Assessment Validation: A Comprehensive Guide to Validate Assessments

Assessment Validation: A Comprehensive Guide to Validate Assessments

Blog Article

Upon receiving registration, RTOs must manage various responsibilities like annual declarations, AVETMISS reporting, and marketing compliance, with validation being a notably arduous task.

While we've discussed validation in multiple articles, let's return to the basics. ASQA defines validation as a quality check of the assessment process.

Essentially, validation is about identifying which parts of an RTO's assessment process are effective and which need improvement. With a proper grasp of its key aspects, validation becomes less daunting.

As per the 2015 SRTOs Clause 1.8, RTOs are required to ensure their assessment systems, including RPL, meet training package requirements and follow the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

The standards require RTOs to perform two types of validation.

The primary type of assessment validation verifies that your RTO's assessment meets the training package requirements.

The subsequent validation type ensures assessments are in line with 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

Defining Assessment Validation

As we mentioned earlier and in our past blogs, validation consists of two parts: (1) assessment tool validation and (2) post-assessment validation.

Assessment tool validation, sometimes called pre-assessment validation, focuses on ensuring all unit requirements are met, in line with the first part of the clause, ensuring complete workbook compliance.

In contrast, post-assessment validation focuses on the implementation, requiring Registered Training Organisations to conduct assessments according to the Principles of Assessment and Rules of Evidence.

This discussion will center around assessment tool validation.

Methods for Conducting Assessment Tool Validation

After reviewing the two types of validation, let’s explore the specifics of assessment tool validation.

Ideal Times to Conduct Assessment Tool Validation

The aim of assessment tool validation is to ensure that all elements, performance criteria, and performance and knowledge evidence are covered 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 until your next 5-year validation schedule. Validate new resources right away to ensure they’re appropriate for student use.

Nevertheless, this isn't the only occasion for this type of validation. Conduct assessment tool validation when you:

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

The risk-based regulatory approach of ASQA requires RTOs to perform regular risk assessments. Student complaints about learning resources indicate it's time for assessment tool validation.

Identifying Training Products for Validation

Keep in mind, this validation ensures that all learning resources comply before use. All RTOs must validate resources for each unit.

Assessment Tool Validation: Required Resources

Course Materials

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

Mapping tool – start by investigating this document. It shows which assessment items meet unit requirements, facilitating quicker validation.

Learner/student workbook – during validation, check if it's suitable as an assessment tool. Ensure instructions are clear and answer fields are sufficient. This is a common gap.

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 – these could be checklists, registers, and templates created separately from the workbook and marking guide. Validate them to confirm they fit the assessment task and meet unit requirements.

Validation Group

Clause 1.11 describes the requirements for validation panel members, indicating that validation can be performed by one or more persons. RTOs often require all trainers and assessors to attend, and sometimes industry experts are invited.

Overall, your validation panel should have:

Vocational competencies and industry skills relevant to the unit being validated

Recent knowledge and skills in vocational teaching and learning

One of the following training and assessment qualifications:

TAE40116 Certificate IV in Training and Assessment or the equivalent successor

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 is beneficial for both the validation process and documentation. It makes it easier to understand 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.
Simultaneously, it can serve as proof that you have validated your resources before they are used by students.

While ASQA does not recommend or require a specific template for assessment tool validation, numerous templates are available online. These tools generally require validators to examine the tools as a whole to see if they meet the principles of assessment.

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

While such templates facilitate validation, they often result in judgment errors because there’s insufficient space for comments on each assessment item.

It is highly recommended to use a more detailed template for inspecting each unit requirement and the assessment items that map to them. Below is an example:

Element Performance Criteria Assessment Guidelines Benchmarks Assessment Instrument Rectification Recommendations
What do you Need to Check?
What Should Be Inspected?

As we covered in our blog post Common Problems In Assessment Tools, your assessment tools must ensure trainers adhere to assessment principles and evidence rules.

Assessment Principles
Fairness – Does the assessment ensure equal opportunity and access for everyone?

Flexibility – Are different options provided in the assessment to demonstrate competence based on individual needs and preferences?

Validity – Is the assessment measuring what it is supposed to measure? Is it a valid tool for assessing the required skill or knowledge?

Reliability – Will the assessment yield consistent results each time, regardless of the trainer? Will different assessors make the same decision on skill competence?

Evidence Basic Rules

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 sufficient evidence to ensure the learner has the required skills and knowledge?

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

Currency – Do the assessment tools mirror current units of competency and modern industry practices?

Even though these are regularly addressed in VET professional development and nationally recognised training, numerous tools fail to meet these requirements.

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

Live Up to Your Words

Observe the verbs in the unit requirements and ensure they are addressed by the assessment item. For example, in the unit CHCECE032 Nurture babies and toddlers, one performance evidence requirement requires students to:

Complete each of the following at least once with two different babies under 12 months old in a safe environment, using age-appropriate verbal and non-verbal communication according to service and regulatory requirements:

diaper changing

bottle preparation, bottle-feeding infants, and cleaning equipment

solid foods preparation and feeding babies

appropriately respond to baby signs and cues

prepare babies for sleep and soothe them

monitor and foster physical exploration and gross motor skills appropriate for the age

Having students describe the nappy-changing process for babies under 12 months doesn’t fulfill the unit requirement. Unless the requirement assesses underpinning knowledge (i.e., knowledge evidence), students should be doing the tasks.

Be Cautious with 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.

Entire 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?
Provide More Detail

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 information can be included in a work package?

Possible answers could include:

Compulsory resources

Pertinent costs

Time span of activities

Designated duties and responsibilities

If an assessment item demands multiple answers, specify how many answers a student must provide. This ensures your assessment is reliable, and the evidence gathered 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.

Possible answers include, but are not limited to:

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

Work area and ground conditions – eliminating hazards, isolation, engineering

People – isolation, engineering, administrative controls

Structural hazards – substitution, isolation, engineering

Chemical hazards – isolating, engineering, administration

Equipment or machinery – isolating, engineering controls, administration

Steering clear of double-barrelled questions makes it simpler for students to respond and for assessors to judge competence accurately.

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