Influences of criteria-based assessment on English language teachers’ teaching practices: a case of one mainstream secondary school in Kazakhstan

Abstract

The Kazakhstani educational system has undergone substantial changes in terms of altering both curriculum content of education and the assessment system, which has been shifted from 5-scale (traditional) to criteria-based assessment. Subsequently, teaching practices had to be adapted to new assessment in order to correspond to changes in the teaching and learning process. Therefore, teachers experience considerable changes in various aspects of their practices including vision of assessment, collaboration, professional development and mastering own professional practices. However, there has not been any empirical study to explore how teachers understand the newly introduced criteria-based assessment and its influences on their teaching practices as well as the challenges they might face in implementing it in their classroom. Thus, this qualitative research was conducted to explore how the criteria-based assessment has influenced and shaped the teaching practices of English language teachers in one of the mainstream schools in Kazakhstan. The research questions explore typical teaching practices before implementation of criteria-based assessment, alterations in practices due to new assessment system and attitudes of teachers towards criteria-based assessment. The purposeful sampling was used to select participants of the study. Five English language teachers of both genders and different teaching experience participated in semi-structured interviews and provided useful insights about the influences of criteriabased assessment on their teaching practices. The study found out major changes in such teaching practices as understanding of assessment, personal vision building, classroom teaching practices, collaboration and professional development. The collected data showed that despite the challenges of criteria-based assessment’s implementation, teachers became more united and established new collaboration practices, they shifted classroom practices to active learning and teachers’ role has been changed to facilitator of students’ learning. However, more experienced teachers still do not believe in the effectiveness of criteriabased assessment even though they could see its positive impact on the teaching and learning process. The study makes recommendation for policy and practice in relation to assessment practices in schools.