|
|
Classroom Assessment Techniques
Conceptual Diagnostic Tests
(Screen 2 of 6)
|
|
Description
A conceptual diagnostic test aims to assess students' conceptual understanding of key ideas in a discipline, especially those that are prone to misconceptions. Hence, they are discipline-specific, rather than generic. The format typically is multiple-choice, so that a conceptual diagnostic test can be given efficiently to large numbers of students and machine scored. Unlike traditional multiple-choice items--and this is crucial!--the distractors are designed to elicit misconceptions known from the research base. (See "Theory and Research.") A student must have a clear understanding of a concept in order to select the correct response. Because conceptual diagnostic tests can be scored quickly, they can be used as formative as well as summative assessments (see the Primer).
Assessment Purposes
- To reveal the misconceptions students bring as prior knowledge to a class.
- To measure the conceptual gains of a class as a whole.
- To identify concepts that are weak areas of understanding.
Limitations
To develop reliable and valid conceptual diagnostic tests is a major, long-term undertaking. Only a limited number of such tests are currently available, and those may not match your course goals. Your field may be one in which no such tests have been developed.
Tell me more about this technique:
|
