate, to learn to
learn – in Section 4.
25
computers can
play a leading
role in the
development of
the skills which
constitute the
new educational
agenda

3.3.2 Assessing ICT at Key Stage 3
Ongoing work funded by QCA sets out to
assess student attainment in ICT at age 13
years. A key principle for the design of
these tests is that students should be
tested on their performance on extended
tasks (‘create a web page about topic X for
audience Y, using a particular set of
resources - a database, ‘clients’ accessible
via e-mail, spreadsheets for planning,
web page creation tools’) not on a series
of sub-tasks (‘use a spreadsheet to add
up these numbers’). An extraordinarily
ambitious goal is to present tasks and
score performance entirely by computer.
This is a laudable aim, and shows a
government commitment to high
quality e-assessment (including £20m
for the project).
3.3.3 Digital portfolios
An historical legacy which bedevils the
current education system in the UK is
the distinction between ‘academic’ and
practical’ subjects. This was enshrined in
the 1944 Education Act, which created
grammar, technical and secondary
modern schools (Tattersall 2003). Abstract
thinking is important; appropriate action in
context that rests on practical competence
is important. Neither is much use on its
own, and students should be taught to
both abstract and apply. For this to
become a classroom reality, assessment
systems must require students to show
the full spectrum of competencies in a
number of school subjects. If high-stakes
assessment systems fail to reward such
behaviours, they are unlikely to be the
focus of much work in school. E-portfolios
offer a way forward.
There are three distinct uses for portfolios.
The first is to provide a repository for
student work; the second is to provide a
stimulus for reflective activity – which
might involve reflection by the student,
and critical and creative input from peers
and tutors; the third is as showcase,
which might be selected by the student to
represent their ‘best work’ (as in an artist’s
portfolio) or to show that the student has
satisfied some externally defined criteria,
as in some teacher accreditation systems
(eg Schulman 1998). These uses are not
mutually exclusive. Students may well
wish to archive all their work; reflective
activities and feedback from others will be
based on a subset of this work; the final
‘presentation portfolio’ will be selected
from this corpus.
These different uses of portfolios reflect
different, but not always incompatible,
theories of learning. A behaviourist
approach will focus on defining ‘core
competencies’ that are impossible to
assess in timed examinations, and the
need for fast and efficient feedback on
student products. A social constructivist
view will focus on the importance of
reflection and sense making by a group
(including the tutor) which will include
the negotiation of educational goals.
ICT provides an opportunity to introduce
manageable, high quality coursework as
part of the summative assessment
process. Student portfolios have been
advocated for a long time, and have
been used on a limited basis. From the
viewpoint of assessment, the rationale for
portfolios is clear: there are a number of
valuable activities and attainments that
cannot be assessed using the format of
timed tests. The ability to create, design,
reflect, modify and persevere are all
26
assessment
systems must
require students
to show the full
spectrum of
competencies
SECTION 3
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT

important goals of education. It is entirely
appropriate to assess these processes by
collecting evidence on the ability to engage
in an extended piece of work, and to bring
it to a successful conclusion by the
creation of some product – lab report,
video, installation etc. Part of the portfolio
can (should) provide evidence of the range
of personal skills demonstrated, perhaps
under the headings suggested in the
Tomlinson Report (2004): student self-
awareness – of themselves and the ways
they learn and what they know; how
students appear to, and interact with,
others; thinking about possible futures and
making informed decisions. A section of
the portfolio in the form of a viva, or simply
annotations of products where students
show their attainments in these three
aspects of performance is appropriate.
A number of problems are associated with
portfolios and other sorts of coursework.
One is the problem of storage – especially
in design projects and in art. ICT can solve
the problem by holding images of artefacts
created. A second problem is student
misbehaviour; this can have a number
of forms. One is simply that work is
plagiarised; another is that students create
some artefact, then ‘back-fill’ by inventing
the development process (which is often
assessed as part of the final mark) post
hoc. ICT can help with both of these
problems by requiring the submission of
images of intermediate products, with
time stamps. On a more positive note,
the ability to store and work with images
(photographs, video) is likely to make
teaching of the design process more
effective. Devices such as mobile phones
with in-built cameras and facilities for
audio recording make it easy to document
the evolution of ideas and artefacts. This
facility serves a number of functions. First,
it simplifies the documentation of the
development of work – reducing the
‘busy work’ students might otherwise
have had to engage in. The process of
documentation via a portfolio of work
supports student reflections on processes
– on decisions made deliberately, those
forced by circumstances, and those that
just sort of happened. Digital images are
easy to manipulate and present. Student
presentations of work on the development
of artefacts is easy, once images are
captured digitally.
In some subjects, such as design and
technology, and art, extended projects are
at the heart of the discipline. The use of
e-portfolios maps directly onto current
conceptions of the domain, and offers
practical solutions to some common
problems (eg Kimbell 2003). This work is
important, and is likely to be applicable on
a large scale in the near future. A very
large number of institutions have made
use of portfolio systems; the American
Association for Higher Education (AAHE)
Portfolio Clearinghouse (www.aahe.
org/teaching/portfolio_db.htm) provides an
online searchable database of profiles of
electronic portfolio projects and resources
in higher education, and is a valuable
source of ideas.
3.4 SUMMARY OF SECTION 3
There are a number of exciting
developments in the use of e-assessment
for both summative and formative
purposes, and several UK developments
are at the leading edge, worldwide. In
the UK, the government has decided
that extensive use will be made of e-
assessment. Some of these developments
are a response to current problems
27
the ability to
create, design,
reflect, modify
and persevere
are all important
goals of
education

