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Evidence from the Questionnaire (A1)
Here I report on the Dinzi’s responses to the questionnaire (A1) on the match between her assessment practice and the assessment policy. Dinzi claimed that most of her assessment practices mirrored the requirements of the policy, such as: assessment informs and improves her curriculum and assessment practices; assessment offers all learners an opportunity to show what they know, understand and can do; assessment helps learners understand what they can do and where they need to develop further; her assessment practices are sensitive to gender and learners’ abilities; assessment is continuous; assessment decisions are based on pragmatic, trial-and-error grounds; facts, applications and higher order thinking skills are assessed; uses the criterion-referenced approach; assessments are not restricted to tests only; assessment is always undertaken for a specific purpose; learners are involved in assessing their own work; learners are involved in assessing the work of their peers; learners are provided with opportunities to reflect and talk about their learning and achievement; a wide range of assessment methods are used confidently and appropriately; assessment information is used to decide what to do next with individuals, groups or the class; portfolios are built over a period of time; marking involves both verbal and written feedback; marking focuses on the learning intentions as the criteria for success; prompt and regular marking occurs; the outcomes of marking, along with other information, are used to adjust future teaching plans; and reporting of results is both informal, namely dialogues in class and formal, namely written reports, amongst others (B1).
However she reported that there was room for improvement in some of her assessment practice such as generating and collecting evidence, evaluating this evidence against the outcomes, recording the findings of the evaluation and using the information to assist learners’ development and improve the process of teaching and learning; identifying the key learning outcomes so that assessment against them can be made and used to help develop learning; assessment decisions are based on thinking through the purpose and principles of assessment; assessment informs daily and weekly practice; assessment allow learning to be matched to the needs of the learners; and prompt and regular marking takes place (A1).
She did not make any claim to show that her assessment practice does not mirror the assessment policy or requires re-thinking (A1). The analyses of her claims suggest that most of her assessment practices match the requirements of the new assessment policy. I followed up these claims in the interviews for deeper information regarding her assessment practice.
The Half-Year Report
The half-year report was called “Senior Phase Progress Report” (A8, 3) issued at the end of the second term in June 2002. The space for the ‘term’ to be written was left blank, and so was the space for the ‘number of days the student was absent’. The new assessment policy requires that the report must “comment on the attendance of the student at the learning site” (Department of Education, 1998: 13) but this was not adhered to, why? It had three columns; one reflected the “learning area”, another “marks achieved” and the other the “effort symbol” (A8, 3). In the column ‘learning area’ acronyms were used, for example LLC 1, NS, HSS and so forth for each of the eight learning areas, but what these acronyms meant was not indicated in the report.
Are assumptions made that parents and the students know what these acronyms mean? How valid are the assumptions? In the column ‘mark achieved’ there was no total indicated, for example, for NS (Natural Science) a student’s mark was indicated as “76” but the total was not indicated, that is, 76 out of what? In the ‘effort symbols’ column symbols such as “A”, “S”, “NAS” were used with their meanings indicated as, “achieved”, “satisfactory” and “needs additional support” respectively. This begs the question: ‘achieved what’? How will students, teachers and parents know what the students achieved and how? What does ‘satisfactory’ mean? In the ‘remarks’ column, which was relatively spacious to accommodate a lengthy remark, a one-word remark was written: “satisfactory”. What does this ‘satisfactory’ mean to students and their parents/guardians? This is inconsistent with the policy requirement that requires the reporting process to comment “on the personal and social development” and to “give an indication of the strengths and developmental needs and identify follow up steps for learning and teaching” (Department of Education, 1998: 13). Why is this policy requirement not being complied with in the report? Does the teacher believe that this form of communicating assessment results meaningful to students, parents and to the education system, including herself? When I enquired from Dinzi whether students receive additional support she responded that they do in the form of after school support. But Dinzi did not refer to the progress/non-progress of students as indicated in the half-year report during my seventeen classroom observations. The question is why?
Chapter One
Introduction and Overview
Chapter Two
Review of the Literature
Chapter Three
Towards a conceptual framework for understanding the relationship between policy and practice
Chapter Four
Research Methodology
Chapter Five
The case of Dinzi: In search of new knowledge and resources
Chapter Six
The case of Hayley: In search of order and certainty
Chapter Seven
Cross- Case analysis: Convergences and divergences?
Chapter Eight
Between Theory and Data: Explaining the relationship between Assessment Policy and Assessment Practice
List of Appendices
Appendix A
Letter to provincial Head of Department
Appendix B
Letter to principal of School A
Appendix C
Letter to principal of School B
Appendix D
Summary of critical research questions and methods
Appendix E
Summary of value of research methods
Appendix F
Questionnaire 1
Appendix G
Free writing schedule
Appendix H
Interview schedule 1
Appendix I
Analysis of the new official assessment policy
Appendix J
Questionnaire 2
Appendix K
Interview schedule 2
Appendix L
Classroom observation protocol
Appendix M
Analysis of teacher and student documents and records
Appendix N
Contact summary form
Appendix O
Document summary form
Appendix P
Contextual Information on the School
Bibliography
