Assessment Validation: Tips and Insights on How to Validate Assessments

Assessment Validation: Tips and Insights on How to Validate Assessments

Blog Article

Post-registration, RTOs are tasked with many responsibilities including annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and marketing compliance, and validation is often the most 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.

Put simply, validation checks which parts of an RTO's assessment process are accurate and spots areas for enhancement. A proper understanding of its main elements can make validation less daunting.

According to SRTOs 2015 Clause 1.8, RTOs must ensure that their assessment systems, including RPL, comply with training package requirements and adhere to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

According to the standards, two types of validation are necessary.

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

The following validation type ensures that assessments follow the principles of assessment and rules of evidence.

It suggests that validation takes place before and after the assessment. This article focuses on the first type—assessment tool validation.

Breaking Down the Two Types of Assessment Validation

Decoding Assessment Validation

As noted earlier and in our earlier blog entries, validation is split into two stages: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.

Assessment tool validation, also known as pre-assessment validation or verification, pertains to the first part of the clause, focusing on ensuring all unit requirements are met and that all workbooks are fully compliant.

On the other hand, post-assessment validation deals with implementation, ensuring Registered Training Organisations follow the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

Our focus in this article will be on assessment tool validation.

How Assessment Tool Validation is Conducted

Having distinguished between the two types of validation, let’s dive into the details of assessment tool validation.

When is Assessment Tool Validation Conducted?

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

Therefore, whenever you acquire new learning resources, you must conduct assessment tool validation before allowing students to use them.

You don't have to wait for the next validation schedule in your 5-year cycle. Validate new resources as soon as you get them to ensure they’re suitable for students.

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

- your resources get updated
- new training products are added to your scope
- when course is reviewed against 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.

What Training Products Need Validation?

It's important to remember this validation ensures that all learning resources are compliant before use. All RTOs need to validate resources for each unit.

Resources Required for Assessment Tool Validation

Instructional Resources

To validate assessment tools, you need the complete suite 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 – verify that instructions for assessors are comprehensive and clear benchmarks for each assessment item are present. Clear benchmarks are key to reliable assessment outcomes.

Other related resources – may consist of checklists, registers, and templates developed independently from the workbook and marking guide. Validate them to confirm they suit the assessment task and address unit requirements.

Validation Team

Clause 1.11 specifies the criteria for validation panel members, indicating that validation can involve one or more persons. RTOs usually require all trainers and assessors to participate, sometimes including industry experts.

Together, your validation panel should possess:

Vocational competencies and current industry skills that relate to the unit being validated

Up-to-date knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning

One of these training and assessment qualifications:

TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or its future version

Assessment validation document/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 can also serve as proof that you have validated your resources before allowing students to use them.

Although ASQA does not recommend or require a particular template for assessment tool validation, many templates are available online. These tools typically have validators review the tools in their entirety to determine if they meet the principles of assessment.

Assessment Principles Guide 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 click here commenting on each assessment item.

A more detailed template is highly recommended for inspecting each unit requirement and the assessment items that align with them. Below is an example:

Element Performance Criteria Assessment Directions Standards Assessment Instrument Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What to Look For?

As noted in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, your assessment tools must ensure trainers follow assessment principles and evidence rules.

Principles of Assessment
Fairness – Are equal opportunities and access ensured in the assessment process?

Flexibility – Does the assessment accommodate different options to demonstrate competence according to various needs and preferences?

Validity – Is the assessment assessing what it is supposed to assess? Is it a valid tool for measuring 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?

Rules of Evidence

Validity – Is the evidence proof that the candidate possesses 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 adequate evidence to ensure the learner has the required skills and knowledge?

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

Currency – Do the assessment tools align with current units of competency and up-to-date industry practices?

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

To prevent using learning resources that do not address some unit requirements, ensure you adhere to these guidelines:

Show What You Mean

Pay close attention to the verbs in the unit requirements and ensure they are addressed by the assessment item. For instance, 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:

change nappies

bottle preparation, feeding babies from bottles, and cleaning equipment

prepare solids and feed infants

respond properly to baby signs and cues

prepare and settle infants for sleep

monitor and support physical exploration and gross motor skills appropriate 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.

Pay Attention to 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 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 sufficient.

Complete or Not Competent

Mind the lists. Again, if students perform just 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

Each assessment item must include clear and specific benchmark answers to guide the assessor’s judgment on the student’s competence. Hence, ensure your instructions are clear and not confusing for students or assessors. For instance:
What kind of information can be included in a work package?
What kinds of information can be included in a work package?

Possible answers include:

Needed resources

Relevant expenses

Activity length

Appointed duties and responsibilities

When an assessment item demands multiple answers, indicate the number of answers a student must provide. This ensures your assessment is reliable, and the evidence collected is valid.

The same applies to assessment items with double-barrelled questions or those requiring multiple answers simultaneously. These can confuse 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 – work area isolation, engineering controls, personal protective equipment

Work area and ground conditions – eliminating hazards, isolating, engineering controls

People – isolating, engineering, administration

Structural hazards – substitution, isolation, engineering controls

Chemical hazards – isolation, engineering controls, administration

Equipment or machinery – isolation, engineering controls, administrative controls

Steering clear of double-barrelled questions makes it easier 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.