系统梳理课程难度评估方法,助力公平教学质量分析。
The Course Difficulty Analysis Cookbook
- 基于成绩与潜变量模型,独立于学生水平评估难度。
- 可检测不同群体间课程结果差异,如辍学与毕业生成绩差距。
- 提供开源工具与教程,适合教育研究者和教务管理者使用。
课程分析(CA)通过研究课程结构与学生数据来保障教育项目质量。其中关键在于为每门课程赋予代表性难度值,这对教学质量监控、课程对比及推荐具有重要意义。测量难度需兼顾多重因素:首先,若难度指标受学生表现水平影响,会因忽略学生多样性而产生偏差;通过独立于学生表现的难度评估,可降低偏见,实现更公平的衡量。其次,从测量理论看,难度测量必须可靠且有效,以支撑后续分析。第三,应考虑协变量,如学生个体特征(如转学生身份)。近年来提出多种难度概念,本文首次系统综述并比较基于绩点与潜变量建模的现有方法,并提供模型选择、假设检验与实际应用的实操指南。应用包括监测课程难度随时间变化、识别不同学生群体间的差异结果(如辍学者与毕业生),旨在推动高质量、公平且包容的学习体验。为支持进一步研究与应用,我们提供开源软件包与人工数据集,促进可复现性与推广。
原文摘要 · Abstract (English)
Curriculum analytics (CA) studies curriculum structure and student data to ensure the quality of educational programs. An essential aspect is studying course properties, which involves assigning each course a representative difficulty value. This is critical for several aspects of CA, such as quality control (e.g., monitoring variations over time), course comparisons (e.g., articulation), and course recommendation (e.g., advising). Measuring course difficulty requires careful consideration of multiple factors: First, when difficulty measures are sensitive to the performance level of enrolled students, it can bias interpretations by overlooking student diversity. By assessing difficulty independently of enrolled students' performances, we can reduce the risk of bias and enable fair, representative assessments of difficulty. Second, from a measurement theoretic perspective, the measurement must be reliable and valid to provide a robust basis for subsequent analyses. Third, difficulty measures should account for covariates, such as the characteristics of individual students within a diverse populations (e.g., transfer status). In recent years, various notions of difficulty have been proposed. This paper provides the first comprehensive review and comparison of existing approaches for assessing course difficulty based on grade point averages and latent trait modeling. It further offers a hands-on tutorial on model selection, assumption checking, and practical CA applications. These applications include monitoring course difficulty over time and detecting courses with disparate outcomes between distinct groups of students (e.g., dropouts vs. graduates), ultimately aiming to promote high-quality, fair, and equitable learning experiences. To support further research and application, we provide an open-source software package and artificial datasets, facilitating reproducibility and adoption.
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