associated with increases in the volume
of assessment; some reflect a desire
to improve the technical quality of
assessment (such as increased scoring
reliability), and to make the assessment
process more convenient and more useful
to users (by the introduction of on-demand
testing, and fast reporting of results, for
example). E-assessment also makes it
possible to assess aspects of performance
that have been seen as desirable for a long
time – such as the assessment of process
skills, and the efficient handling of student
portfolios. Using E-assessment to test
student ICT capability represents an
extremely ambitious goal of presenting
holistic tasks to assess performance,
rather than a collection of short tasks
which are symptoms, rather than
exemplars, of ICT capability. Nevertheless,
some major challenges face these new
developments. Paper tests have a number
of advantages in terms of the quality of the
image presented, and the variety of ways in
which students can respond; automatic
scoring of responses will be very difficult,
and in some cases impossible to achieve
via computer.
A complete reliance on paper-based
assessment has a number of drawbacks;
first is that such assessments are
increasingly ‘inauthentic’ as classroom and
professional practices embrace ICT.
Second is that such assessments
constrain progress, and have a negative
effect on students who have to learn (just
for the exam) how to do things on paper
that are done far more effectively with ICT.
A third major constraint is that current
innovative suggestions for curriculum
reform, which rely on student portfolios for
their implementation, will be impossible to
manage on a large scale without extensive
use of ICT.
E-assessment is a stimulus for rethinking
the whole curriculum, as well as all
current assessment systems. E-
assessment provides a cost-effective way
to integrate high quality portfolio
assessment with externally set and
marked tests, in any combination. This
makes it likely that there will be significant
changes in the structure of summative
assessments, because of the range of
student attainments that can now be
assessed reliably. There is likely to be
extensive use of teacher assessment of
those aspects of performance best judged
by humans (including extended pieces of
work assembled into portfolios), and more
extensive use made of on-demand tests of
those aspects of performance which can
be done easily by computer, or which are
done best by computer.
28
SECTION 3
CURRENT DEVELOPMENTS
IN E-ASSESSMENT

4OPPORTUNITIES AND
CHALLENGES FOR E-ASSESSMENT
Here, we consider some issues which need
to be addressed as a matter of urgency.
First are some speculations on how we
might assess process skills - essential but
often ill-defined educational goals. It will
be important to establish the value of
such assessments as part of large-scale
summative assessment, in contrast
to their roles as potentially useful
components of formative assessment.
It will also be important to establish the
appropriate scale of such assessments,
and their locus in the curriculum, in terms
of educational gains and manageability.
Second, we consider the problems of
‘going to scale’. Large scale innovation –
especially where computers are involved –
does not always run smoothly.
4.1 ASSESSING PROCESS SKILLS
4.1.1 Assessing metacognition
As we move towards a knowledge-based
society, the development of metacognitive
skills increases in importance, and they
become educational goals in themselves.
Currently, these goals are ill-defined in
that there is not yet a consensus in the
educational community about their exact
nature or how they can be assessed. Goals
can be described, and recognised when
they are achieved, but exemplification
needs further work, and a general sharing
of ideas. Ridgway, Swan and Burkhardt
(2001) exemplify this process as part of
‘Assessing Mathematical Thinking’ in
materials developed for the US National
Institute for Science Education
(www.wcer.wisc.edu/nise/cl1).
Here, examples of metacognition are given
under four headings: knowing how to use
knowledge; analysing and improving
cognitive processes; supporting reflection
and critical skills; and assessing
competence with different thinking styles.
Knowing how to use knowledge: the web
offers great opportunities and pitfalls for
assessment. Most obviously, the existence
of the web means that successful use of it
should be an educational target. Expertise
in navigation, such as learning how to
bookmark useful sources, and how to
refine searches are useful skills, but are
subsidiary to a set of meta-knowledge
skills about the nature of knowledge – how
it is constructed, presented, and used by
different people for different purposes.
There is a need for students to develop
sophisticated theories-in-action about
knowledge. These theories should include
accounts of the nature of knowledge – its
generation, and the various functions it
serves (including its use as just another
rhetorical device!). Students also need to
know about their own knowing – what they
do and do not know, how they acquire, lose
and change their own knowledge – and
how they control their cognitive processes
when solving problems.
We address the first goal elsewhere in the
discussion on assessing competence in
ICT. The latter goal is illustrated by Lord
Armstrong’s remark “power is knowing
how to use knowledge”. The common
corruption to “knowledge is power”
misses Armstrong’s point almost entirely.
Our educational ambitions should be
to encourage students to become
sophisticated users and creators of
knowledge. Good formative assessment
should contribute to students’
development; web-based sources can
29
there is a need
for students
to develop
sophisticated
theories-in-
action about
knowledge
SECTION 4
OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
FOR E-ASSESSMENT

be part of both formative and summative
assessment of these key elements of
student performance.
Key aspects of performance relate to the
exploration of the origins of the source,
analysis of its qualities as a source, and its
relation to a wider set of information.
Successful formative assessment helps
students to internalise questions and
question styles. For summative
assessment, we expect students to ask
questions about the nature of the
information source. The originator can be
important – dietary advice from Kellogg’s
should be treated more cautiously than
advice from the British Medical
Association. Who created it? For what
purpose? From what perspective was this
written? The poor quality of much of the
information on the web can be a virtue,
pedagogically, because students see the
sense in challenging the authority of any
source, and can do so easily by considering
alternative sources (eg Downes and
Zammit 2000).
Skills in analysing documents in terms of
their style and their use of particular
rhetorical devices, and in creating
documents for different audiences and in
different writing genres, are being
developed and used in English (and
sociology and philosophy at university
level). Again, the ubiquitous use of web
sources provides both a rationale for the
value of these analytic and creative
activities, and a rich source of resources
for assessment purposes.
The web makes it easy to compare and
contrast different interpretations of ‘the
same’ events by different ‘news’ providers,
and by the same provider over time. In
terms of assessment, students can be
asked to compare and contrast different
presentations, and to describe the
evolution of a news event over time. This
requires analysis of the way that evidence
is selected, and the ways that ‘events’ are
reconstructed over time.
A further key aspect of knowledge use is
the ability to relate a particular source to a
larger body of knowledge. It will always be
important for learners to develop rich
schemas of knowledge – facts, skills, and
procedures and their interconnections – as
the basis for judging the value or
otherwise of putative new information, or a
theoretical account. In science, a simple
example is a digital image of a mammal
with horns and claws. Students are
expected to say it is most unlikely, because
horns are associated with herbivores, and
claws with carnivores. At a higher level of
abstraction, students might be asked to
resolve famous conflicts in scientific ideas,
in terms of what was known at the time.
For example, Lord Kelvin – probably the
most distinguished scientist of his day –
argued against the theory of evolution, on
the grounds that the timescale was
impossible. The core of the Earth is largely
molten, but if the Earth were really the
millions of years old needed for
evolutionary processes to work, it would
have cooled down long ago. What didn’t he
know (or is his criticism valid)? The web is
a source of information that challenges
current knowledge – students can be
asked to relate ‘breaking’ research to a
wider set of knowledge. The recent scare
over the MMR vaccine (and the damage
that will be done to children by an under-
analysed and over-publicised piece of
research) provides an example.
A vivid example of summative evaluation
which requires both a deep knowledge
30
SECTION 4
OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
FOR E-ASSESSMENT

