The National Examinations Council of Tanzania (NECTA) organized a ten day workshop of examinations item on writing and editing from 17th to 26th July, 2017 at its marking centre at Mbezi Wani in Dar es Salaam.
The items were for teachers’ examinations that is Grade A teachers’ Certificate, Grade A teachers Special Course and Diploma Courses. The purpose of the workshop was to increase on the number of items in the bank.
One of the facilitator, Dr. Septimi Kitta from Mkwawa University, presented a topic on item writing and editing of different types of items, while the Head of Examinations Design and Development Ms. Angela
Kitali dwelt on the objectives of the workshop.
“We have very few items in our Item Bank, the purpose of this workshop is to make sure we get as many quality and error free items as possible, so that we can be in a position to use them in the future,” said
Kitali.
During the workshop, many participants claimed ten days were not enough for undertaking the item writing exercise. They said since item writing is a very sensitive activity, people need to have ample time so that they can do the work diligently.
The total number of people who participated in the item writing and editing workshop was 328 from different colleges and universities. Ms Kitali promised to arrange more workshops in order to be in a position to have more items.
In early 2014, the then Ministry of Education and Vocational Training transferred the responsibility of administering teachers’ examinations from the National Examinations of Council of Tanzania (NECTA) to the National Council of Technical Education (NACTE).
This meant that NECTA wasn’t setting any items for teachers’ courses until 2016, when the government mandated it to administer the examinations, hence a need for teachers’ examinations items.
Recently, NECTA also organized another seminar of Item Writing for Ordinary and Advanced level students. The aim of these workshops is to ensure the Council has as many items as possible in the near future.
