Teachers’ Knowledge and Readiness towards Implementation of School Based Assessment in Secondary Schools

Abstract

<p class="apa">School-Based Assessment (SBA) was implemented in Malaysian secondary schools in 2012. Since its implementation, teachers have faced several challenges to meet the aims and objectives of the School-Based Assessment. Based on these challenges this study aims to find the level of teachers’ knowledge and readiness towards the implementation of school-based assessment (SBA). The study was conducted in 15 daily secondary schools in the state of Kedah, which is situated in the northern part of Malaysia, bordering Thailand. 155 teachers were randomly selected from a total of 260 teachers. This study used 2 questionnaires to assess teachers’ knowledge and readiness to implement SBA. The questionnaire was adapted from Alabah (2012) which was designed to assess the teachers’ knowledge (30 items) and readiness (35 items) on Nigerian teachers’ perception of SBA. This questionnaire used a 4-point Likert-type scale with strongly disagree e to strongly agree. The findings provide evidence that the knowledge of the teachers in terms of 5 dimensions, that is, conducting SBA, bands in SBA, knowledge of evaluating SBA, SBA procedural knowledge and knowledge of implementation of SBA. The overall mean (3.27) for the level of teachers’ knowledge towards SBA shows that all the teachers agree that they have the knowledge about SBA. In terms of readiness, the mean (3.09) shows that all the teachers agree that they are ready to implement SBA. The comparison of the two means suggest that teachers have relatively more knowledge but are less ready to implement the SBA. The implication here is that teachers feel that their level of knowledge is not complete and more initiatives need to be taken by the educational authorities so that teachers are more confident of their level of readiness.</p>

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“…Similarly, Fook & Sidhu (2006) revealed that the respondents in their survey study did not have sufficient knowledge to implement SBA effectively. In a more recent study, Veloo, Krishnasamy & Md-Ali (2015) found that, although the 155 teachers in their survey study claimed to be knowledgeable about SBA, they lacked sufficient knowledge to implement it. Concerns in carrying out SBA are also evident in other Asian countries.…”

“…Despite the many benefits of SBA (e.g., Clarke, Timperley & Hattie, 2001;Klute, Apthorp, Harlacher & Reale, 2017;Marsh, 2007;McManus, 2008) success to date in Malaysia has been hampered by a number of issues, including insufficient guidelines, lack of teachers' knowledge and time constraints (e.g., Abas, Rasali & Rahmat, 2013, Fook & Sidhu, 2006Majid, 2011;Malakolunthu & Hoon, 2010;Mansor, Leng, Rasul, Raof & Yusoff, 2013 ;Omar & Sinnasamy, 2017;Rashid & Jaidin, 2014;Sardareh, 2016;Veloo, Krishnasamy & Md-Ali, 2015). As a consequence, Abdullah, Idris, Hamzah & Sembak (2015) believe that only moderate levels of SBA implementation are presently occurring.…”