The implementation of standard-based performance assessments in Malaysian primary schools / Rubiah Dalail

Today’s 21st century learning has witnessed a global shift in assessment which has observed a move from assessment of learning to assessment for learning in schools. Henceforth, beginning 2011, the Ministry of Education (MOE), Malaysia implemented the standard referenced educational system that witnessed the integration of formative assessment into teaching and learning practices. However, the implementation has been inhibited by problems such as misconceptions on the intention of the transformed policy, readjustment to teaching and learning approaches, alteration to assessment approaches, adopting a new reporting format and issues surrounding the validity and reliability of scorings and monitoring aspects. Moreover, research has further indicated that integrating assessment tasks into daily teaching and learning activities has been a challenge. Since, there is scant empirical evidence of significant studies conducted in Malaysia, this study aimed to investigate the implementation of standard-based performance assessment in Malaysian primary schools. Specifically, the study sought to examine teachers’ knowledge of standard-based performance assessment, their practises and challenges they faced in implementing standard-based performance assessment. Finally, the study also explored strategies to overcome these challenges. The study involved a total of 2 headmasters, 291 teachers and 530 students from two Grade A national primary schools from the state of Selangor in Malaysia. The respondents were selected based on a mixed random sampling technique. Data was collected through the use of measures such as survey, tests, students’ performance reports and interviews. The findings displayed that teachers knowledge was at the beginner level and they were confused between obsolete and current knowledge. Teachers’ practices in formative assessment were at the mediocre level and they lacked the connection necessary to conduct effective standard-based performance assessment. Teachers admitted they spend only half of their time practicing the needs of assessing students. The Cohen’s kappa statistical test indicated that teachers’ scoring in formative environment was subjected to low reliability. The result of inter-rater scoring agreement indicated that most of the teachers overestimated their students’ performance level. In essence, the findings of the study show that teachers across demographic variable were approximately undecided to define the problems they faced as challenges. Most of their problems were dominated by their belief factor. Consequently, there were many limitations on strategies undertaken by teachers and headmasters as it was confined to tasks assigned by the authority namely district and state educational offices. The findings of this study imply that better professional development and training need to be provided so that teachers can effectively adopt and implement quality standard-based performance assessment system into their 21st century classrooms.