Diagnostic Assessment

Introduction

At the start of a semester, course, or lesson, I will use various diagnostic techniques to determine my students’ knowledge, skills, and understanding level. These diagnostic techniques are pre-tests for my college and undergraduate business studies students. These pre-tests enable me to ascertain student strength, clarify misconceptions, identify special needs, and adjust the curriculum to meet student needs (Erie, 2017).

I usually use a pre-test that is easy to administer, like getting a poll, giving multiple choices about the course objectives and lesson goals, and short answer questions to see how student articulate their answers. These tools are excellent for me in evaluating and measuring what students know, what they want to know, and how they have learned (Lamprianou & Athanasou, 2009, p. 18).

I will examine and appraise the diagnostic assessments and expound on my frustration and satisfaction. Some suggestive advice is offered on the use of the diagnostic test for students with lower proficiency levels to identify better specific learning needs (Looney, 2011, p. 27).

Appraising Diagnostic Assessments

The purpose of the pre-test is to gather as much information about a student as possible. In every lesson, I am faced with a diverse class of multicultural, multi-ethnic, and multi-lingual students from India, China, Vietnam, Indonesia, and others. Administering a standardized pre-test on what students know, what they want to know, and how they have learned is a process that needs to be examined and appraised continuously. Students come to the class with many ideas about what they know. However, they might not fully comprehend their proficiency level (Lucariello, 2015).

Diagnostic assessment allows the instructor or teacher to highlight a student’s assumption of a topic or subject matter. The teacher can clarify this assumption and provide constructive ideas by articulating why the premise is a misconception. An example of a business unit in “Dark Tourism” might elicit different concepts for the topic from students. However, dark tourism involves travel to places historically associated with death, disaster, or tragedy (Ronan, 2019).

Challenges of Diagnostic Assessments

Pre-test such as “getting to know you” quizzes, polls, multiple-choice questions on lesson topics, and surveys on business topics to be debated have offered me a sound evaluation and appraisal of my students. I still cannot know how well they have learned and how they can apply what they have learned.

Although I have incorporated students’ self-assessment into my weekly lesson plan, I have failed to systematically or explicitly use diagnostic feedback to develop students’ capacity to evaluate and adapt to their learning (Manitoba, 2006, p. 14).

The pre-test suggests that my diagnostics technique is not consistently producing similar results and is not reproducible. Hence the tool I am using might not be reliable. On the other hand, what I set out to gather is also not working too well. The validity of what I intend to obtain from students’ feedback is not forthcoming (Lynch, 2016).

Dilemma in diagnostic assessments

The dilemma in diagnostic assessment is that it should help teachers identify the gaps so that the teachers can further refine formative and summative assessments. However, in my current curriculum and instructional design, many business program studies are already designed for specific criteria reference and norm reference. Unfortunately, we are not able to change these criteria or norm references. Therefore, it is sound advice to use authentic assessment involving multiple skills, diverse knowledge, and attitudinal component for students to demonstrate their understanding of the subject rather than adapting to the program's design (Lamprianou & Athanasou, 2009, p. 35).

Conclusion

Authentic assessment is holistic and formative; it helps to continuously enable students to be self-directed in their learning and bring them to speed with the content of the materials. Diagnostic assessment can be a valuable tool if it is well integrated with the authentic assessment to encourage a student to take ownership of their learning and desire to inquire and know why they are learning (Looney, 2011).

References

Erie, P. (2017). Public Schools Diagnostic assessment. Retrieved from ERIESD: https://www.eriesd.org/cms/lib/PA01001942/Centricity/Domain/1917/Types%20of%20Assessments%20information%20sheets.pdf

Lamprianou, I., & Athanasou, J. A. (2009). A Teacher’s Guide to Educational Assessment. Rotterdam, The Netherlands: Sense Publishers. Retrieved from file:///F:/UoPeople%20-%20MED/EDUC%205440/EDUC%205440%20Unit%202/Reading%20Materials/2.%20TeachGuideEduAssessment.pdf

Looney, J. W. (2011). Integrating formative and summative assessments: progress towards a seamless system. Education Working Papers No. 58. Geneva: OECD. Retrieved from https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED529586.pdf

Lucariello, J. (19 March, 2015). How Do My Students Think: Diagnosing Student Thinking Applications of Psychological Science to Teaching and Learning modules. Retrieved from American Pyschological Association: https://www.apa.org/education-career/k12/student-thinking

Lynch, M. (22 November, 2016). The five major features of summative assessments. Retrieved from The Edvocate: https://www.theedadvocate.org/five-major-features-summative-assessments/

Manitoba. (2006). Rethinking classroom assessment with purpose in mind: assessment for learning, assessment as learning, assessment of learning. Winnipeg, Manitoba: Manitoba Education, Citizenship and Youth. Retrieved from https://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/assess/wncp/full_doc.pdf

Ronan, A. (29 April, 2019). Every teacher’s guide to assessment. . Retrieved from Edudemic: https://www.moedu-sail.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/CFA-Handouts-for-C-Assessment-Design.pdf