The support offered ranges from consultation on the creation of the concept of digital examinations through the implementation of applied examination didactics to the interpretation of evidence-based examination diagnostics. This consultation is based on the individual concerns of the teachers and is provided holistically from media pedagogical, diagnostic, and information technological perspectives.
Digital examinations with e-assessment software offer a wide range of didactic potential for measuring competence. The central examination didactic support is structured to help integrate the individual potential of e-assessment software into the entire competence and examination development process.
One aim is to help lecturers learn how to utilize the changed digital framework conditions to develop competence-oriented examination formats rather than merely replicating paper-based examination formats and processes in digital form. This way, teaching staff will become familiar with different perspectives on how the assessment of examination quality can be data-based. They will learn to use digital tools to further develop examinations in a student-centered and competence-oriented manner.
Offerings
The team of digital exams offers support for the following challenges posed by digital examinations
- Designing, conducting, and evaluating digital (on-site) written exams, tests, and practice courses with the help of e-assessment software
- Assessing the suitability of various digital examination formats for measuring the competence of a module’s qualification objectives and teaching/learning methods
Identifying suitable task types for competence assessment based on the learning objectives of a module - Development of competence-oriented tasks based on the current state of research in empirical educational research and teaching and learning in higher education
- Evidence-based examination diagnostics (assessment of objectivity, reliability, and validity)
University members can view the entire range of offers, including workshop and seminar calendars, on the edu-assist platform.
Concept of digital exams
The examination-didactic support center helps with all steps in the digital examination process in e-assessment software. The services offered cover all available functions and process steps—from planning to calculating examination results. All steps in the examination process are taken into account—starting with the task creation and extending to task summarization for an examination. Support is also offered for the integration of media, exporting and importing on examination servers, alongside the evaluation and assessment of the students’ results.
Applied exam didactics
Counseling on exam didactics is key to improving the quality of examinations. Before competence-oriented exams can be devised, competence-oriented tasks must be developed that summarily cover the measurement of all learning objectives of a module adequately. Lecturers are supported in constructing tasks reflective of action situations that enable situation- and context-related competence measurements. This is the only way to ensure that subject-related competence measuring instruments can be developed.
Evidence-based exam diagnostics
The quality of examinations can be assessed in a data-based manner by measuring evidence-based quality criteria. By applying test quality criteria such as objectivity, reliability, and validity, examinations can be assessed in a way that allows quality improvement changes to be made to examinations and their processes. This method allows a better assessment of the significance of the examination results in relation to the competencies to be acquired by students over the course of their studies.
Cooperation with the University Didactics department
Before competence-oriented examinations can be devised, competence-oriented tasks must be developed that summarily measure all learning objectives of a module in an adequate manner. Therefore, the individuals seeking support should be prepared to develop the learning objectives and teaching methods of a module in parallel. These three dimensions are interdependent according to the concept of constructive alignment. Accompanying every consultation need, the support services of the University Didactics Department should be utilized in order to maintain alignment between learning objectives, teaching methods, and examinations.
