No description available.

Based on evidence of the success of data informed interventions in the literature, we undertook a qualitative case study investigation of how two public primary schools used the results of the two external assessments, the Gauteng Provincial Assessment (GPA) and the Annual National Assessment (ANA) in 2008, to improve teaching and learning. At the time of the study the Department of Basic Education (DBE) has not yet guided the schools officially how to use the results and the district participating in the study used innovative measures to assist the schools. During semi-structured interviews, the district coordinator and principal, head of department and Grade 3 Literacy and Numeracy teachers at each of the two schools helped us understand how they interacted with the results. Several reasons were given why neither of the two schools used the GPA results. The ANA results were more useful for the classroom and the district and both schools considered them in part for planning their intervention strategies for the following year. Both exercises were new to the schools and at the time of the study the DBE had not yet provided teachers with guidance on how to use the test results to improve teaching and learning. As a result the two schools studied made very little use of the ANA scores, while the GPA results were found by the teachers to be of no assistance. Instead both schools relied on their internal assessment practices. The DBE have started to address the lack of guidance on how to use the results in 2011.

No description available.

This qualitative ethnographic study explored the various ways a team of early childhood teachers made sense of, and used, an assessment framework based on learning dispositions and formative assessment for assessing children’s learning. In the late 1980s and early 1990s traditional methods for assessing children were being significantly questioned. The development in 1996 of Te Whāriki, the early childhood curriculum, signalled a re-form of assessment practices in the early years. This reform involved a major shift in thinking and practice for teachers who worked in early childhood education. The teachers in this study were already beginning to change their assessment practices to reflect learning dispositions and formative assessment. This study focused on the theoretical and policy framework that reflected the shift toward teachers being encouraged to adopt these new ways for assessing children’s learning Multiple sources of data collection included individual interviews, a group interview, an analysis of documents including relevant policies, staff meeting minutes and Learning Stories written by three of the teachers over a six-month period. Findings revealed that the ways in which the teachers in this study made sense of, and used, the dispositional framework depended on how they viewed the purposes of assessment and their role as teachers. The study also explored some of the consequences of teachers adopting the dispositional framework when they were already experienced in other forms of assessment practice. The significance of self-directed professional development was also highlighted. Implications for management include the need to consider that the theoretical concepts associated with shifting from a developmental approach to a dispositional focus requires extensive time, resources and a team that is committed to change.

Students are rarely explicitly taught how to develop their writing within a subject discipline, as there is usually a focus on teaching content. However, academic writing, and in particular Academic Reflective Writing (ARW), is very challenging for most students. In this study, a series of three embedded writing development interventions were trailed with successive cohorts of postgraduate Nursing students writing a summative 4000 word piece of ARW. The interventions included the use of example texts to make task requirements more explicit, formative peer feedback on draft texts and facilitating increased dialogue between staff and students regarding expectations of this task. Overall the interventions represented a shift towards assessment for learning. Quantitative results showed a decrease in the number of students investigated for plagiarism, a rise in pass rates and mean grades, and an increased uptake of academic supervision over the three cohorts. In addition, complementary findings from a self-selected focus group interview indicated that respondents perceived the writing development activities to be very useful. In particular, the formative peer and tutor review of written drafts, was valued. However, a limitation of this pragmatic mixed method study was that the three cohorts were non-equivalent. Despite this, it is argued that, as ARW is so complex, disciplinary academics should embed explicit guidance and scaffolding in their teaching in order to enhance written reflection and learning. Failure to do so may lead ARW to become an exclusive educational practice leading to unintentional plagiarism and poor written reflection on practice.