schema and powerful skills in knowledge
deconstruction and reconstruction is
provided by a final undergraduate
examination at Goldsmith’s University on
the art history course, where students are
presented with two pictures, side by side,
which they are to compare and contrast.
They are required to name the artist,
deconstruct the iconography, and interpret
each work in its historical context. This
could be presented via ICT, and could be
extended to film, and to other contexts.
Another approach to supporting reflection
about knowledge acquisition and creation
is to incorporate assignments that require
a reflective account of the process of
creating some artefact (object or written).
Students can be asked process questions
about sources of information – ways to find
good sources (perhaps in the form of
‘advice to someone with a similar job to
do’), and about the sources themselves.
They can be asked about problems faced,
and the ways they were solved, in these
‘meta-learning’ essays.
‘Open-web’ examinations offer a parallel
to open-book examinations. One virtue
of such examinations is that they are
more ‘authentic’ than conventional
examinations, in that, outside educational
contexts, one rarely has to answer a
substantive question without any
resources. They allow the examiner to set
a broader range of questions, because
students are not expected to retain all
the relevant information in memory.
An adaptive strategy for success on
such examinations is to develop meta-
knowledge of the whole area, and to index
sources very carefully. A large information
bank with no index is of little use. Compare
the preparation necessary for this sort of
examination with the ‘cramming’ strategy’
that can be effective when preparing for
conventional examinations. There, the
danger is that students hold information
in a relatively temporary state for the
purpose of the examination, then forget
the information once the examination is
over. Open-web examinations are likely to
have desirable ‘consequential validity’ –
that is to say, are likely to lead to desirable
learning (and learning strategies). The
unpopularity of open-book examinations
(which probably arises because they
require serious thought about the subject
matter) is likely to apply equally to open-
web examinations. The potential for
fraudulent behaviour by students (such as
e-mailing for advice in situations where
the purpose of testing is to assess the
ability to search the web, or searching the
web when the purpose of the assessment
is to assess ‘networking’ skills) means
that student activities will need to be
constrained in appropriate ways.
Nevertheless, open-web assessment
should be explored further.
Analysing and improving cognitive
processes: interactive whiteboards can
provide the facility to work as a whole
class on a problem or simulation, then to
replay and critique the sequence of
actions. This provides the opportunity to
discuss seemingly abstract concepts such
as ‘strategy’ and exemplify them with
concrete examples. Analogies with the
analysis of games (eg tennis) can make the
activity seem natural in class (of course,
analysis of on-screen video of ongoing
games is a specific example of the sorts of
analyses being described here). The long-
term intention is to help students develop
metacognitive skills that will be applicable
in a wide variety of situations. By looking at
different solution attempts, students can
be asked high-level questions such as
31
open-web
examinations
are likely to lead
to desirable
learning
(and learning
strategies)

‘how do you solve problems of this sort?’ –
which can be assessed more formally by
tasks such as ‘write some guidance for
someone else, that will help them to solve
problems like this one’. A requirement for
summative e-portfolios could be that
sample reflective analyses of processes
be included.
These techniques have great potential
when the focus is on the social and
emotional education of students. Topics
raised in personal and social education
such as approaches to bullying can be
approached by presenting students with
video vignettes, and asking them to
describe situations, the interactions that
take place, and the feelings of participants.
Parallel information channels (provided by
the participants) can provide students with
feedback on the correctness or otherwise
of their insights. At a lower level,
assessing children’s ability to identify the
emotions being expressed in different
faces can give insights into their
developmental state (or, in more extreme
cases, into pathological states such as
autism). If summative information is
appropriate, it can be based on the
analysis of such vignettes.
Supporting reflection and critical skills:
an important higher-order skill is the
ability to review and improve work. This
can be done via paper and pencil (for
example by writing on every third line, and
changing pen colour at every revision
cycle), but is made very easy by the use of
ICT, with facilities such as ‘track changes’
in MS-Word. Students can be asked to
provide examples of their ability to improve
work on the basis of others’ and their own
suggestions, and of their ability to critique
the work of others. Another way to assess
critical thinking is to require students to
annotate work to show where they meet
the assessment criteria.
Courtenay (personal communication, 2004)
described an activity designed to support
creative writing in English in a night class
comprised of 30 non-native speakers at an
early stage of learning English. Courtenay
focuses on creation and critique, and
seeks to spend as much time as possible
interacting with his students. Each student
writes online, and when they are satisfied
with their composition, it is posted to a
shared server. Every student is required to
offer constructive comments on five
compositions, and to revise their own
writing in the light of five sets of
comments. The teacher is able to tour and
coach individuals as they write. With little
effort, this approach could be extended to
providing summative assessment.
Students could be required to submit their
comments on others’ writing to be
evaluated, and could provide evidence of
their ability to use comments on their own
work. An assessment system like this
would reinforce rather than distort the
educational ambitions of the teacher.
Peer assessment is attractive for a
number of reasons. (Topping’s 1998 review
demonstrated that it is associated with
gains on conventional performance
measures, in higher education.) Students
can be asked to create far more pieces of
work than could be marked by a single
tutor. It can avoid the problem that as a
class size gets bigger, the load on the
tutor increases directly, along with the
time taken to provide feedback to students.
Students must understand criteria for
assessment, and must acquire a range of
higher-order skills, such as abstracting
ideas, detecting errors and misconceptions,
critiquing and suggesting improvements, if
32
SECTION 4
OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
FOR E-ASSESSMENT

