Development and Validation of Competency-based Assessment tools in General Biology for Senior High School STEM Students

Authors

  • Sarina Mae B. Arciga

Keywords:

competency-based assessment; Performance-based assessment; traditional assessment; validity; reliability

Abstract

Any change in the content and pedagogical focus of the curriculum needs a corresponding change in the assessment procedures. Assessments that enable to measure skills holistically are therefore important where such tools focus not solely on the knowledge but on skills and attitudes acquisition. Educators are therefore challenged to anchor assessment methods in the competencies of the subject. This is especially emphasized in the implementation of the K-12 curriculum in the Philippines. Senior High School is now in full swing. It is timely that the Department of Education provides a means of assessing student competencies in the different subjects including Biology. Attainment of competencies can only be evaluated using appropriate tools of assessment. Since Senior High has just been implemented, we do not have a standard tool in Biology for teachers to accurately gauge whether or not the students were able to develop the expected competencies in the said subject and to what extent. This descriptive-developmental study focused on developing assessment tools which were based on the competencies in General Biology for use in the Senior High School STEM. Specifically, it aimed to: determine what assessment tools may be developed which are competency-based and making use of traditional and performance-based assessments; determine the validity and reliability of the assessment tools developed through expert-validation and pilot-testing, respectively; revise the assessment tools based on the results of the validation process; and produce an assessment package out of the developed tools. There were two phases in the study, namely: assessment tool development phase and validation and pilot-testing phase. The first phase included the development of both traditional and performance-based assessments and the second phase involved the series of validation by expert-jurors of the content and technical aspects of the assessment tools. From the conduct of the study, the development of assessment tools were based on the competencies provided in the Curriculum Guide of Senior High School Biology under the STEM strand. They were both traditional and performance-based in nature. The development of the tools began with the use of Table of Specifications (TOS) made from the Curriculum Guide of STEM General Biology. Then, traditional multiple choice and performance-based assessments were developed based from the TOS. These were subjected to content validation by experts and then revised according to their suggestions for improvement. After revision, the traditional assessment was subjected to first pilot-testing to determine its discrimination and difficulty indices and in order for non-discriminatory items to be removed. The improved version was again subjected to second validation by a different group of experts to look into the technical aspect. Upon second validation, it was again revised and pilot-tested for the second time to a different group of students. The second pilot-testing allowed some more items to be discarded and yield the final version of the multiple choice assessment. This had undergone the final administration among selected STEM Students in Albay. The final administration yielded the reliability value upon subjecting the students’ responses to statistical analysis. In the case of the performance-based assessments, the first revision of the tools as a result of first validation was followed by second expert validation and then second revision. After such, the performance-based assessments were pilot-tested to 62 STEM students. This yielded the reliability value upon subjecting the students’ responses to statistical analysis. STEM students in the Tabaco City, Legazpi City, Ligao City and Albay Divisions who finished General Biology 1 and 2 served as the main respondents of the study. Selected students from schools covered by these divisions took the expert-validated test and perform performance-based assessment tasks. The first version of the traditional assessment had a mean rating of 3.9 out of 5. Aiken’s validity test yielded 0.74, which falls within the acceptable value of validity. The inter-rater agreement was equal to 0.78 which means that the experts had a substantial agreement in rating the traditional assessment. The Cronbach Alpha value is equal to 0.873. This value indicates that the traditional assessment had an acceptable value of reliability based on cited literatures. The performance-based assessments had a mean rating of 3.98 out of 5 coming from the experts which means that the indicators were very satisfactorily observed in the tasks. Its reliability value using Cronbach alpha is 0.927 for the performance tasks. Revisions interms of content and technical aspects were also made based on the comments and suggestions of the experts. Finally, an assessment package was produced featuring the developed assessment tools. This is titled the General Biology Assessment Toolpak (GBAT).The salient findings of the study were: the assessment tools developed were both traditional and performance-based and were based on the General Biology Curriculum Guide for Senior High School. They were therefore competency-based; both the traditional and performance-based tasks were reliable upon validation and pilot-testing; several revisions were made to refine the assessment tools and improve their content and technical construction. Following the validation procedures, an assessment package was produced featuring the assessment tools developed. The researcher therefore, recommends the following: administering the assessment tools to other STEM students outside the province of Albay; using assessment tools that are appropriate to the expected competencies of students in the STEM strand; making use of the results of assessments to reflect on the extent of student participation, engagement and commitment in the learning process.Keywords: 

Published

2018-09-18