This essay approaches the different kinds of feedback that teachers in Spanish give to their secondary level students in Sweden. The purpose of the study is to investigate how feedback is perceived by students and how students would like feedback to be. Classical studies about assessment divide feedback into two categories: formative feedback and summative feedback. Our study intends, on the one hand, to analyze if students perceive receiving one of these kinds of feedback more than the other. On the other hand, the study intends to find out if students prefer summative or formative feedback. Furthermore, we aim to analyze if there is a link between the students´ perceptions and preferences and their level of proficiency in the Spanish language. The study was carried out with 190 students from Småland (Sweden) that were studying Spanish as a foreign language at school. We used questionnaires in order to gather information about the feedback they get in their Spanish lessons and the feedback they personally prefer. The results of the study show that students do perceive receiving more summative feedback than formative feeback. The students who perceive a higher reception of formative feedback are those who have a higher proficiency in Spanish, and this fact was proved to be statistically significant. The results of the study show as well that students like to get formative feedback as much as summative feedback. Nevertheless, the higher achivers do prefer getting formative feedback in a higher grade than the lower achievers, even though this could not be proved as statistically significant.

This thesis investigates upper secondary students’ usage of scientific and colloquial language through a custom-designed game. The aim of the game is for the participants to, without any time limit, explain chemical concepts using other words than the one written on the playing card so that the partner is able to guess what the target concept is. During the audio recorded game sessions the students showed usage of scientific and colloquial language as well as a blend of these two linguistic resources. The students also used metaphors and helpwords in some measure together with a linguistic resource that seems to border to spontaneous metaphors and helpwords, here referred to as ‘phonetic metaphors’. These phonetic metaphors seem to lack a direct connection to the chemical meaning of the target concept in return for its phonetic connection to the concept. It though seems like the students’ usage of these different linguistic resources may support meaning making processes as well as memorization processes. The thesis concludes with a discussion according whether this game, if used professionally and thoughtfully, aligns with the guidelines for Assessment for Learning specified by the Assessment Reform Group and whether it may function as a tool for assessment for learning in practice.

The students participating in my development work will work with a process book for handicraft studies. In the beginning of their studies, the students need practical knowledge about the development of the profession itself, but they also need to be challenged and learn how to solve problems on their own which will help them gain a deeper knowledge of the subject.     I focus on open questions to create a process with the students. This process is created when working with Solution-Focused-Education. Through “assessment for learning” we can help the students to improve their self-assessment and understanding of the learning process. Assessment for learning also requires a communication between student and teacher, student and student and between teacher and teacher. The process book is to be used where communication and dialog already exist between the teacher and the student, as a way to enhance the knowledge. By using this kind of teaching method I have grown as a teacher. I have also felt that the students have gained a greater understanding for the craft work and have acquired a new way of embracing the knowledge. The student’s development has become more personal and the “tacit knowledge” has been more visible through the written communication. Key words: Solution-Focused-Education, Assessment for learning, process book, communication. / En processbok inom hantverket är vad eleverna i mitt utvecklingsarbete kommer att arbeta med. I starten av en utbildning behöver eleverna stora kunskaper om hur yrket kommer att utvecklas men framförallt behöver eleverna utmanas och tränar på att lösa många problem själva för att ha möjlighet att lära sig mer om ämnet Fokus ligger på öppna frågor för att skapa en process hos eleverna. En process med eleven skapas när man arbetar med lösningsinriktad pedagogik förkortat LIP. Genom den formativa bedömningen kan man skapa plats för elevens självvärdering och förståelse kring lärprocessen. Formativ bedömning förutsätter även att man skapar kommunikation mellan elev och lärare, elev och elev och mellan lärare och lärare. Processboken används där en kommunikation och dialog sker mellan lärare och elev för att locka fram och stärka kunskaperna. Genom användningen av den här typen av undervisningssätt har jag utvecklats som lärare. Men jag har även upplevt att elevens förståelse för det nya hantverket har stärkts och lockat fram ett nytt sätt att se på kunskapen. Elevernas sätt att utveckla sig på har jag sett mer personlig och den tysta kunskapen har blivit lite mer synlig genom en skriftlig kommunikation. Nyckelord: Lösningsinriktad pedagogik, formativ bedömning, processbok, kommunikation