they are to engage in peer assessment.
Peer assessment is a fact of life outside
education, so peer assessment is far more
‘authentic’ than some forms of assessment
such as multiple choice tests. Possible
disadvantages relate to the possibility of an
enhanced workload on students, unreliable
feedback, and biased feedback.
A number of commercially available
systems have been designed to support
peer assessment. Calibrated Peer
Review™ (Chapman and Fiore 2001) was
designed to support the peer assessment
of essays in molecular science, but has
been applied in a variety of subjects, and
with students across the education system.
Students write short essays, and are asked
questions designed to foster their critical
thinking. Students are presented with
three ‘calibration’ essays to grade, and
must demonstrate their competence
before they progress. Two of the essays
contain errors and misconceptions which
students must identify and correct.
Students are also asked questions on style
and grammar. The scores they give to the
assignments are compared with ‘official’
scores, and a calibration report is created
for the student and the tutor. If
performance is inadequate, more
instruction is provided, and the student
must repeat the activity. Once they have
shown that they can assess essays
effectively and reliably, they are asked to
grade three essays by peers, and finally
are asked to grade their own essay. The
student and the instructor receive
comments and scores.
CPR is not restricted to essays in science;
the idea is generic, and can be applied to
literary criticism, commentaries on a piece
of art, or laboratory reports, for example.
The tutor must select the focus of the
assignment, write an exemplar answer
for calibration, and select two pieces of
student work which contain interesting
errors or omissions. Each of these has
to be graded by the tutor, and relevant
comments have to be written. The tutor
also writes key questions on content and
style. CPR is designed to overcome the
potential weakness of peer assessment
in terms of unreliable assessment
(via training and moderation) and bias
(via anonymity). The authors claim
considerable gains in students’ ability to
‘learn to learn’ because their attention
is focused on abstracting ideas and
arguments, describing, analysing and
assessing the quality of material, and in
review. CPR also increases the amount
of writing that students do.
Doiron and Isaac (2002) have developed a
novel form of online peer review designed
to complement the American College of
Surgeons Advanced Trauma Life Support
Course for fourth year medical students.
Their system involves self-assessment,
peer evaluation, feedback and debate.
There is an inherent problem giving large
numbers of students direct experience of
Emergency Room procedures. Here,
students are presented with a realistic
case study, and must prevent the patient
from dying, conduct clinical tests, then
request appropriate lab work followed by
diagnosis and recommendation of a
treatment. Students reflect on, and self-
assess, their knowledge. They submit a
diagnosis and proposed treatment plan to
the whole group. For peer review, they are
presented with two other diagnoses and
treatments – one from the tutor, prepared
to contain errors, for critique. If the
student fails to detect the errors, they get
individual feedback from the tutor.
Students then review ‘live’ reports from
33
peer assessment
is a fact of life
outside
education

two of their peers (so three reviews are
considered together). Where there are
disagreements, the two views are
presented to a larger group (four to ten
students) who must all offer their own
view, and debate the issue. Similar work is
being conducted on a health psychology
course, and in engineering.
Assessing competence with different
thinking styles: mobile phone technology
might provide a means of assessing
thinking styles via simulated group work.
Here, each student works in a simulated
environment, where responses from other
‘group members’ are pre-specified, and
some responses to the actions of the
student are pre-defined. This environment
is artificial for a number of obvious
reasons – contact is via phone (or e-mail)
rather than face-to-face and the range of
dynamic interactions is constrained.
However, these constraints mean that
students can be assessed in relatively
standardised conditions, and sequences
can be replayed for analysis and reflection
as part of formative assessment.
Analysing the ability to engage in De
Bono’s (2000) ‘Thinking Hats’ activity
provides a concrete example. De Bono has
identified a number of thinking styles, all
of which are useful when solving problems.
None is effective on its own. He argues
that people differ in their preferences for
these different thinking styles, and often
stick with a particular style of thinking. In
terms of group dynamics, individuals can
become ego-involved with a particular
style of thinking, with negative
consequences for the productivity of the
group. De Bono argues that these different
thinking styles should be made explicit,
and that every group member should
engage with every thinking style in the
course of group work. He suggests a
formal mechanism for this, where thinking
styles are associated with hats of different
colours, and group members are invited to
take particular roles – sometimes as
individuals, and sometimes as a whole
group. Thinking styles include asking
about what is known or what is needed
(the White Hat); saying why an idea won’t
work (the Black Hat); generating ideas and
alternatives (the Green Hat); describing
feelings, hunches and intuitions (the Red
Hat); managing group processes (the Blue
Hat); and the optimistic advocacy of ideas
(the Yellow Hat).
Given some specific suggestions for
actions via mobile phone or e-mail,
students can be asked to work in Red,
Yellow and Black Hat styles; or given a
stream of (simulated) input to a
conference, students can be asked to work
in Blue Hat mode. Their responses provide
information on their strengths and
weaknesses working in different thinking
styles. This idea is not restricted to de
Bono’s framework, but is a generic
idea for assessing individual skills in
group settings.
4.1.2 Assessing group projects
A valuable skill is the ability to work
productively in groups. This requires
good communication skills, understanding
the criteria for effective group work,
understanding different roles, the ability to
assess one’s own work and the work of
others, and the ability to respond positively
to formative and summative feedback. The
assessment of group work is problematic
for a number of reasons: problems can
be caused by ‘social loafing’ and the
allocation of equal marks for unequal
34
mobile phone
technology might
provide a means
of assessing
thinking styles
SECTION 4
OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
FOR E-ASSESSMENT

