Quality control checks from assessment experts describe and illustrate how to evaluate the quality of assessment questions before administering them to students. These quality control checks include validity, reliability, freedom from bias, standards alignment, thinking-skill rigor, academic vocabulary, and formatting. Educators are encouraged to occasionally include in their end-of-unit assessments questions that reflect the formats of state assessments so that students become familiar with, and have ongoing opportunities to demonstrate, their learning in the ways they will be expected to respond on external (state) achievement tests.

Quality control checks pinpoint any needed revisions that educators need to make to their assessment questions prior to administering the assessment to their students. These revisions will ensure that the inferences educators will make about students’ understanding from their assessment responses will be accurate.

Related Workshop:

CRITIQUE ASSESSMENT QUESTIONS WITH QUALITY CONTROL CHECKS