STANDARD OF FINAL YEAR STUDENT TEACHERS’ MAIN SUMMATIVE ASSESSMENT PAPERS AT A UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY

Abstract

There are specific standards that are recommended for setting main summative assessment papers in accordance with Bloom’s taxonomy of the cognitive domain. For final year student teachers, the recommendation is that eighty percent of the question paper must be pitched at Bloom taxonomy’s upper cognitive levels, which are analyzing, evaluating, and creating. Only twenty percent of the question paper must be pitched at Bloom’s lower cognitive levels, namely, remembering, understanding, and applying. This distribution is designed to assess higher order thinking and thus instill, promote, and reinforce independent and critical thinking, as well as problem-solving skills in final year students from the faculty of humanities as the final measure to prepare them for the envisaged world of work. To determine whether examiners comply with this recommendation, I analyzed ten question papers from the faculty of humanities through document analysis. The study found that some examiners pitch their question papers at Bloom’s lower cognitive levels. Some spread the questions almost evenly throughout the paper, while only a few distribute the questions close to the required recommendations. Of concern was that some examiners inappropriately used action verbs belonging to Bloom’s higher levels. This was evident through the posed questions and what the memorandum or marking guide revealed. It is imperative that questions are pitched at the recommended level, most significantly for final year student teachers. It is recommended that examiners be re-trained in setting question papers in line with the revised Bloom’s taxonomy protocol. It is recommended also, that experts in assessment and Bloom’s taxonomy be brought in to conduct workshops on the appropriate use of appropriate action verbs.