Measuring Noncommissioned Officer Knowledge and Experience to Enable Tailored Training

Abstract

Tailoring training can improve effectiveness and efficiency. However, before informed decisions regarding tailoring Army institutional training can be made, instruments which predict performance must be available. To that end, instructors from the Infantry Advanced Leaders Course at Fort Benning, GA were interviewed to determine which course criteria exhibited large variation in student performance. Based on those interviews, two criteria were chosen: land navigation and troop leading procedures Four types of predictors were constructed for each criterion. The first type was predictive judgments of Soldier criterion performance. The second type was demographic items. The third type was self-report items concerning specific, criterion-relevant experiences. The fourth type was prior knowledge tests. For each criterion, prior knowledge alone significantly predicted performance. The different nature of the criteria has implications for both the construction of prior knowledge tests and how prior knowledge tests can be used to predict performance. Ways in which these results can be translated into user-friendly tools for course managers, instructors, and other relevant personnel are illustrated.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Nov 01, 2011
Accession Number
ADA552941

Entities

People

  • Christopher J. Brogdon
  • Paul N. Blankenbeckler
  • Peter S. Schaefer

Organizations

  • U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Biomedical
  • Human Systems
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Applied Psychology
  • Command And Control
  • Education
  • Educational Psychology
  • Global Positioning Systems
  • Instructors
  • Land Navigation
  • Navigation
  • Noncommissioned Officers
  • Personnel Management
  • Professional Development
  • Psychology
  • Situational Awareness
  • Social Sciences
  • Students
  • Training
  • Urban Areas

Fields of Study

  • Education

Readers

  • Military Science
  • Psychometric Testing or Psychological Assessment.
  • Systems Analysis and Design