Assessment Validation and You: Steps to Validate Assessments

Assessment Validation and You: Steps to Validate Assessments

Blog Article

After gaining registration, RTOs need to monitor several aspects including annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and marketing compliance, with validation being a major concern.

While we've discussed validation in multiple articles, let's return to the basics. ASQA defines validation as a quality check of the assessment process.

Essentially, validation is about identifying which parts of an RTO's assessment process are effective and which need improvement. With a proper grasp of its key aspects, validation becomes less daunting.

As per Clause 1.8 of the SRTOs 2015, RTOs are required to ensure that their assessment systems, including RPL, meet training package requirements and are conducted following the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

The standards require RTOs to perform two types of validation.

The first validation type ensures your RTO's assessments comply with the training package requirements in your scope.

The second validation type ensures that assessments adhere to the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.

This means we validate assessments both before and after they are conducted. This article will cover the first type—assessment tool validation.

The Basics of the Two Types of Assessment Validation

Assessment Validation: What It Is

As mentioned earlier and in our earlier blog entries, validation is divided into two parts: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.

Pre-assessment validation or verification, also known as assessment tool validation, relates to the first part of the clause, ensuring all unit requirements are met and workbooks are 100% compliant.

Conversely, post-assessment validation focuses on the implementation side, ensuring Registered Training Organisations conduct assessments in line with the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

In this write-up, we will focus on assessment tool validation.

Procedure for Assessment Tool Validation

After reviewing the two types of validation, let’s explore the specifics of assessment tool validation.

Best Times to Conduct Assessment Tool Validation

Assessment tool validation seeks to ensure all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are addressed by your assessment tools.

This means that whenever new learning resources are acquired, you must perform assessment tool validation before student use.

You don’t need to wait until the next scheduled validation in your 5-year cycle. Immediately validate new resources to ensure they’re ready for student use.

Still, this isn't the sole reason for conducting this type of validation. Conduct assessment tool validation when you:

- you update resources
- new training products are added on scope
- your course includes training product updates
- you identify your learning resources as a risk during your risk assessment

The Australian Skills Quality Authority's risk-based approach to regulation means RTOs must conduct regular risk assessments. Complaints from students about learning resources signal the need for assessment tool validation.

How to Choose Training Products for Validation

Remember, this validation aims to ensure all learning resources are compliant before use. All RTOs are expected to validate all unit resources.

Assessment Tool Validation: Required Resources

Educational Materials

For validating your assessment tools, you will need the full array of your learning resources:

Mapping tool – this should be the first document to examine. It shows which assessment items correspond to unit requirements, facilitating quicker validation.

Learner/student workbook – ensure it's appropriate as an assessment tool. Check if the instructions are clear and answer fields are adequate. This is a frequent issue.

Assessor guide/marking guide – ensure sufficient instructions for assessors and clear benchmarks for each assessment item. Clear benchmarks are vital for reliable assessment outcomes.

Other related resources – might include checklists, registers, and templates created apart from the workbook and marking guide. Validate them to ensure they fit the assessment task and address unit requirements.

Assessment Validation Team

Clause 1.11 specifies the requirements for validation panel members. It states validation can be performed by one or more people. However, RTOs usually require all trainers and assessors to participate, sometimes including industry experts.

Your validation panel, as a group, must possess:

Vocational competencies and industry skills pertinent to the unit being validated

Recent expertise and skills in vocational teaching and learning

Any one of the following training and assessment qualifications:

TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or its updated version

Assessment validation form/template
Having a validation tool helps you with both the validation process and documentation. Using a validation tool makes it easier to look at how each assessment item maps against each unit requirement.
A validation tool assists with the validation process and documentation. It makes it easier to view how each assessment item aligns with each unit requirement.
At the same time, it can serve as your document evidence that you have validated your resources before letting the students use them.
It also acts as evidence that you have validated your resources prior to student use.

While ASQA does not recommend or require a specific template for assessment tool validation, numerous templates are available online. These tools generally require validators to examine the tools as a whole to see if they meet the principles of assessment.

Principles of Assessment Form Yes/No/Partially Comments
1. Fair
2. Flexible
3. Valid
4. Reliable

While templates of this kind simplify validation, they can introduce judgment errors due to a lack of space for comments on each assessment item.

