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The week of October 28, 2012 Kristi had some very good question about our project. I was able to give some good examples and explanations to her that made her say in one of her subject lines, “Rhonda has rocked my world this week”. I felt that these different threads are a good example of how I work as a team player. I only left in the parts of the thread I felt were relevant to my jury. Some of them are not mine as you can see by the author.

 

Thread:

Test items: if I can't tell the difference between 80 and 90% proficiency, how do I set criteria?

Post:

Test items: if I can't tell the difference between 80 and 90% proficiency, how do I set criteria?

Author:

Kristi Holsinger

Posted Date:

October 30, 2012 4:04 PM

Hi Team,

Dave has mentioned multiple times that on our objectives, if we can't determine the difference between 80% and 90%, why are we using that criteria? I absolutely understand his rationale, and I can absolutely hear my trainees voicing their concerns with this kind of evaluation. I just don't know how to fix it!

Here's an objective I could use some help fixing:

Given an image of black, white, and green electrical wires, learners will explain how power reaches a light fixture with 80% accuracy.

Thanks for your help!

Kristi

 

Thread:

Test items: if I can't tell the difference between 80 and 90% proficiency, how do I set criteria?

Post:

specific number of examples in criterion?

Author:

Rhonda Schalk

Posted Date:

October 30, 2012 9:41 PM

Here's your objective: Given an image of black, white, and green electrical wires, learners will explain how power reaches a light fixture with 80% accuracy.
In trying to explain a fact objective in another post, I think I may have come up with a helpful idea. (Your call on whether it truly is helpful or not!) I used an assessment criterion of something like "with at least 3 examples". So, thinking of your instruction, you might give your learners 5 points of how the power reaches the light fixture. Then say that they need 4 out of the 5 points to say they've mastered the objective (thanks Micah for pointing that out!). Since I don't know how the power reaches a light fixture, I don't really know how many points they would need to make. It's magic! LOL

Does this make it more confusing????
Rhonda

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Thread:

Test items: if I can't tell the difference between 80 and 90% proficiency, how do I set criteria?

Post:

RE: specific number of examples in criterion?

Author:

Kristi Holsinger

Posted Date:

October 31, 2012 3:19 PM

Hi Rhonda,

That's great advice, thank you!!!

Kristi

 

Thread:

Test items: if I can't tell the difference between 80 and 90% proficiency, how do I set criteria?

Post:

How about . . . .

Author:

David Knowlton

Posted Date:

October 31, 2012 4:35 PM

I agree with Kristi that this objective does need some work.  I'm glad that Rhonda offered a potential solution.  How about something like this (keep in mind that I don't understand the content).

Uh . . .

Yeah, I'm struggling to fake my way through it because I don't know the content.  I'm trying to say something like this:

Given a blank piece of paper, the learner will explain how power reaches a light fixture that includes a consideration of the black, white, and green wires.

Does that help?

Maybe your "explanation" doesn't really fit Morrison's model.  Does he say that "explanation" is a valid test?  What does Morrison call that type of test question?  How does he say to assess it?  So, I just looked in the chapter on test items:  essay tests versus short answer tests, for instance.  Would declaring which type of test you think this is help you decide how to assess it?

Maybe you need to rethink the entire objective to multiple choice or true and false something:

Given five statements about the role of the black, white, and green wires in powering a light fixture, the learner will identify three of them as being true.

Dave

 

Thread:

Test items: if I can't tell the difference between 80 and 90% proficiency, how do I set criteria?

Post:

and labeling the test question...

Author:

Rhonda Schalk

Posted Date:

October 31, 2012 5:14 PM

If Kristi went with Dave's suggestion for her objective of: Given five statements about the role of the black, white, and green wires in powering a light fixture, the learner will identify three of them as being true.
Then, would her test question then be labeled: Objective test/multiple choice (or maybe true-false depending on how she actually worded the question/s)?
Rhonda

 

Thread:

Test items: if I can't tell the difference between 80 and 90% proficiency, how do I set criteria?

Post:

RE: Rhonda has rocked my world this week!

Author:

Kristi Holsinger

Posted Date:

October 31, 2012 7:12 PM

Hi Rhonda,

Thanks for all of your great ideas--truly can't thank you enough! This ties into one of my biggest projects after listening to Dave's MP3: labeling test questions.

Kristi

 

Thread:

Fact recall or concept application?

Post:

Fact recall or concept application?

Author:

Kristi Holsinger

Posted Date:

October 30, 2012 4:07 PM

Hi Everybody,

In labeling an objective, I just want to check and see if I have fixed this one correctly.

Objective: Given a diagram of an electric box, the learner will explain how to safely deactivate power to the home with 100% accuracy.

I had this listed as fact-recall, but I think it's concept application. Am I right?

Thanks,

Kristi

 

Thread:

Fact recall or concept application?

Post:

procedure application?

Author:

Rhonda Schalk

Posted Date:

October 30, 2012 4:56 PM

Hey Kristi,
I went back to the book to check out what it said. I think that your objective would be procedure application. The book says, "A procedure is a sequence of steps one follows to achieve a goal" (p. 126). So, isn't deactivating the power a sequence of steps? First you go to the power box, then you flip the switch, then you check to see if the outlet is getting power using the little checking thingy. Right? (Of course you would use the correct terminology)

The book said, "concepts are categories we use for simplifying the world." So I don't really think that this falls under that. Maybe if your objective was "Given a picture, the learner will be able to identify the circuit breaker box with 100% accuracy." then that would be concept-recall because they are identifying the box. I can't think of one for concept application right now, sorry.

