Oral exams in four Norwegian secondary schools – characteristics and variations in practice and possible threats to validity and fairness

This article explores oral exams in four Norwegian secondary schools. These oral exams are high-stakes assessments, however, knowledge about practice and implications for validity and fairness is scarce. Data for the study consist of video recordings of 36 authentic oral exams in the school subject Norwegian language and literature. Applying thematic analysis, this study explores how oral exams are organised and the curriculum components assessed. Findings show that oral exams comprise five phases with clear characteristics in terms of activities to which students and examiners orient: greeting and preparing, student presentation, subject conversation, grading and feedback and grade. These phases are sequenced similarly in all but one of the studied exams. There are, however, variations in the time spent on each phase and in the parts of the curriculum assessed. The variations have implications for validity and fairness, indicating that securing high degrees of validity and fairness might be difficult.