Exploring creativity, innovation and validity in on-screen assessment: Accessibility and Inclusivity

Nathan Evans, of our modernising assessment team, explores the findings from a recent series of digital assessment workshops in this four-part blog series.

Designing engaging assessments involves detailed consideration of how they can be accessible and inclusive. Modernising assessment and making the best use of digital technology offers incredible opportunities to better meet the needs of learners.

Digital assessment can give learners the ability to adjust their own experiences. For example, our teacher participants noted that the options for changing colour overlays and resizing text, shown in the video below, could effectively support learners with dyslexia by improving readability and reducing visual stress.

Digital platforms also offer assistive media options, like text-to-speech functions. These features can significantly benefit learners with visual impairments, for example, lowering barriers to participating in assessments. These tools may also support the overall inclusivity of an assessment, perhaps being used by learners who feel they would benefit from listening to a question, task or piece of written stimulus material. In short, digital assessments provide more ways for more learners to engage with the same assessment. Teachers also appreciated the practical advantages of these tools. With built-in assistive features, there’s less need for specialised equipment like screen readers, simplifying the process for all.

Thinking outside of high-stakes summative assessments, some digital platforms also considered how they could support learners in lower-stakes or formative assessments, or provide useful supplementary information for a specific item. For instance, the ‘hint’ function showcased in the below example allows students to be given a little nudge in the right direction when calculating resultant force. The teacher's main focus here is on the learner’s ability to use an equation correctly, not whether they can memorise it. While this might not be suitable for a high-stakes assessment, teachers saw it as a powerful tool for the classroom, promoting learner independence while allowing teachers to target their support more effectively.

While the individual benefits of all of these functions are impactful, when brought together there are opportunities for learners to take more personalised assessment experiences, that more effectively enable them to demonstrate their knowledge, skills and understanding. It’s also worth highlighting that many of these accessibility features -like text-to-speech or colour overlays -can be controlled directly by learners during the assessment, promoting their independence and building confidence.

In summary, digital assessments provide a rich array of tools which can create more accessible and inclusive environments, ensuring every learner has the chance to succeed, no matter their individual needs or circumstances.

Exploring creativity, innovation and validity in on screen assessment: Innovation

Transition towards digitalised assessment – Coming soon