Teachers' Roles in Large Scale Literacy Assessment

[Extract] In this paper we focus on the contribution of teacher decision-making in large-scale literacy assessment in Australian schools. Throughout the discussion, the term 'decision-making' is understood to refer to a range of inputs to the planning and implementation of literacy assessment programs, including judgments that teachers make about students' literacy learning progress and outcomes. We describe and analyse a sample of current national and State literacy assessment developments that make available quantitative and qualitative information about literacy outcomes to a range of stakeholders. In the analysis we offer a conceptual framework of four broad categories of literacy assessment practices: cohort testing, survey sampling, progress mapping, and school-based assessment. Within each category, an example of an assessment program is discussed to highlight the points at which teacher decision making occurs, and the points at which teacher decisions intersect with the decisions and actions of others involved in the program. The paper is timely given the heightened interest in school accountability, especially as this is linked to government-initiated testing to monitor and report on literacy standards.