contributions; undesirable effects of
students rating peers; and time-hungry
procedures for gathering accurate
evidence on student performance.
SPARK (Self and Peer Assessment
Resource Kit - www.educ.dab.uts.
edu.au/darrall/sparksite) is an academic
open source project designed to support
the effective evaluation of group work, that
has been used in a variety of contexts in
higher education. It requires a clear
specification of the tasks to be performed
by the group and the assessment criteria.
Students reflect on group processes during
the performance of the task, and rate all
the group members, and themselves
against the criteria provided. The tutor
monitors the work of the group, grades the
product of the group work, uses SPARK to
convert group marks into individual marks,
and provides individual summative and
formative feedback (eg that a student rates
their own contribution to the group far
higher than other group members do).
Evaluations of SPARK by its authors in
a variety of higher education contexts
have been positive (eg Freeman and
McKenzie 2002).
4.1.3 Assessing creativity
‘Creativity’ involves the production of a new
idea or artefact that is judged by some
community to be of value. Many writers
have made a distinction between analytic
and creative thinking. Analytic thinking has
been characterised as: linear, rational,
logical, conscious and deliberate. Creative
thinking has been described as: parallel,
unconstrained, illogical, unconscious, and
chaotic. Creativity became a bandwagon
for education in the 1960s, in part as a
healthy corrective to an over-emphasis on
‘Intelligence’. A problem with some of
these early proponents of ‘creativity’ (eg
Getzels and Jackson 1962) was that they
accepted many of the philosophical
assumptions of the Intelligence movement,
and many of their methods, but were
incompetent in their use. The result was a
movement that was based on some good
ideas, but which was poorly theorised, and
supported by flawed evidence. Just as
there are many styles of analytic thinking,
that are coloured and improved by
knowledge in particular domains, and
different ways to represent information,
so too are there many styles of creative
thinking, again, influenced by knowledge
and experience in a variety of domains.
Creativity (as defined above) requires an
intimate interplay of creative and analytic
thinking. It is important to develop
creativity, and to evaluate the products of
creative thinking. Creativity should be
evaluated by an analysis of product, and
by an analysis of student processes,
using methods described earlier (notably,
tracking the design process, and reflective
accounts on this process).
It can be difficult to obtain good paper-
based accounts of student processes and
results after engaging with an extended
piece of work. This can be a desirable
activity for a number of reasons. First, it
requires students to translate knowledge
from one form to another, and to consider
the needs of a different audience – notably
from a static written form whose primary
audience is the teacher, to a visual and
dynamic form for some predefined
audience, who will have a range of
understandings about the topic in hand.
Second, it is inherently valuable as a skill.
Digital cameras and whiteboards make it
easy for students to show their work
(which might be on paper, in the form of
35
it is important
to develop
creativity, and
to evaluate the
products of
creative thinking

manipulatives, or some artefact that has
been created) and to explain what they
have done, justify their answer, and
describe the design decisions they took.
4.1.4 Assessing communication skills
Mobile phones could be used more
extensively for assessment. A simple
example would be to use mobile phones
for the aural comprehension aspect of
language learning. Current practices of
using an analogue tape recorder at the
front of a classroom are inherently unfair.
The quality of the sound will differ as a
function of the tape machine used; the
sound intensity at the front of the room will
be dramatically higher than at the back of
the room. Using conventional computer
technology, Southern Australia uses MP3
files to test language comprehension (see
www.ssabsa.sa.edu.au) – clearly, good
practice.
The eVIVA project (www.qca.org.uk/
adultlearning/downloads/eviva_project.pdf,
www.eviva.tv) uses phones as the medium
for oral testing with portfolio-based Key
Stage 3 ICT assessment. Students can
book a test session, and so can have
(almost) on-demand testing. The phones
are also used for recording ‘voice
postcards’ of learning milestones, and
posting these to a central website. The
‘voice postcards’ can be used by a student
to support the piece of portfolio evidence
which they are presenting.
As speech recognition technologies
continue to improve, one can envisage a
situation where questions are posed orally
by telephone, and student responses are
scored automatically. In the case of
language learning, this could be applied to
elementary aspects of learning such as
pronunciation, to vocabulary, and to
correcting sentence structure ‘mistakes’
presented to students. Given test
technologies that support ‘tailored testing’,
the phone system could be used to provide
on-demand testing of some aspects of
language use. Such systems are unlikely to
be useable (in the short term at least) for
high-stakes testing, because of problems
of impersonation. These problems may be
removed if effective person recognition
systems are developed and introduced on
a large scale.
4.2 NATIONAL CURRICULA,
NATIONAL ASSESSMENT
The Tomlinson Report (2004) addresses
fundamental questions about curriculum
design and assessment, and describes a
number of serious problems with current
systems. Assessment exemplifies
educational goals, and has a major effect
on educational practice. Unless
assessment systems are aligned with
educational goals, they will distort
curriculum ambitions. There is a general
desire for more school-based assessment,
and more process-based assessment, and
an insistence that current high standards
of equity and probity in the examination
process are maintained. E-assessment
(eg via e-portfolios) can provide the means
to empower teachers and schools, while
ensuring that high standards of
assessment are met. ICT can support the
whole process of teacher preparation, and
the establishment of procedures to ensure
comparability of standards across schools.
School-based judgements could be
moderated by external computer-based
tests. E-assessment can extend the range
of reliable assessments that can be
36
SECTION 4
OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
FOR E-ASSESSMENT

