Abstract
This chapter focuses on the important role of educators' beliefs as they shape and consequently influence their teaching and learning approach from the planning to the implementation stage. Such beliefs were investigated using collaborative action research (CAR) on the belief-to-practice relationship of prospective teacher users of formative assessment (FA). A nine-month qualitative study with three Maltese state primary school teachers indicated that even with the transformation in the teachers' understanding, knowledge, and practice about FA, their belief was that success of FA depends on the learner motivation, hence shifting the problem onto the learner when it might well have been a problem with the system shaping the teaching and learning context. The point that will be made here is to look at FA as an inclusive teaching and learning approach if its strategies are used to attend to student diversity.
TopIntroduction – The Context And The Study
Malta is a small island state with very few natural resources. Consequently, the human capital is an essential government priority (Scicluna, 2014), which has been acknowledged in the current National Framework Strategy For Education 2014-2024, (Ministry for Education and Employment, 2014, p. 3), aiming at reducing the achievement gap, supporting the educational achievement of at-risk-of-poverty students, increasing participation in lifelong learning and eventually, in higher education. In this regard, Wiliam (2011a, 2011b) sustains that any educational system which is seriously interested in raising learner achievement should seek to include the formative assessment (FA) principles within teaching and learning. This is further supported by Expert (2020) who reaffirms that FA, or as it is interchangeably used Assessment for Learning (Afl), aims at improvement in learning. Malta’s NCF has embraced this advice as it strongly recommended the use of Assessment for Learning (Afl) procedures within the compulsory education cycles (Ministry of Education and Employment, 2012). In being recommended, FA practice is projected on an encouraged and voluntary basis meaning that schools can opt out of such practice. Further support for this recommendation has come from Rose (2015, p. 45) in the Malta Audit Report by the European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education which stated that an “overall emphasis on high-stake exams systems and competition still predominate….and little evidence of AfL with limited possibilities for learners to take control over their learning permeated across schools.” Despite the international and local recommendations, the main challenge remains the Malta Union of Teachers’ directive on FA practice, which is stating that to-date there has been no agreement on this (Malta Union of Teachers, 2020). With the union’s backing, some schools are opting out of such practice. It could be that this dilemma has resulted from the rush for the implementation of FA has overshadowed the teachers’ beliefs about this teaching and learning approach, a gap pointed out by Marshall and Wiliam (2005). In fact, there have been consistent findings by Satariano (2015), (Said Pace, 2018, 2020) and Giordimaina (2020) about the incongruence in the teachers’ level of understanding of FA and its practice.
In a concerted effort by the Directorates for Education to consolidate their position on Afl, the importance of such practice has also been flagged in the Policy on Inclusive Education Schools: Route to Quality Inclusion, (Ministry For Education and Employment, 2019) as the approach within the Teaching and Learning theme that could contribute to the provision of opportunities for the learners to reach their full potential within an optimum learning environment.
Although this study has taken place in the Maltese Primary school context, the process adopted should be of interest to the international fora as it explains how a collaborative action research has been implemented to affect change on the beliefs about FA of a small group of teachers. Given the shared international concern about the level of assessment literacy amongst teachers, (Darling-Hammond & McCloskey, 2008; DeLuca & Klinger, 2010; Jonsson et al., 2014; Department for Education & McIntosh, 2015; Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, 2015; Shewbridge et al., 2013; Volante & Fazio, 2007), this chapter should be of interest to a wider audience than the Maltese.
Key Terms in this Chapter
Pedagogy: The act of teaching used in class or in any other learning environment.
Beliefs: Personal understanding and thoughts about a phenomenon.
Motivation: The voluntary will or interest of the individual to engage in an activity.
Educational Reforms: Changes within the educational sphere with the intent to ameliorate the quality of teaching and learning within a country.
Inclusive Formative Assessment: FA is inclusive because through the success criteria which outline a scaffolded path towards the learning intention, the right feedback can be given to the student to close the gap to move to the next step in the learning trajectory.
Assessment for Learning: Assessment used for the purpose of learning thus taking place during the process of learning rather than at the end of the learning episode.
Teaching and Learning: The activity that goes on in a learning environment between the teacher or the most knowledgeable person and the learner.
Formative Assessment: Assessment that not only stops at the judgement stage of the evidence of learning but follows on that by providing feedback to the learners and by checking whether that feedback has been acted upon to close the gap.
Student’s Competences: The student’s ability to do something.