Teacher involvement in high-stakes language testing

Abstract

Over the past few years, High-Stakes testing has grown in importance in a number of international contexts. In some cases, it is used as the primary means of assessing students and evaluating teacher performance. As a powerful educational driver, High-Stakes testing is sometimes seen as divorced from the reality of the classroom, so much so that 鈥渢he pressures of assessment systems鈥�pay little heed to consistency or coherence between teachers鈥� visions of desirable education and those articulated in High-Stakes examinations鈥� (Atkin 2007, p. 57). These pressures not only affect classroom practices but they also disempower teachers. In fact, Reich and Bally (2010) argue that High-Stakes testing makes teachers 鈥渋ncreasingly feel that they are at the mercy of forces beyond their control鈥� (p. 181). This has led to accusations that High-Stakes testing engenders social and educational inequality (Au 2008), and that it is mechanistic and reductive (Allen 2012). High-Stakes tests have been branded 鈥渙ppressive鈥� because they 鈥渦ndermine quality teaching and learning, and鈥�make students vulnerable in the classroom to a narrowly focused curriculum in which teachers teach to the test鈥� (Grant 2004, p. 6). High-Stakes tests have the power to change teachers鈥� instructional practices (Hoffman et al. 2001) and to influence the way they respond to students鈥� learning needs (Flores and Clark 2003; Pennington 2004). Partly for these reasons, Nichols鈥� (2007) review questions whether High-Stakes tests enhance student learning. [Excerpt from the Introduction by Daniel Xerri and Patricia Vella Briffa]