conducted, and so can widen the debate on
curriculum and assessment design. On-
demand testing will have considerable
implications for curriculum planning.
Students could take summative tests at
different times, and could progress
through the curriculum at different rates.
E-assessment could reduce the damage
caused by current tests. At present, new
SAT papers are created each year, and all
students answer the same questions. If the
purpose of testing is to establish the
performance of some system (such as a
school or an LEA), better methods could
be employed. If there were a large bank of
tasks available in electronic form, and
different students received a different set
of tasks, then coverage of the curriculum
could be better, and there would be no
need to report individual student scores.
This would have the advantage that a
larger variety of task types could be used,
and would avoid the current distortions
caused by teachers ‘teaching to the SAT’.
4.3 EVOLUTION AND REVOLUTION
Even where there is a shared vision on
future curricula, there can be considerable
problems in implementation. Ridgway
(1998) draws analogies between ecological
restoration and educational change, and
describes the sorts of research needed for
successful change. This style is close to
research in fast-changing fields such as
electronics, where discoveries and
inventions drive practice and theory, in
contrast to well-established fields where
theory can lead practice. It is important to
be aware that some goals are easy to
achieve from most starting points, whilst
others need a good deal of capacity
building before they can be reached. It
will be important to phase the introduction
of e-assessment in such a way that the
load on students, teachers, schools
and systems is lower than the current
assessment load. Some barriers are
discussed below.
Establishing the credibility of
e-assessment: in some areas such as
competency-based assessment, the case
for e-assessment is self-evident. In other
areas, reasonable sceptics will have to be
convinced of its value. They will have
concerns about the construct validity of
new tests (exactly what do they measure?);
the reliability of new tests in comparison
with existing tests; and the educational
standards required – both in relation to
current tests, and across tests such as
those given ‘on-demand’ in different places
and at different times. Each of these
questions will need to be addressed for
each family of e-assessments, usually
by means of an empirical study.
Building system capacity: there is an
urgent need to build capacity for e-
assessment that ranges from test design,
test delivery and processing, and expertise
in school. Each of these is problematic.
Task and test design: very few people have
expertise in creating e-assessments, in
comparison to the large numbers of
people competent to create conventional
tests. There is an urgent need to create
new task types and to explore their
reliability and validity. If we do not continue
to explore, students will be faced with a set
of tasks which recently were innovative,
but which are now hackneyed.
37
e-assessment
could reduce the
damage caused
by current tests

Establishing technical standards:
currently, there are three sets of technical
standards. We need a consensus
document. The needs of students with
special needs must be addressed.
Standards for monitoring the quality of the
assessments given in schools (actually a
rather hostile environment for ICT,
because of the plethora of machines and
operating systems), and the procedures
put in place by examination authorities
need to be written, and validated in
practical settings.
ICT infrastructure: good broadband
systems are needed – in particular, very
high specification systems are needed for
big schools. Currently, about 40% of
primary schools, and about 100% of
secondary schools have broadband access,
but not necessarily at the levels needed for
online assessment (Rt Hon Charles Clarke
MP 2004). The proposals set out in the
Tomlinson Report are only feasible if a
national database of student achievement
is established. At school level, extensive
investment in ICT will be needed, and
costs will recur.
The examination process: dealing with
e-assessment poses serious challenges
to paper-based examination authorities.
They need to develop a robust technology
infrastructure, and (at least as important)
the competencies of staff to make these
systems function effectively. A good start
has been made here, for example in the
work on the assessment of basic and key
skills. However, there are salutary
messages from the QCA Report on
implementation (QCA 2004). AQA report
(Adams and Hudson 2004) that their
surveys show considerable satisfaction
from examiners. Examiners report that the
software is easy to use; they like the
increased accuracy and validation at input,
and the auto-totalling of marks by the
computer, and the electronic management
of reporting and discrepancies.
On examiners and examining: High quality
training is an essential aspect of reliable
assessment. Tomlinson recommends
(paras 134–136) “a thorough
professionalisation of the role of markers
and examiners, including coursework
markers”, and the Report makes a number
of specific recommendations on how this
might be institutionalised via schemes for
professional development, accreditation,
and appropriate professional reward
systems. The Secondary Heads
Associations have argued for the
establishment of ‘Chartered Examiners’ in
schools and colleges, who would give their
organisations the right to take more
control over examination assessment.
School and test-centre expertise:
this presents a massive challenge for
professional development. Schools need
to develop systems which are robust.
Plagiarism: poses a major threat to all
assessment systems (eg Ridgway and
Smith 2004). These threats range from
downloading work direct from the internet,
commissioning work, and impersonation.
Assessment systems will need to be
resistant to such attacks.
Equity issues: it is important that
e-assessment does not create a ‘digital
divide’ which privileges some students
over others on the basis of opportunities
of access.
38
it is
important that
e-assessment
does not create
a ‘digital divide’
SECTION 4
OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
FOR E-ASSESSMENT

4.4 RELIABLE TEACHER
ASSESSMENT VIA E-PORTFOLIOS
A key decision for educational systems is
to decide exactly how much of the
students’ time should be devoted to
working on extended projects, and how
much should be based on shorter
activities. A related decision is the balance
to be struck between portfolio systems
assessed in school, and timed external
assessments. A key issue is to establish
robust and reliable systems of school-
based assessment. It is worth highlighting
the extreme positions that different
systems use. In some systems, all
assessment is done externally. In some
systems – for example Queensland,
Australia - all assessment is school-
based. Queensland provides extensive
systems for training teachers, and for
moderating their judgements. ICT can
facilitate this process. All student
submissions can be put onto the web,
and systems of cross-moderation can be
established. Externally defined tests can
be used to guide the moderation process.
4.5 DUMBING-DOWN ASSESSMENT
There is a danger that considerations of
cost and ease of assessment will lead to
the introduction of ‘cheap’ assessment
systems which prove to be very expensive
in terms of the damage they do to
students’ educational experiences. At the
time of writing, this seems most unlikely in
the UK. QCA have funded some innovative
e-assessment developments at investment
levels beyond the reach of most companies,
and have a large group focused on
developing and sharing expertise in
e-assessment (www.qca.org.uk).
4.6 SUMMARY OF SECTION 4
New educational goals continue to
emerge, and the process of critical
reflection on what is important to learn,
and how this might be assessed
authentically needs to be institutionalised
into curriculum planning. In this section,
we explore ways to assess metacognition,
group projects, creativity and
communication skills. E-assessment is
certain to play a major role in defining and
implementing curriculum change in the
UK. There is a strong government
commitment to e-assessment, and good
initial progress has been made. Major
challenges of ‘going to scale’ have yet to
be faced. A good deal of innovative work is
needed, coupled with a grounded approach
to system-wide implementation.
39
e-assessment
is certain to play
a major role in
defining and
implementing
curriculum
change in the UK

