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Understanding the connections between large-scale assessment and school…
Understanding the connections between large-scale assessment and school improvement planning.
Abstract Keyword
School administrators
Teaching and administrative experience
Large-scale assessment knowledge.
Professional development
Instructional planning
Capacity building
Instructional leadership.
Introduction
Every state and province administers external tests which serve as a broad benchmark of district and school effectiveness.
Using widely reported performance data, administrators and teachers are compelled to improve their instructional planning to the benefit of student, schools, and society in general.
Large-scale assessment and School improvement
At the policy level, the results are meant to hold school accountable by measuring the degree to which specific standards are meant.
The latter is usually accomplished by noting the percentage of students who meet or exceed a specified state or provincial standard in reading, writing and mathematics.
Context of study
Student are tested once per year in grades 3 and 6 in reading, writing, and mathematics.
High school students are tested in grade 9 mathematics and complete the Ontario Secondary School Literacy Test in grade 10.
Theoretical framework
The importance of disaggregation of large-scale assessment results and the integration between large-scale and classroom-based assessments for school improvement planning are fundamental data literacy skills noted by provincial assessment office and also by the broader literature.
Method
Participants
Two school districts in southern Ontario,Canada.
Research site
Two districts located in the Golden Horseshoe- an area around the western end of Lake Ontario, mainly the south-central region if the province.
Data collection
The semi-structured interviews entailed 12 lead questions and lasted approximately 60 minutes.
Data analysis
Analysis of interview followed a constant comparison approach.
Results & Analysis
Level two response
The results suggested little evidence that secondary administrators were disaggregating external assessment data for specific student group.
Level three response
This participant expressed an awareness of the impact to weave assessment data with a whole lot of other areas in which we gather data and evaluate data,assess it,and take it into the classroom.
Level one response
In various contexts all of the Secondary Administrators indicated that the large-scale assessment data was factored into their school improvement plans.
Discussion
The results of this study suggested that few educators conceptualized the use of large-scale assessment results in a manner consistent with data-integrated decision-making.
Conclusion
Faced with increasing accountability , schools and districts are implementing at variety of methods for gathering, storing, analyzing,and reporting different from of data, but they are moving forward with paltry amounts of guidance.
The present study affirms this criticism and suggested direction must be provided to enhance educators use of large-scale assessment data.