Clarifying the purposes of educational assessment

Newton, Paul E.

doi:10.1080/09695940701478321

Cited by 204 publications

(172 citation statements)

References 7 publications

(8 reference statements)

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“…This issue points to the potential consequences linked to the use of assessment data to inform decisions, since (1) more than one stakeholder is often involved and (2) the potential for misinterpretation always exists. Different stakeholders will apply assessment results for different purposes and therefore often need different kinds of evidence to support their decisions (Newton 2007). For example, some countries implement national tests to provide evidence both to teachers and decision-makers.…”

Section: Policy Issuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…That is, the same assessment should inform teaching and should provide information about individual students as well as information that can be used to evaluate the success of mathematics education at the regional or national level. Having multiple purposes such as these is highly problematic, since an assessment that validly and reliably provides information at the national level might not provide the same at the student level (Newton 2007;Fischer 2004).…”

Section: Policy Issuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Pellegrino et al (2001), for instance, claim that when "a single assessment is used for multiple purposes…the more purposes a single assessment aims to serve, the more each purpose will be compromised" (p. 2). Further, Newton (2007) points to the risks of ambiguous allocations of assessment purposes, since policy-makers could be misled if the complexities of the assessment design are over-simplified, for example when an assessment for a particular purpose (such as short-term system monitoring) is wrongly used for long-term system monitoring. Therefore, to scrutinise any potential consequences connected to the use of a particular assessment, different argument procedures might be applied, depending on whether the assessment was designed to assess individual students or for research or programme evaluation purposes at the institutional or national level.…”

Section: Assessment Validitymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Mathematics tests may also be used for admission to higher education or to monitor or evaluate the effectiveness of schools or educational systems. In addition, assessment outcomes are widely used to inform policy-making and decisions about educational reform (Elstad et al 2009;Newton 2007;Nortvedt 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The applied assessment and the purposes for which the data are to be used may not align well (Newton 2007), which might be the case even when assessment is used for admission to higher education or for policy-making.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Assessment in mathematics education: responding to issues regarding methodology, policy, and equity

Nortvedt

Buchholtz

2018

ZDM Mathematics Education

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In educational contexts, assessments may be designed to target students, preservice teachers, or teachers, either as individuals or as representatives of a group, and for a multitude of purposes. One key aim of assessment in mathematics education is to provide evidence that can be used to make decisions about or improve mathematics education, which then raises questions about which aspects of mathematical competence should be assessed-as well as how and for what purpose. This review paper addresses three related themes: (1) issues related to the assessment process and to the development of assessments that can validly assess mathematical competence in all its complexity; (2) issues related to educational policy and policy-making based on assessment data, in particular the reciprocal relationship between assessment and policy; and (3) issues related to equity, such as gender issues or the achievement gap between majority and minority students. Awareness of the relation between assessment, teaching, and learning is shown throughout the paper. Strong relationships between the three focus areas are found, that impact assessment validity and call for further development of assessment practices in mathematics education.

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Section: Policy Issuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Policy Issuesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Assessment Validitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Assessment in mathematics education: responding to issues regarding methodology, policy, and equity

Nortvedt

Buchholtz

2018

ZDM Mathematics Education

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“We must assess all, even a student farting [is also assessed] for the behavioural aspect of learning”: Teachers' conceptions of assessment in the context of assessment reform in Indonesia

Arrafii

2021

The Curriculum Journal

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This paper explores Indonesian secondary school teachers' conceptions of assessment in the context of assessment reform. Teachers working at different school level were interviewed both individually and in groups and their responses were analysed using the content analysis approach. Detailed examination of teachers' assessment propositions revealed that their perspectives about assessment embrace values, purposes, and understanding, and are marked by conceptions about the learner agency, accountability and improvement orientations. However, despite being considered important, the learner agency and accountability conceptions were often considered irrelevant. In addition, teachers reported tension with regard to their perceptions towards the reform and demonstrated a varied level of conceptual and practical understanding of the reform.The paper ends with a discussion of the complex nature of and tensions in the teachers' conceptions of assessment. Principal implications are discussed.

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Beyond counting the correct responses: Metacognitive monitoring and score estimations in mathematics

Başokçu

Guzel

2022

Psychology in the Schools

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This study investigated how well students differentiate their responses' accuracies (metacognitive monitoring) and estimate their test scores beyond counting—and counting on—the number of correct responses alone. Monitoring abilities of 2832 sixth‐graders (1410 male and 1422 female native in Turkish) at an 11‐item Program for International Student Assessment (PISA)‐equivalent mathematics test were measured via response‐contingent Type‐2 signal detection theory. The students also made score estimations right before and immediately after completing the test (pre‐ and posttest estimations, respectively). Although high‐scoring students underestimated and low‐scoring ones overestimated how they would perform in the test, high‐scorers were accurate in their posttest estimations unlike the low‐scoring group, where the lattaer retained their overestimation tendencies. Having better monitoring performance, the high‐scoring group could subsequently calibrate their posttest estimations. Additional assessment methods such as measuring monitoring and score estimations seem to have the potential to reveal how mathematics students behave before, during, and after responding.

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Clarifying the purposes of educational assessment

Cited by 204 publications

References 7 publications

Assessment in mathematics education: responding to issues regarding methodology, policy, and equity

Assessment in mathematics education: responding to issues regarding methodology, policy, and equity

“We must assess all, even a student farting [is also assessed] for the behavioural aspect of learning”: Teachers' conceptions of assessment in the context of assessment reform in Indonesia

Beyond counting the correct responses: Metacognitive monitoring and score estimations in mathematics

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