Creating a Competency Continuum: Assessing mathematical literacy in secondary education

Abstract

Following educational trends in jurisdictions around the world, in 2015 the Ministry of Education (MOE) in British Columbia (BC), Canada introduced a redesigned K-12 curriculum which moved away from content-focussed educational objectives towards competency-driven learning outcomes. One of the significant challenges of this curriculum change is the absence of a framework that supports educators in effectively assessing the type of learner competency development used by the MOE as part of their graduation framework at the secondary level. In this project, we responded to this challenge by developing and testing a novel assessment instrument for use in a competency-based learning environment in BC. This instrument incorporates fuzzy logic principles to assess learning artifacts in the context of mathematical literacy as defined by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA). In partnership with the Pacific School of Innovation and Inquiry (PSII), an independent, inquiry-based secondary school located in Victoria, BC, we introduced this assessment instrument, and then, over the course of two months in 2018, collected data concerning its use in assessment of mathematical literacy in their highly personalized and interdisciplinary learning environment. We present the initial findings from the study, and iterations on the assessment tool which further address challenges of implementing competency-based assessment (CBA) in BC K-12 classrooms and beyond.