Using transaction-level data to diagnose knowledge gaps and misconceptions

The role of assessment in learning is to evaluate student comprehension and ability. Assessment instruments often function at the task level. What is rarely considered is the process students go through to reach the final solution. This often allows knowledge component gaps and misconceptions to go undetected. This research identified higher levels of knowledge component gaps and misunderstandings when assessing transaction-level knowledge component data than task-level final solution data. Final solution data showed little evidence that students had any misunderstanding or knowledge gaps about the use of absolute references. However, when analyzing these data at the transaction level we found evidence that far more students struggled than the analysis of the final solutions suggested.