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Testing, drilling and learning: what purpose does the Grade 3 Territory-wide System Assessment serve?

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Abstract

In Hong Kong, pupils at Grades 3, 6 and 9 are required to take the Territory-wide System Assessment (TSA). TSA is a low-stakes standardized assessment, tracking pupils’ attainment of the basic competence levels in English, Chinese and Mathematics. By design, TSA does not constitute part of individual pupils’ school results, but generates assessment information which monitors teaching and learning in school as a quality assurance mechanism. Despite its low-stakes nature, key stakeholders remain skeptical about its rationale, purpose and usefulness, especially when it comes to ranking school performance. Because of this, this paper examines the extent to which the Grade 3 TSA could serve its purpose to enhance teaching and learning and promote constructive alignment of assessment and learning. The paper begins with an overview of the international assessment arena, followed by a discussion on the Hong Kong assessment reform landscape. Then, the paper reviews three issues in TSA, namely pedagogical, societal and political concerns. Next, it addresses whether TSA has become a high-stakes test; whether it brings about drilling; and whether it facilitates positive learning. Lastly, three sustained recommendations as to how the Grade 3 TSA could concurrently serve its evaluative, pedagogical and learning purposes are provided.

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Notes

  1. School sponsoring bodies refer to the founder of a school or a group of schools which lays out vision and mission of school development. They are stand-alone, legal entity which does not directly involve in school daily operation, but have executive power to regulate how the senior management teams implement policy-level administration in their affiliated schools.

  2. Initiated by the Education Bureau, External School Review is a quality assurance mechanism to monitor teaching, learning and administration in Hong Kong public-funded schools. When schools are selected for review, they are visited by a team of external reviewers and Education Bureau personnel who examine school-related documents, conduct lesson observations, and have discussions with pupils, teachers and parents. Upon completion of the exercise, a final report is generated for school’s response before it is endorsed.

  3. Fully introduced in 2007, English School-Based Assessment evaluates senior secondary students’ oral proficiency based upon a designated list of reading and viewing materials. The assessment, performed by the students’ own teachers in Grades 11 and 12, is counted 15% of the total weighting of the English Language in the Hong Kong Diploma of Secondary Education Examination. English School-Based Assessment is one recent assessment reform which attempts to positively synergize summative and formative assessment.

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Funding

Funding was provided by the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China (Grant No. HKBU 22400414).

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  1. Department of Education Studies, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong

    Ricky Lam

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  1. Ricky Lam
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Correspondence to Ricky Lam.

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Lam, R. Testing, drilling and learning: what purpose does the Grade 3 Territory-wide System Assessment serve?. Asia Pacific Educ. Rev. 19, 363–374 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12564-018-9523-z

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