The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore three questions regarding formative assessment (FA) and Student-Involved assessment strategies among five middle years teachers in Saskatoon Public Schools. The questions were one, what were the beliefs of the teachers regarding formative assessment and student involved assessment? as well as two, what were their perceptions about attitudes of students, parents, and the community about these innovative assessment practices? and thirdly, what did the teachers believe would support teachers in taking up formative assessment and student-involved assessment? The five participating teachers had varying lengths of service ranging from five to over twenty-five years. Teachers were interviewed in a semi-structured style during one forty-five minute interview, each. Teachers were provided with sample prompts in order to facilitate the conversation. Teachers reported using FA and student involved assessment strategies with mixed results. Teachers used strategies and modified them on occasion to suit the learning conditions, to allow for time constraints, or to accelerate the pace of instruction. Teachers also reported using FA and student-involved assessment strategies primarily in subject areas in which they felt most comfortable and relied on more traditional summative assessments in subject areas in which they were less comfortable. Teachers stated there were varying degrees of support from colleagues, school based administrators, and school division consultants. The support generally disappeared if the school based administrator whose emphasis was FA and student-involved assessment left the school for a different assignment. Some participants reported taking initiative to pursue FA of their own accord, but were left to roll out the initiative on their own. Teachers described mixed results with other stakeholders in these processes as well. Generally parents and students were less interested in FA and student-involved assessment and showed a preference for summative evaluations such as percentages and letter grades. Implications of these findings are that teachers are not appropriately trained in student assessment and support for formative assessment is inconsistent. Students are often omitted from the unpacking of curricula, are not accountable for collection of their own assessment data and are not held responsible to act upon any formative assessment feedback in order to improve their learning. This study led to the following definition of formative assessment: formative assessment is the demonstration by students they can act upon descriptive feedback to show they have achieved a learning outcome regardless of mode (oral, written, performance, etc.).

Följande arbete handlar om bedömning som ett pedagogiskt verktyg för att främja elevers lärande och kunskapsutveckling, en så kallad formativ bedömning eller bedömning för lärande. Arbetets forsknings- och litteraturgenomgång behandlar, utifrån syftet, vilka förutsättningar som krävs för en formativ bedömning och hur lärare kan arbeta med en sådan bedömning. Skolans styrdokument förespråkar en formativ bedömning, varpå undersökningens syfte är att beskriva hur denna bedömning upplevs av elever för att kunna analysera och påvisa vilka förutsättningar eleverna ges till att utveckla sitt lärande. Utifrån arbetets inriktning fokuserar undersökningen på elevers upplevelser av den formativa bedömningen i de samhällsorienterade ämnena, i grundskolans tidigare år. Arbetets syfte är uppdelat i de preciserade frågeställningarna: Vad innebär det att arbeta med formativ bedömning? Hur upplever elever bedömningen i de samhällsorienterade ämnena? På vilka sätt blir eleverna involverade i bedömningsarbetet i de samhällsorienterade ämnena? Undersökningen genomfördes med fokusgruppsintervjuer, med totalt 15 elever i årskurs 5-6 uppdelade i fyra olika fokusgrupper. Resultaten av fokusgrupperna visar att de formativa inslagen i bedömningsarbetet i de samhällsorienterade ämnena överlag lyser med sin frånvaro. De förutsättningar som krävs för den formativa bedömningen upplevs inte i större utsträckning i dessa ämnen utav eleverna, vilket behöver förändras om bedömningsarbetet ska kunna främja elevernas lärande och kunskapsutveckling. / The following assignment is about assessment as a didactic tool to promote pupils learning and knowledge development, called formative assessment or assessment for learning. The assignments research and literature review describes, according to the purpose, the preconditions for a formative assessment and how teachers can work according to this. The schools governing documents indicates a formative assessment, upon which the research purpose is to describe how this assessment is experienced by pupils to be able to analyze and show what conditions are given to the pupils to develop their learning. The research focuses, based on the direction of the work, on pupils experiences of the formative assessment in civics in elementary school. The assignments purpose is divided into these following questions: What does it mean to work with formative assessment? How do the pupils experience the assessment in civics? In which ways will the pupils be involved in the assessments of civics? The research was conducted with focus group interviews, a total of 15 pupils in grade 5-6 were divided into four different focus groups. The result of these groups shows that the formative components of assessments in the civics generally are absent. The conditions required for the formative assessment is not experienced to a greater extent in these substances out of the pupils, which needs to be changed if the assessment process are to promote the pupils learning and knowledge development.