Revisiting purpose and conceptualisation in the design of assessments of mathematics teachers’ knowledge

ABSTRACT

In this paper, we focus on the design of assessments of mathematics teachers’ knowledge by emphasising the importance of identifying the purpose for the assessment, defining the specific construct to be measured, and considering the affordances of particular psychometric models on the development of assessments as well as how they are able to communicate learning or understanding. We add to the literature by providing illustrations of the interactions among these critical considerations in determining what inferences can be drawn from an assessment. We illustrate how the considerations shape assessments by discussing both existing and ongoing research projects. We feature discussion of two projects on which the authors of this paper are collaborating to demonstrate the affordances of attending to all three considerations in designing assessments of mathematics teachers’ knowledge to provide readers with opportunities to see those considerations in use.

KEYWORDS:

• Assessment design
• pedagogical content knowledge
• content knowledge

Acknowledgement

The work reported here was supported in part by the National Science Foundation under grants DRL-1813760, DRL-1751309, and DRL-1054170 as well as the Institute of Education Studies grant number R305A180392. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the funding agencies.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

The work reported here was supported in part by the National Science Foundation under grants DRL-1813760, DRL-1751309, and DRL-1054170 as well as the Institute of Education Sciences grant number R305A180392.