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
We wish to thank a number of people who
have commented constructively on this
document, in particular Keri Facer, Annika
Small, Jeremy Tafler, and Kathleen
Tattersall. We are grateful to them for their
input. All the faults and errors of omission
are our own.
GLOSSARY
Adaptive testing a sequential form of
individual testing in which successive
items in the test are chosen based
primarily on the psychometric properties
and content of the items, and the
participant’s response to previous items
A-level (AS/A2) General Certificate of
Education (GCE) Advanced Level. Study
usually consists of a two-year academic
course and students will usually select two
or three subjects from subjects studied at
AS-levels to continue to A-level (called A2)
Anchor(s) a sample of student work that
exemplifies a specific level of performance.
Markers use anchors to score student
work, usually comparing the student
performance to the anchor
AQA an awarding body: Assessment and
Qualifications Alliance formed from the
merger of Associated Examining Board
(AEB) and the Northern Examinations and
Assessment Board (NEAB) in 2000
AS-levels General Certificate of Advanced
Supplementary Level, considered to be the
equivalent of half an A-level. Young people
are now expected to study four AS-levels
during Year 12 at school or college
Assessment any systematic method of
obtaining evidence from tests,
examinations, questionnaires, surveys and
collateral sources used to draw inferences
about characteristics of people, objects or
programs for a specific purpose
Basic skills the ability to read, write and
speak in English and use mathematics at a
level necessary to function and progress at
work and society in general
CAS Computer Algebra System. Software
package used for the manipulation of
mathematical formulae. Automates
tedious and sometimes difficult algebraic
manipulation tasks. Systems vary and may
include facilities for graphing equations or
provide a programming language for the
user to define their own procedures
City and Guilds major awarding body for
vocational qualifications in the UK
Competency-based assessment
assessment process based on the
collection of evidence on which judgments
are made concerning progress towards
satisfaction of standard performance
criteria
Concept map the arrangement of ideas
into a visual layout highlighting
connections between associated ideas,
revealing the structural pattern in the
information
Criterion referenced assessment
assessment linked to predefined
standards. (eg ‘Can swim 25 metres in a
swimming pool’)
CSE Certificate of Secondary Education:
former system of British examinations
taken in a range of subjects, usually at the
age of 16
Diagnostic testing testing used to identify
the conceptions and misconceptions with a
view to providing appropriate remedial
experiences
40
GLOSSARY

Discrimination the ability to distinguish
between and among different levels of
work or achievement
E-assessment electronic assessment:
processes involving the implementation of
ICT for the recording, transmission,
presentation and processing of
assessment material
Edexcel UK examining and awarding body
providing a range of qualifications
including at higher education level
EiC Excellence in Cities. Government
initiative aimed at raising the educational
aspirations and attainment of children in
inner cities
European Computer Driving Licence
European-wide qualification allowing
candidates to demonstrate competence in
computer skills, covering the areas of
basic concepts of IT, using the computer
and managing files, word processing,
spreadsheets, database, presentation and
information, and communication
Formative assessment often called
assessment for learning. Assessment used
to support teaching and learning, which
identifies strengths and weaknesses of the
student
GCE General Certificate of Education
GCSE General Certificate of Secondary
Education (GCSE). The main secondary
school examinations usually at 16, which
replaced previous system GCE O-levels
and CSEs
GIS Geographic Information System.
System of software used for the storage,
retrieval, mapping and analysis of spatial
data, such as mortality by different regions
GNVQ General National Vocational
Qualification. Vocational qualification, often
taken as an alternative to GCSE or A-
levels, usually after compulsory schooling.
Available at three levels; Foundation,
Intermediate, and Advanced
High-stakes assessment assessment that
has important consequences or
implications for students, staff or schools
ICT Information and Communications
Technology
Key sills a group of skills valued by
employers as being central to all work and
learning, including communication,
information technology, application of
numbers, working with others, and
improving own learning and performance
Key Stages the four stages of the National
Curriculum: KS1 for pupils aged 5-7; KS2
for 7-11; KS3 for 11-14; KS4 for 14-16
NVQ National Vocational Qualifications.
Work-based vocational qualifications. They
are portfolio-based qualifications which
show skills, knowledge and ability in
specific work areas. Can be taken at five
levels, depending on level of expertise and
responsibility of the job
O-level also GCE Ordinary level. Former
system of British examinations taken in a
range of subjects, usually at the age of 16.
Ran in parallel with but at a higher level
than CSE. Both systems now replaced by
current GCSE
Parallel forms tests that are created to
measure the same constructs, and to
produce the same scores, if they were
given to individuals on different occasions
PDA Personal Digital Assistant; a small
hand-held computer. Depending on level of
sophistication may allow e-mail, word
processing, music playback, internet
access, digital photography or GPS
reception
41

