Beyond formative assessment : a study of the practices of two primary school teachers

Abstract

This study was carried out to seek to understand the formative assessment practices of two experienced teachers; to establish the impact of being immersed in a top-down model of education and the extent to which personal and professional biographies influence approaches to formative assessment. Through adopting a case study approach that valued the voices of the children in the research process, this study elaborates some of the findings of earlier research and highlights important new findings. These include: the sophisticated relationship between a teacher's values and beliefs, the top-down demands of the National Literacy Strategy (NLS) and approaches to formative assessment; the key role played by specification of attainment in such a top-down model and the notion of three discernible feedback types defined as 'phatic', 'evaluative' and 'analytical'. In addition, a more comprehensive model of assessment is offered that demonstrates the above. This is conceived as 'Reflective Assessment'. Although this study is small in scale, it is anticipated that the issues raised will be of interest to policy makers, researchers interested in the relationship between the NLS, formative assessment and teacher development, and to primary practitioners themselves.