2.8 Strategies of monitoring
2.8.1 Assessment
Assessment as a strategy of monitoring teaching and learning can provide information to leadership and other stakeholders to make informed decisions (Southworth, 2004; Bush &
Glover, 2012). There is consensus among scholars (Southworth, 2004; Du Plessis, 2013) that
Page | 20 monitoring involves collecting, analysing and interpreting data depicting classroom situations. Locally, the Department of Education through the National Protocol for Assessment (DBE, 2011c) stipulates that all classroom activities must be recorded, analysed and interpreted to assist learners, parents and other stakeholders in making decisions about progress of learners (DBE, 2011c). This definition of assessment indicates the significance of assessment as a monitoring strategy.
Assessment directed at obtaining learning progress can indirectly give information on teaching. The DBE (2011b) gives further clarity on monitoring when stipulating that it should provide an indication of learner progress and achievement in the most effective and efficient manner. It is, further, asserted that adequate evidence of achievement ought to be collected in various forms of assessment in order to enhance learning experience (DBE, 2011b, c).
Implicitly, assessment as a strategy of monitoring can be conducted to evaluate teaching effectiveness.
According to CAPS documents (DBE, 2011a, b), learners’ performance must be recorded and reports communicated to the learners and other relevant stakeholders. Recorded information should inform the teachers, the SMT members and other stakeholders about learner performance. The main purpose of recorded information, however, is to provide regular feedback to learners. The learner scores reflecting performance should be obtainable from the teacher files which are obtainable from teachers on request at all times for accountability and moderation purposes (DBE, 2011c). Teacher files are indirectly used to verify the progress made by teachers and learners in teaching and learning, respectively. Nonetheless, it is not clear whether school management has internalised and took ownership of monitoring work. Informal observations made in the Ilembe District which were presented in Chapter One suggest laxity of the SMT members’ monitoring conducted to appease the Departmental officials. The Annual National Assessment (ANA) is beginning to be a wake-up call for managers to be involved in instruction. Serious monitoring appears to be conducted only in Grade 12 classes in preparation for the final secondary school examination. In this regard, a comparison with New Zealand, a country with similar situations like South Africa can provide clarifying perspectives.
New Zealand and South Africa, among other respects, share an assessment philosophy framework which encourages assessment for learning. In South Africa, the National
Page | 21 Curriculum Statement (NCS) embraces assessment for monitoring and reporting and also as a driving force for learning with the ultimate goal of assisting learners to make judgements about their own performance (DBE, 2011b). The initial part of monitoring and reporting is a significant reminder to school leadership about their management roles. The emphasis of monitoring is on feedback to the learners after assessment in order to enhance the learning experience thus guides further learning. In addition, the Protocol for Assessment calls for the use of recorded data for feedback to the learners, the parents, the teachers and other stakeholders, in order to plan for teaching and learning activities as well as other interventions deemed necessary (DBE, 2011c).
On the other hand, New Zealand, in order to ensure quality, participates in national while emphasising school-based assessments in education as part of its system of monitoring. The government has invested immensely in advanced computer technology in order to ease the effects of compulsory national testing (Archer & Brown, 2013). Furthermore, Archer and Brown (2013) who explored New Zealand assessment framework, note that the government of New Zealand realised that monitoring learning activities can be cumbersome to both the teachers and school leadership. Through the Ministry of Education’s Strategic Policy the government has developed a toolkit, named the Assessment Tools for Teaching and Learning software abbreviated as AsTTle. As the name suggests this toolkit is aimed at providing support to teaching and learning and is carried through advanced electronic software systems.
These measures facilitate and ease possibilities of regular assessment and quicker feedback at a school level.
Although New Zealand as a country participates in national and international assessments to ensure quality but their system is firmly entrenched in school based assessments. At school level in New Zealand, more often feedback to the stakeholders is ongoing and public comments are encouraged. This creates an increased climate of trust, confidence and competence in which national monitoring purposes are supported by school-based assessments which are clearly evident in the daily lives of teachers (Archer & Brown, 2013), contrary to the South African situation where the SMT members tend to monitor in preparation for national assessments, for instance the NSC examination or ANA. In spite of the levels of economic developments in these two countries, New Zealand being a developed country while South Africa is a developing one but there are lessons to be noted for the New Zealand approach. However, infrastructural challenges in South Africa cannot be overlooked
Page | 22 although these countries both encourage assessment in education as part of the monitoring and quality assurance strategy.