Towards a philosophy for educational assessment 1 2

Research in Hospitality Management, 2013

Conceptions of education Every educational programme can be considered to be an operationalisation of a particular educational philosophy. Using the main areas of philosophy as a framework, we could say that the educational philosophy consists of particular ideas about knowledge and knowing (epistemology), the nature of being (ontology), acting (ethics), reasoning (logic), and the supernatural (metaphysics). In this paper only the first of these five areas will be more closely examined. While epistemology is often defined as covering both the nature of knowledge as well as the nature of knowing (Hofer and Pintrich, 1997; Hofer, 2000), we prefer to split the two parts. Our definition of epistemology will be restricted to the first part, which concerns a subject's conceptions of knowledge. The second part, on the nature and process of knowing, will be categorised as conceptions of learning. Both sets of conceptions are supplemented by two further sets of conceptions, about instruction and assessment, together creating what we identify as a conception of education (see Figure 1). We further assume that all conceptions of education are located on a continuum ranging from a traditional to a constructivist orientation toward education (Samuelowicz and Bain, 2002). Some indicators for each of these two broad orientations are included in Figure 1. The success of a particular conception of education as propagated by a particular institution will depend on the successful implementation of its principles and policies. Implementation in turn will depend on the acceptance and actions by staff and students. We hypothesise that if the institutional and individual conceptions of education are in alignment, improved performance will be realised. Beside the match between the conceptions of education held by the institution on one side and by the students and instructors involved on the other, we are also interested in the internal structure of the four constituent parts of a subject's conception of education. More specifically, we like to find out whether someone can have a traditional conception of knowledge while at the same time embracing a constructivist view on assessment. Is the orientation on all four subsets of conceptions independent of or dependent on each other? First, the different sets of conceptions will be explained, starting with conceptions of assessment. Conceptions of assessment Conceptions of assessment have to do with the format,

1991

This paper is intended to raise questions and identify some of the problems posed by assessment within an educational setting. The principal aim is to offer a springboard for discussion, rather than to propose a specific plan of action. It is also worth stressing that assessment designates more than just examinations (public or otherwise). As teachers and educators, we are constantly making assessments of our students, passing official, unofficial, conscious and unconscious judgements. These are judgements which inevitably influence our attitudes to our jobs, our performance and our teaching or administrative styles. They also have wide-ranging repercussions on the attitudes, performances and future of our students. They are judgements based on a complex series of assumptions which we habitually make about, for instance, what education involves, the nature of schooling, school structures and their aims, the learning process as it relates to human development. What follows is largely inspired by a desire to identify and scrutinize some of the most recurrent of these assumptions.

Measurement: Interdisciplinary Research & Perspective, 2003

2001). The committee issuing this report was charged with synthesizing advances in the cognitive sciences and measurement, and exploring their implications for improving educational assessment. The article opens with a vision for the future of educational assessment that represents a significant departure from the types of assessments typically available today, and from the ways in which such assessments are most commonly used. This vision is driven by an interpretation of what is both necessary and possible for educational assessment to positively impact student achievement. The argument is made that realizing this vision requires a fundamental rethinking of the foundations and principles guiding assessment design and use. These foundations and principles and their implications are then summarized in the remainder of the article. The argument is made that every assessment, regardless of its purpose, rests on three pillars: (1) a model of how students represent knowledge and develop competence in the subject domain, (2) tasks or situations that allow one to observe students' performance, and (3) interpretation methods for drawing inferences from the performance evidence collected. These three elements-cognition, observation, and interpretation-must be explicitly connected and designed as a coordinated whole. Section II summarizes research and theory on thinking and learning which should serve as the source of the cognition element of the assessment triangle. This large body of research suggests aspects of student achievement that one would want to make inferences about, and the types of observations, or tasks, that will provide evidence to support those inferences. Also described are significant advances in methods of educational measurement that make new approaches to assessment feasible. The argument is presented that measurement models, which are statistical exam-ples of the interpretation element of the assessment triangle, are cuuently available to support the kinds of inferences about student achievement that cognitive science suggests are important to pursue. Section III describes how the contemporary understanding of cognition and methods of measurement jointly provide a set of principles and methods for guiding the processes of assessment design and use. This section explores how the scientific foundations presented in Section II play out in the design of real assessment situations ranging from classroom to large-scale testing contexts. It also considers the role of technology in enhancing assessment design and use. Section IV presents a discussion of the research, development, policy, and practice issues that must be addressed for the field of assessment to move forward and achieve the vision described in Section I.

Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy & Practice, 2017

Educational assessments define what aspects of learning will formally be given credit and therefore have a huge impact upon teaching and learning. Although the impact of high-stakes national and international assessments on teaching and learning is considered in the literature, remarkably, there is little research on the connection between theories of learning and educational assessments. Given the voluminous assessment that takes place annually in systematic ways in most many nations, it is surprising that more has not been gained from these assessments in the development of theories of learning and vice versa. In this article we consider both theories of learning and assessment and draw the main message of the article, that if assessments are to serve the goals of education, then theories of learning and assessment should be developing more closely with each other. We consider fundamental aspects of assessment theory, such as constructs, unidimensionality, invariance and quantifiability, and in doing so, we distinguish between educational and psychological assessment. Second, we show how less traditionally considered cases of a) international assessments and b) Assessment for Learning affect student learning. Through these cases we illustrate the otherwise somewhat theoretical discussion in the article. We argue that if assessment is to serve the learning goals of education, then this discussion on the relationship between assessment and learning should be developed further and be at the forefront of high-stakes, large-scale educational assessments.

Critical Quarterly, 2000

Journal of Philosophy of Education, 2012

It is sometimes said that there has been a 'paradigm shift' in the field of assessment over the last two or three decades: a new preoccupation with what learners can do, what they know or what they have achieved. It is suggested in this article that this change has precipitated a need to distinguish two conceptually and logically distinct methodological approaches to assessment that have hitherto gone unacknowledged. The upshot, it is argued, is that there appears to be a fundamental confusion at the heart of current policy, a confusion occasioned by the demand to know what learners know and compounded by a failure to recognise what this properly entails for assessment methodology.

2004

Assessment in Education: Principles, Policy & Practice, 2004

The completion of the first ten years of this journal is an occasion for review and reflection. The main issues that have been addressed over the ten years are summarized in four main sections: Purposes, International Trends, Quality Concerns and Assessment for Learning. Each of these illustrates the underlying significance of the themes of principles, policy and practice, which the journal highlights in its subtitle. The many contributions to these themes that the journal has published illustrate the diversity and complex interactions of the issues. They also illustrate that, across the world, political and public pressures have had the effect of enhancing the dominance of assessment so that the decade has seen a hardening, rather than any resolution, of its many negative effects on society. A closing section looks ahead, arguing that there is a move to rethink more radically the practices and priorities of assessment if it is to respond to human needs rather than to frustrate them.

Teaching in Higher Education, 2008

Over the past few decades assessment has been heralded for its key role in the improvement of teaching and learning. However, more recently there have been expressions of uncertainty about whether assessment is in fact delivering on its promised potential. Against this backdrop of uncertainty and circumspection this paper offers a critical reflection on higher education assessment discourses with a particular focus on the discourse of criterion referenced assessment. The central argument is that while the social constructivist perspective has significantly illuminated our understanding of assessment, inadvertently the very object of assessment Á knowledge Á has been eclipsed. I propose that a fruitful way forward for our assessment practices is the centring of disciplinary forms of knowledge as an explicit component of the object of our assessment. Drawing on sociologists of education Á Basil Bernstein and Karl Maton Á I stake out some of the theoretical ground for reconceptualising the relationship between knowledge and assessment.

Educational Measurement: Issues and Practice, 2020

Professor Gordon argues for a significant reorientation in the focus and impact of assessment in education. For the types of assessment activities that he advocates to prosper and positively impact education, serious attention must be paid to two important topics: (1) the conceptual underpinnings of the assessment practices we develop and use to support learning and instruction, and ( ) the arguments and evidence we establish for their validity given the intended interpretive use. Such a focus highlights fundamental concepts that have long existed in the broader assessment literature -carefully defining and operationalizing our constructs and then validating the assessments of those constructs. What differs now are the conceptual frameworks, briefly outlined here, that can and must be used to guide both aspects of such work.