I hope I'm not giving you false info and not confusing issues!
Rhonda

 

Thread:

Fact recall or concept application?

Post:

Fact-recall

Author:

Micah Day

Posted Date:

October 30, 2012 4:59 PM

 Hey Kristi,

It sounds to me that your original label was correct.  Within this objective, you are solely mentioning how to deactivate an electric box, correct?  If you were to have mentioned more than one box, then I could see you changing it to concept.   

Also, explaining how to deactivate the power, this sounds more so of a simple recall.  However, if there are multiple steps involved within this explanation, then I would say application may be a better fit within this objective classification.

Micah

 

Thread:

Fact recall or concept application?

Post:

not fact, I'm pretty sure

Author:

Rhonda Schalk

Posted Date:

October 30, 2012 9:29 PM

I'm pretty sure that Amber's objective isn't fact-recall. (You may have posted before you read my other reply, but I'm going to try to make my point again in a different manner anyway. :-)

Here's her objective: Given a diagram of an electric box, the learner will explain how to safely deactivate power to the home with 100% accuracy.
The book says, "A fact is a statement that associates one item with another" (p. 125). So if her objective were something like "Given a piece of paper and pencil, the learner will explain why the electricity needs to be deactivated prior to the repair naming at least 3 reasons." then it would be fact-recall, I think. I don't think this would be a concept because the book says that concepts are categories. My objective wouldn't be principles or rules, either because they are "relationships between concepts". Couldn't be procedure because those are steps. It's pretty obviously not interpersonal skills or attitude.

So, like I said in a previous post, I really think that her objective is procedure because it says "how to". I also think it's application because they are using the diagram to help explain it. Although I've been questioning myself about that part.
Rhonda

 

Thread:

Test items: include a description of the type of assessment question

Post:

Test items: include a description of the type of assessment question

Author:

Kristi Holsinger

Posted Date:

October 29, 2012 7:18 PM

Hi Everybody,

This is a follow-up question from last week. Dave asked "WHY" are we adding certain elements to our project, and there is one element that is still a mystery to me:

Do you understand WHY the rubric asks you for the test items to include a "description of the type of assessment question"? Do you understand how to do that?

I'm not clear on how to answer either of these questions.

Thanks for the help!

Kristi

 

Thread:

Test items: include a description of the type of assessment question

Post:

matching test to objective

Author:

Rhonda Schalk

Posted Date:

October 30, 2012 7:23 PM

I briefly went back to the examples on reserve and didn't really find answers in these. But I did find that chapter 12 answers these questions, kind of.

Kristi asked about Dave's questions: Do you understand WHY the rubric asks you for the test items to include a "description of the type of assessment question"? Do you understand how to do that?

I think the reason that Dave is wanting us to include the "description of the type of assessment question" is to make sure that we are really thinking about why we are using this type of question for our assessment. The book says this, "A direct relationship between instructional objectives and test items must exist. Thus, it is customary to derive test items directly from the objectives" (p. 302). So the verb of the objectives gives us the clue as to what type of assessment we need to apply.

Here is an objective from Kristi's project:

Given an image of black and white electrical wires, learners will explain how power reaches a light fixture with 100% accuracy.

  Task Analysis:  VI:D—E.3

  Principle: Concept application

 

The verb in this is "will explain". by looking at the examples on p. 302, it says, "To state or describe: writing or speaking a short or lengthy answer." For her labeling of her assessment, then she should be "Constructed-response" and her test question should be one of the following: short answer, essay, or problem solving.

 

Does this help, Kristi?

Rhonda

 

PS I now need to go back and make sure that my questions match in this manner! Ack, more work!!! :-)

 

Thread:

Test items: include a description of the type of assessment question

Post:

Good reference

Author:

Jami Trusty

Posted Date:

October 30, 2012 9:11 PM

Edited Date:

October 30, 2012 9:14 PM

Status:

Thanks Rhonda, this really helped me.  I was a little lost as to "the description of the assessment" myself.  Your explanation was very helpful - good reference back to the text.  I guess I will add this to my never-ending list!

Thanks.

Jami

 

Thread:

Test items: include a description of the type of assessment question

Post:

"Verb Implications" PP was at my side

Author:

Scott Esker

Posted Date:

October 31, 2012 8:17 AM

Status:

Rhonda,

Great reply! In addition to what the book says about labeling and designing an assessment, Dave has some great PP's that helped me out tremedously as I was desiging my documentation.

 

There is a PP called "Verb Implications" that guides a designer in choosing an assessment based on the verb that is used in the objective. The PP lists some common verbs in the objective then goes on to offers suggestions for the assessment type. In other words, it sort of offers a prescription of assessment based on the action verb used.

 

The "Verb Implications" PP can be found here (if the link doesn't work, try following the learning object for test items under week 5):

https://bb.siue.edu/bbcswebdav/courses/IT-510-701-201235/ISDOnline/ContentISD/Test%20Items/MatchToObjective.html

 

This had this PP at my side (literally, I had it open on my ipad) as I designed the assessments for my documentation.

 

Scott

 

Thread:

Test items: include a description of the type of assessment question

Post:

RE: matching test to objective

Author:

Kristi Holsinger

Posted Date:

October 31, 2012 3:20 PM

Hi Rhonda,

You're awesome! Thanks so much!

Kristi

 

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