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While we often think of exams as a way to test students’ comprehension of material, exams can serve more than one purpose. Being aware of why we are testing students and what exactly we want to test can help make students’ and instructors' experience of exams more useful. The following tips will gear you towards issues you should think about during the entire exam process, from planning to reflection. Before you start preparing an examWhy are you giving an exam to your students?
What do you want to assess?What you want to assess should be related to your learning outcomes for the course.
How do you decide what to test and how to test it?The overall exam should be consistent with your learning outcomes for the course. There are a number of ways to review and prioritize the skills and concepts taught in a course. You could:
What are the qualities of a good exam?
After the exam is readyPrepare a marking scheme or rubricPreparing a marking scheme ahead of time will allow you to review your questions, to verify that they are really testing the material you want to test, and to think about possible alternative answers that might come up.
Inform students of the purpose and parameters of the exam
After your students write the examMonitor the quality of your examsExams provide you with the opportunity to obtain feedback on student learning, your teaching methods, and the quality of the exam itself.
Reflect on the gathered informationReviewing examination results can help you identify concepts and methods that students are having difficulty with – questions that were missed – as well as concepts and methods that were well understood – questions generally successfully answered. Or it may highlight well-constructed or poorly constructed exam question. Consider using this information to:
Resources
CTE teaching tips
This Creative Commons license lets others remix, tweak, and build upon our work non-commercially, as long as they credit us and indicate if changes were made. Use this citation format: Preparing Tests and Exams. Centre for Teaching Excellence, University of Waterloo. What considerations must be considered in the preparation of a good test to produce an appropriate assessment tool?There are four considerations to examine when designing an appropriate assessment method that will reflect the established learning goals and activities:. Reliability.. Standardization.. Validity.. Practicality.. Which of the following best explains the importance of using statements of learning objectives in the assessment of students?Which of the following best explains the importance of using statements of learning objectives in the assessment of students? The teacher knows the specific outcomes students should attain and develops appropriate assessment procedures to assess them.
What are examples of effective assessment techniques that will guide your understanding of student knowledge?Teaching conceptual understanding and procedural fluency. What are examples of effective assessment techniques that will guide your understanding of student knowledge? Feedback, on-going observation and continuous data gathering.
What are the rules that we need to consider in constructing different kinds of tests?(i) Preparing the Test Items:. Test items must be appropriate for the learning outcome to be measured: ... . Test items should measure all types of instructional objectives and the whole content area: ... . The test items should be free from ambiguity: ... . The test items should be of appropriate difficulty level:. |