Time for radical rethink if tests don’t create effective learners

Last updated 11:34, Wednesday, 20 August 2008

When Albert Einstein said that it is “...our theories that determine what we measure”, he was making a very profound point, extending beyond the boundaries of the scientific discipline in which he worked.

It has a crucial relevance for the sort of thing that passes for assessment in education in this country.

Currently the national tests or Sats are yet again having their rationale questioned. This testing regime has been under a battering following the failure of the firm ETS Europe, who were contracted to administer the national tests, to ensure that the results were delivered on time.

In addition to this, teachers have been disturbed by marking that seemed erratic and in some cases erroneous and which produced results that bore little relation to the quality of a child’s work. Completed scripts have been returned to schools partially or completely unmarked.

During investigations some 10,000 unanswered emails were found complaining about the quality of marking.

Ed Balls has apologised for these shortcomings and acknowledged that there is a serious case here that needs urgent attention. Clearly there will be a record number of appeals and requests for remarking of papers and so the deadline for schools to send back exam papers for remarking has been extended until September 10.

Indeed the Quality and Curriculum Authority responded to the potential for further disillusion with the national tests by banning the original contractor ETS from the re-marking procedures and handed it over to the National Assessment Agency.

The QCA went on to terminate the £156m five-year contract with ETS.

In general I have a lot of sympathy for the examination boards who have had to cope with a level of change that would cause any organisation to wilt under the pressure.

The content of the exams is constantly being prescribed and altered by government, the nature of the mode of testing changed, coursework is in then it’s out, etc.

There hardly seems any year when some element of the examination system is not under review and change. And with such public outcomes in the form of results, they are under the bright searchlight of accountability and scrutiny.

The quality of marking in any examination system is a critical component in giving the qualification or test its credibility.

While there can be no system which is 100 per cent error free, parents, pupils and teachers should retain confidence in the system by seeing that, in the main, results or measurements are commensurate with what was anticipated or predicted.

Over the years, few students I taught gained GCSE or A-level results that were wildly outside the parameters expected of them. The systems of marking and moderating largely work at this level of examination. With the Sats, however, it is a different story.

In the light of the Sats fiasco it begs the question of how this data driven form of assessment matches up with, supports and complements other avowed aims of education like fostering team work, developing creative thinkers, allowing for independent enquiry and encouraging students to reflect on what and how they are learning.

It seems that Frankenstein’s brain is sending out two different messages; trying to walk to the left and to the right at the same time.

Huge amounts of money are being spent in merely checking up that the process is working according to plan rather than using the opportunity of assessment to improve, enhance and inform teaching and learning.

We have to ask the question, what is the contribution of the tests or examinations to making our students effective learners?

If the answer is none, then it is time for a radical rethink.