From 1983 until 2011 Grade 12 students in the Canadian province of British Columbia were required to write provincial exams in a wide variety of academic subjects, including Biology 12, Chemistry 12, and Physics 12. These government-administered exams may be considered “high stakes” in that they counted for 40% of a student’s mark, were used in part to determine post-secondary admissions and scholarships, and the publicly-available exam results were used in highly publicized school “ranking” systems. A large volume of research literature suggests high stakes exams of this nature dictate the manner in which courses are delivered as teachers feel obliged to “teach to the test” in order to maximize the grades students receive on these exams.
A major gap in the literature appears to be an examination of the effects on teacher behaviours and practices when a long-standing high-stakes testing program is eliminated. The decision made by the British Columbia Ministry of Education to remove provincial exams in secondary science at the Grade 12 level in August of 2011 created a unique and original opportunity to examine teacher pedagogical practices following the removal of subject-specific exams. Specifically, the question considered in this investigation centred upon the effect(s) the elimination of provincial exams in Biology 12, Chemistry 12, and Physics 12 had on the pedagogy and work environment of teachers in one British Columbia school district.
This investigation followed case study methodology. The primary source of data was interviews with teachers who had experience teaching the three aforementioned courses in both the time of mandatory exams and following exam elimination. Interviews were semi-structured and focussed on the effects of the removal of Grade 12 exams on teacher pedagogy and general practices, classroom resource and time allocation, relations with colleagues, perceived student responses to courses, and exam data usage.
The findings from this research suggest that, contrary to popular discourse, exam-generated data is not a valuable pedagogical resource for teachers and a high-stakes exam is not required to ensure full curricular coverage by teachers. In fact, the results suggest the opposite: curricular coverage is enhanced in the absence of a high-stakes exam. Further, not having to spend classroom and external time preparing students for exams has allowed teachers to implement and explore a greater diversity of pedagogical avenues not utilized during the time of exams. Teachers also spoke of reduced pressures in the absence of an exam. Finally, findings of this investigation suggest the presence of an exam greatly affected the way teachers both assessed and motivated students, effects that continue to have repercussions following elimination of provincial exams. / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:uvic.ca/oai:dspace.library.uvic.ca:1828/6321 |
| Date | 08 July 2015 |
| Creators | Heese, Brian |
| Contributors | Blades, David W. |
| Source Sets | University of Victoria |
| Language | English, English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Thesis |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | Available to the World Wide Web |
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