Assessment Validation: A Comprehensive Guide to Validate Assessments

Assessment Validation: A Comprehensive Guide to Validate Assessments

Blog Article

RTOs have numerous responsibilities post-registration, including annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and ensuring marketing compliance. Among these tasks, validation often stands out as particularly challenging.

Despite our extensive coverage on validation, let's re-examine the term. ASQA states that validation is a quality check of the assessment process.

In essence, validation confirms which parts of an RTO's assessment process are correct and pinpoints elements for improvement. With a solid grasp of its key components, validation becomes manageable.

The SRTOs 2015 Clause 1.8 specifies that RTOs need to ensure compliance of their assessment systems, including RPL, with training package requirements, following the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

The standards necessitate conducting two types of validation.

The initial assessment validation ensures your RTO's assessments comply with the training package requirements.

The next validation type confirms assessments are conducted following the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.

Thus, validation is performed both prior to and following the assessment. The first type, assessment tool validation, is the focus here.

Understanding the Two Types of Assessment Validation

Unraveling Assessment Validation

As noted earlier and in previous blog posts, validation comprises two stages: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.

Assessment tool validation, often referred to as pre-assessment validation or verification, deals with ensuring all unit requirements are addressed as per the first part of the clause, ensuring complete workbook compliance.

On the implementation side, post-assessment validation ensures Registered Training Organisations conduct assessments according to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

We will dedicate this article to assessment tool validation.

Guidelines for Conducting Assessment Tool Validation

With a clear understanding of the two types of validation, let’s focus on assessment tool validation.

Ideal Times to Conduct Assessment Tool Validation

The purpose of assessment tool validation is to confirm that all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are met by your assessment tools.

Hence, whenever new learning resources are bought, assessment tool validation is necessary before student use.

There's no requirement to wait for your next 5-year cycle validation schedule. Validate new resources promptly to ensure they’re ready for students.

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

- resources get updated
- new training products are added to your scope
- course is reviewed against training product updates
- identify your learning resources as a risk during your risk assessment

The Australian Skills Quality Authority's risk-based approach means RTOs should carry out regular risk assessments. If students complain about learning resources, it's an ideal time for assessment tool validation.

Choosing 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.

What You Need for Assessment Tool Validation

Teaching Materials

To validate your assessment tools, you will need the complete set of your learning resources:

Mapping tool – the first document you should look at. It highlights which assessment items meet unit requirements, accelerating validation.

Learner/student workbook – check its suitability as an assessment tool during validation. Ensure instructions are clear and answer fields are sufficient. This is a common issue.

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

Other related resources – such as checklists, registers, and templates developed separately from the workbook and marking guide. Ensure they are suitable for the assessment task and address unit requirements.

Panel of Validators

Clause 1.11 outlines the requirements for validation panel members, noting that validation can be done by one or more people. Typically, RTOs require all trainers and assessors to attend and may invite industry experts.

As a whole, your validation panel must have:

Vocational competencies and industry skills relevant to the unit being validated

Recent knowledge and expertise in vocational teaching and learning

Any one of these training and assessment credentials:

TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or the equivalent successor

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 aids in both the validation process and documentation. It helps visualize how each assessment item meets 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.
Additionally, it can provide proof that you have validated your resources before students use them.

ASQA does not specify a recommended or required template for assessment tool validation, but many templates are accessible online. These tools usually have validators review the tools in their entirety to ensure they meet the principles of assessment.

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

While templates like these make validation easier, they also allow for judgment errors since there is little room for commenting on each assessment item.

We strongly recommend using a more detailed template to inspect each unit requirement and the assessment items that map to them. Here is an example:

Element Performance Criteria Assessment Guidelines Standards Assessment Instrument Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What Needs Inspection?

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

Key Principles of Assessment
Fairness – Does the assessment provide equal opportunity and access to all participants?

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

Validity – Does the assessment assess what it is intended to assess? Is it a valid tool for measuring the required skill or knowledge?

Reliability – Will the assessment yield the same results every time, no matter who conducts the training? Will different assessors make the same decision on skill competence?

Core Rules of Evidence

Validity – Does the evidence confirm that here 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 there sufficient evidence to confirm the learner has the required skills and knowledge?

Authenticity – Does the assessment tool verify that the work is the candidate’s own?

Currency – Do the assessment tools correspond to current units of competency and industry practices?

Even though these are often covered in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, many tools still struggle with these requirements.

To avoid using learning resources that leave certain unit requirements unaddressed, ensure you adhere to these guidelines:

Act on Your Words

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:

nappy changing

bottle preparation, bottle-feeding babies, and cleaning equipment

prepare solid foods and feed infants

appropriately respond to baby signs and cues

prepare infants for sleep and soothe them

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

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

Plurals Matter!
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 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 asks 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 Requirements or Not Competent

Pay attention to lists. As mentioned 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?
Be More Specific

Every assessment item needs clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on student competence. Thus, ensure your instructions are not confusing for students or assessors. For example:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What details can be included in a work package?

The answer might include:

Necessary resources

Applicable expenses

Length of activities

Allocated roles and responsibilities

If an assessment item requires multiple answers, specify the number of answers a student must provide. This ensures your assessment is reliable, and the evidence collected is valid.

The same is true for assessment items with double-barrelled questions or those asking for multiple answers at once. Such questions can confuse both students and assessors, as demonstrated in the sample question below:

Identify a hazard and/or environmental issue in the workplace and select the most effective hazard control hierarchy.

Answers might include, but are not limited to:

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

Work area and ground conditions – elimination, isolating, engineering controls

People – isolation, use of engineering controls, administration

Structural hazards – substituting, isolation, engineering controls

Chemical hazards – isolating, engineering, administration

Equipment or machinery – isolation, engineering controls, administration

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

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