The University of British Columbia and Paragon Testing Enterprises are proud to sponsor the UBC-Paragon lecture series.
Talk in Tests: A Micro-analytic Perspective on Intimacy, Interaction and Affect in Computer-based Assessment
Bryan Maddox, PhD, University of East Anglia, U.K.
Thursday, March 16, 2017 | 2:30 – 4:00 p.m.
Neville Scarfe Building, 2125 Main Mall, Room 310
All are welcome to attend. No RSVP required.
This lecture will examine the presence and status of talk in computer-based educational tests, and what it can tell us about embodied assessment performance and the ecology of testing situations. Learn how video-ethnographic methods can be used to capture “missing data” on talk and gesture that usually flies under the radar of conventional studies of assessment performance and validity. The lecture will present transcripts and video animations from real-life assessment events observed in the OECD Adult Skills Survey (PIAAC); allowing us to dig deep into the roles of the computer and interviewer in the management of the testing situation and to investigate the character of human-computer-human interaction. Finally, the potential of a micro-analytic approach to inform large-scale data analysis and machine learning will be discussed.
About Dr. Bryan Maddox
Dr. Bryan Maddox is a senior lecturer in Education and International Development at the School of International Development, University of East Anglia, and a Director of the Laboratory of International Assessment Studies . He is an accomplished ethnographer with experience of research on literacy practices and literacy acquisition in South Asia. His ethnographic research with UNESCO and the OECD has focused on International Large-Scale Assessments (ILSAs). Dr. Maddox has developed a ‘micro-analytic’ approach to assessment research. It combines small-scale, ethnographic observations of ‘real-life’ assessment practice with larger-scale data. Those observations are used to inform understanding of assessment design, performance and validity.
UBC-Paragon Lecture Series
The Lecture Series is one of several initiatives that stem from the partnership among the University of British Columbia (Vancouver Campus) Faculty of Education, UBC Office of the Provost, and Paragon Testing Enterprises (a subsidiary of the University of British Columbia). This research initiative, its component activities, and collaboration with Paragon Testing enhance UBC’s standing as a global leader in research and graduate student training in the field of the statistical science of measurement and highlights UBC’s Faculty of Education as the Canadian centre of excellence drawing on visiting scholars and scientists to collaborate with researchers and interact with graduate students in the field.