Report 1: Harnessing eAssessment
The first seminar I attended at yesterday’s Learning Technologies 2009 Exhibition was from Pearson Vue, on ‘Harnessing eAssessment’.
Their basis on eAssessment centres around computer-based training, and the example they loved to use is the fact that Pearson Vue manage, and helped develop, the DVLA’s computer-based driving theory test and test centres.
This is not the kind of eAssessment I was hoping for. In fact, the whole seminar and exhibition was not quite what I was expecting. There were few speakers or exhibitors who had even contemplated the academic world when thinking about ‘learning technologies’.
Anyway, back to the seminar. While the majority of the seminar wasn’t applicable to an academic view-point, there were elements that I could take away with me; like the differences between diagnostic, formative, and summative assessment, as well as the advantages of computer ‘adaptive’ training and the impact of security in the test. I will try and cover these below:
Computer-based Training
Can often be though about in the following way:
Providing the reasoning behind the CBT is ‘fit for purpose’ the CBT should work. This fails when the test, or approach to the test, does not match the intended outcome.
Computer-adaptive Training
This is a really good emergent technology, and one which is not currently is use in the UK (please let me know if I’m wrong on that fact). This is where the test is modified as the student is already taking the test; the next question is relative to the student’s knowledge. Therefore, if the student gets question 1 right they get a harder question. When they get one wrong the next question is easier, so the test is able to find the right ‘level’ for each individual student.
Security
How do we/you ensure the person taking the eAssessment is the person who should be taking it? There are various methods of candidate identification that range from simple to extreme (and fairly intrusive). At the extreme is biometric scanning (including behavioural, physiological, keystroke, signature and voice recognition). Through managing the ‘content exposure’ to ensure integrity of the assessment questions and fraud-prevention, the natural (and recommended) action is to continue with detection and ultimately prosecution of individuals who abuse the system.
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