Pedagogy philosophy of approach to
schooling, learning, and teaching including
what is taught, how teaching occurs, and
how learning occurs
Portfolio a representative collection of a
candidate’s work, which is used to
demonstrate or exemplify either that a
range of criteria has been met, or to
showcase the very best that a candidate is
capable of
Portfolio assessment assessment based
on judgment made about the work shown
as evidence within a portfolio
Predictive validity the extent to which
scores on a test predict some future
performance. For example, a student’s
GSCE grade can be used to predict their
likely A-level grade – in some subjects, the
prediction is better than in other subjects
QCA UK public body, sponsored by the
Department for Education and Skills
(DfES). Roles include the maintenance and
development of the national curriculum
and associated assessments, tests and
examinations
Reliability reliability in measurement and
testing is a measure of the accuracy of the
score achieved, with respect to the
likelihood that the score would be constant
if the test were re-taken or the same
performance were re-scored by another
marker, or if another test from a test bank
of ostensibly equivalent items is used
Summative assessment assessment used
to measure performance, usually at the
end of a course of study
TIMSS Trends in International
Mathematics and Science Study, formerly
Third International Mathematics and
Science Study. Comprehensive study
offering data on students’ mathematics
and science achievement from an
international perspective. Data from 1995,
1999, and 2003
UCLES University of Cambridge Local
Examinations Syndicate, comprising three
business units: Cambridge ESOL (English
for Speakers of Other Languages),
providing examinations in English as a
foreign language and qualifications for
language teachers; CIE (University of
Cambridge International Examinations),
providing international school
examinations and international vocational
awards; and OCR (Oxford, Cambridge and
RSA Examinations), providing general and
vocational qualification
Validity the appropriateness of the
interpretation and use of the results for
any assessment procedure
Value added the increase in learning that
occurs during a course of education.
Based either on the gains of an individual
or a group of students. Requires a baseline
measurement for comparison
42
GLOSSARY

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45

APPENDIX:
FUNDAMENTALS OF ASSESSMENT
How shall they be judged?
Here we consider some of the criteria
against which tests and testing systems
can be judged.
Validity and reliability are often written
about as if they were separate things.
Actually, they are intimately entwined, but
it is worth starting with two simple
definitions: validity is concerned with the
nature of what is being measured, while
reliability is concerned with the quality of
the measurement instrument.
A loose set of criteria can be set out under
the heading of educational validity
(Frederikson and Collins (1989) use the
term ‘systemic validity’). Educational
validity encompasses a number of aspects
which are set out below.
Consequential validity: refers to the
effects that assessment has on the
educational system (Ridgway and Passey
(1993) use ‘generative validity’). Messick
(1995) argues that consequential validity is
probably the most important criteria on
which to judge an assessment system. For
example, high-stakes testing regimes
which focus exclusively on timed multiple
choice items in a narrow domain can
produce severe distortions of the
educational process, including rewarding
both students and teachers for cheating.
Klein, Hamilton, McCaffrey and Stecher
(2000), and Koretz and Barron (1998)
provide examples where scores on high-
stakes State tests rise dramatically over a
four-year period, while national tests taken
by the same students, which measure the
same constructs, show little change.
Construct validity: refers to the extent to
which a test measures what it purports to
measure. There is a need for a clear
description of the whole topic area (the
domain definition) covered by the test.
There is a need for a clear statement of
the design of the test (the test blueprint),
with examples in the form of tasks and
sample tests. Construct validity requires
supporting evidence on the match between
the domain definition and the test.
Construct validity can be approached in a
number of ways. It is important to check on:
• content validity: are items fully
representative of the topic being
measured?
• convergent validity: given the domain
definition, are constructs which should
be related to each other actually
observed to be related to each other?
• discriminant validity: given the domain
definition, are constructs which should
not be related to each other actually
observed to be unrelated?
• concurrent validity: does the test
correlate highly with other tests which
supposedly measure the same things?
The essential idea about reliability is that
test scores should be a lot better than
random numbers. Test situations have lots
of reliabilities. The over-arching question
concerning reliability is: if we could test
identical students on different occasions
using the same tests, would we get the
same results?
Take the measurement of student height
as an example. The concept is easy to
define; we have good reason to believe
that ‘height’ can be measured on a single
dimension (contrast this with ‘athletic
ability’, or ‘creativity’ where a number
of different components need to be
considered). However, the accurate
measurement of height needs care.
46
APPENDIX:
FUNDAMENTALS OF ASSESSMENT

Height is affected by the circumstances of
measurement – students should take off
their shoes and hats, and should not
slump when they are measured. The
measuring instrument is important – a
yard stick will provide a crude estimate,
good for identifying students who are
exceptionally short or exceptionally tall,
but not capable of fine discriminations
between students; using a tape measure is
likely to lead to more measurement error
than using a fixed vertical ruler with a bar
which rests on each student’s head. Time
of day should be considered (people are
taller in the morning); so should the time
between measurements. If we assess the
reliability of measurement by comparing
measurements on successive occasions,
we will under-estimate reliability if the
measures are taken too far apart, and
students grow different amounts in the
intervening period.
Exploration of reliability raises a set of
finer-grained questions. Here are some
examples:
• is the phenomenon of being measured
relatively stable? What inherent
variation do we expect? (mood is likely
to be less stable than vocabulary size)
• to what extent do different markers
assign the same marks as each other to
a set of student responses?
• do students of equal ability get the
same marks no matter which version of
the test they take?
Fitness for purpose: the quality of any
design can be judged in terms of its
‘fitness for purpose’. Tests are designed
for a variety of purposes, and so the
criteria for judging a particular test will
shift as a function of its intended purpose;
the same test may be well suited to one
purpose and ill suited to another.
Usability: people using an assessment
system – notably students and teachers –
need to understand and be sympathetic to
its purposes.
Practicality: few designers work in arenas
where cost is irrelevant. In educational
settings, a major restriction on design is
the total cost of the assessment system.
The key principle here is that test
administration and scoring must be
manageable within existing financial
resources, and should be cost-effective in
the context of the education of students.
Equity: equity issues must be addressed -
inequitable tests are (by definition) unfair,
illegal, and can have negative social
consequences.
47

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