The Principles of Assessment in Medical Education module (CM50137)

You will learn about the principles of assessment in health professions education. This will also cover current best practices in health professions education assessment.

You will develop the skills to design and implement appropriate assessment techniques. You will understand the rationale, and be able to critique the different assessment strategies. This will be at both undergraduate and postgraduate levels.

The module will run for 12 weeks, and introduce you to the key principles of good assessment.

What you will learn

In this module, you will learn:

• Principles of “good” assessment – this will include discussion of application of various concepts, such as Miller’s triangle, competency based medical education, utility index, Summative and formative and programmatic assessment.
• How to establish the quality of an assessment through utilising tools like blueprinting, standard setting, validity and reliability measures.
• Recognising the concepts of ethical, legal, and cultural consideration in current assessment practises.
• Introduction to Psychometrics and their application in the field of medical education. 

By the end of this module, you will be able to:

• Recognise the foundational principles and theories of assessment in medical education. 
• Recognise and plan appropriate assessment practices based on different levels of competencies in medical education.  
• Design assessment tools in line with competency-based education and best practices in medical education.  
• Reflect on ethical, legal, and cultural considerations within assessment practices.  
• Critically evaluate assessment tools using basic psychometric properties and report evaluation for different stakeholders  

Assignments / assessment

• written end-of-module graded assignment (100%)

To support your learning you will also be involved in:

• formative assessment
• group activities
• quizzes

These activities will be used to give you feedback on how you will need to complete the graded assessment.

Teaching methods / timetable

• online materials split into weekly chapters across 10 weeks
  • all materials will be available on day 1 of the module
  • Learning resources include reading books , video clips, and relevant articles
• interactive asynchronous teaching via discussion boards
  • tutors will be on the boards on office days to answer queries and to facilitate group discussions
• virtual classroom sessions staggered across the module
  • Each session will last approximately 1.5 hours. They will be recorded for revision or for those unable to attend