It is highly advisable to use a more detailed template for evaluating each unit requirement and its corresponding assessment items. Below is an example:

Element Performance Criteria Instructions for Assessment Benchmarks Assessment Tools Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What Needs Review?

As we explained in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, it’s vital that your assessment tools enable trainers to follow assessment principles and evidence rules.

Assessment Core Principles
Fairness – Does the assessment ensure equal opportunity and access for everyone?

Flexibility – Does the assessment provide different options to demonstrate competence according to individual needs and preferences?

Validity – Does the assessment measure what it is supposed to measure? Is it a valid tool for evaluating the required skill or knowledge?

Reliability – Will the assessment give the same results every time, regardless of the trainer? Will different assessors make the same decision on skill competence?

Evidence Core Rules

Validity – Is the evidence demonstrating that the candidate has the skills, knowledge, and attributes described in the unit of competency and associated assessment requirements?
Sufficiency – Is there enough evidence to ensure that the learner has the skills and knowledge required?
Sufficiency – Is the evidence enough to ensure the learner has the required skills and knowledge?

Authenticity – Is the assessment tool verifying that the work belongs to the candidate?

Currency – Are the assessment tools based on current units of competency and up-to-date industry practices?

Despite being frequently covered in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, many tools still have issues with these requirements.

To avoid using learning resources that do not address all unit requirements, ensure you follow these guidelines:

Follow Through with Actions

Focus on the verbs used in the unit requirements and make sure they are addressed by the assessment item. For example, in the unit CHCECE032 Nurture babies and toddlers, one performance evidence requirement requires students to:

Perform each of the following tasks at least once with two different babies under 12 months old in a safe environment, using age-appropriate verbal and non-verbal communication per service and regulatory requirements:

nappying

prepare bottles, bottle feed infants, and clean equipment

solid food prep and feeding infants

respond to infant signs and cues appropriately

prepare infants for sleep and settle them

monitor and promote physical exploration and gross motor skills suitable for the age

Having students explain the process of nappy changing for babies under 12 months doesn’t meet the unit requirement. Unless it’s meant to assess underpinning knowledge (i.e., knowledge evidence), students should be doing the tasks.

Be Mindful of Plurals!
Pay attention to the numbers. In our example on one of the unit requirements of CHCECE032, this single unit requirement calls for the students to complete here the tasks at least once on two different babies under 12 months of age. Having students complete the tasks listed twice on just 1 baby won’t cut it.
Pay attention to the numbers. In our CHCECE032 example, one unit requirement requires students to complete the tasks at least once with two different babies under 12 months old. Doing the tasks twice with one baby isn’t enough.

All or Nothing

Pay attention to lists. As noted earlier, if students perform only half the tasks listed, it’s non-compliant. Each assessment item must address all requirements, or the student is not yet competent and the assessment tool is non-compliant.
Can you be more specific?
Can You Clarify Further?

Each assessment item should have clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on the student’s competence. Therefore, it’s important that your instructions do not confuse students or assessors. For instance:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What details can be included in a work package?

Possible answers could include:

Needed materials

Corresponding costs

Length of activities

Appointed duties and responsibilities

If an assessment item demands multiple answers, specify how many answers a student must provide. This ensures your assessment is reliable, and the evidence gathered is valid.

The same applies to assessment items with double-barrelled questions or those that ask for multiple answers simultaneously. Such questions can confuse both students and assessors, as illustrated in the example below:

Identify a hazard and/or environmental concern in the work area and select the most effective hazard control hierarchy.

Answers may include, but are not limited to:

Weather conditions – isolation of the work area, engineering, personal protective equipment

Work area and ground conditions – eliminating hazards, isolation, use of engineering controls

People – isolation, engineering, administrative controls

Structural hazards – substitution, isolation, engineering

Chemical hazards – isolating, use of engineering controls, administrative controls

Equipment or machinery – isolating, use of engineering controls, administrative controls

Avoiding double-barrelled questions makes it easier for students to answer and for assessors to judge competence accurately.

Seeing these requirements, you might think, “Don’t learning resource developers offer audit guarantees?” However, with such guarantees, you must wait for an audit to rectify noncompliance. This affects your compliance history, so it’s better to take a safe and compliant route.