Assessment practice has changed enormously with student agency and pedagogic voice (student voice about teaching and learning) linked with assessment for learning over the last few years in Aotearoa/New Zealand schools. In this article we share leader voices (with pseudonyms) and findings from our research into dimensions of assessment leadership. These leaders shared deliberate aspects of their leadership practice that focused on leading assessment learning and development in their schools. The following examples of practice and the table detailing the features of ‘assessment capable leadership’ provide an opportunity to consider what this looks like in your school or Kāhui Ako. Assessment capable leaders draw on their pedagogical leadership and understanding of assessment principles to support teacher learning. Trina, principal of a regional secondary school, describes how she embeds formative assessment practice in her work with teachers.
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I don’t consider that I teach general secondary students anymore. I consider that I am teaching other teachers. I try to use similar practices with them. In other words, getting them to reflect on their practice – giving them an opportunity to look at how they are [teaching] – to actually get them to look at their learners first before they [start], and then, use that to inform how they’re going to teach. Assessment capable leaders foster understandings around the principles of assessment design, such as ensuring that the assessments are fit for purpose, and that approaches to assessment have a positive impact on children’s learning and wellbeing. Kim, assistant principal of an urban primary school, is critical of narrow approaches to assessment. I get a bit hung up because people just think of assessment like one running record or a maths test or whatever, so assessment should be more global than that to see the whole child and their progression. Our graduate profile, which we have a progression for, is not only about those basic competencies in your basic literacies, but it is about that global perspective of a child and how far they have come, and how they are able to be resilient when things get tough in their learning . . . It comes back to that design for learning and to individualise that learning for each individual child to make it just the right amount of challenge. Assessment capable leaders not only demonstrate curricular and pedagogical capability but also the intention to foster teacher assessment literacy. Bella is principal of a small regional full primary. She highlights that leaders should not assume that teachers are assessment literate. She signals the importance of the principal’s role in ensuring staff are taught to analyse data and to triangulate evidence in order to generate a balanced and dependable overall teacher judgement. You have to strategically plan for modelling assessment to staff and you actually have to teach staff how to assess . . . So, you can’t make assumptions and wonder why the data is not shifting. You actually have to teach staff how to analyse data and teach them to understand what the data is telling them, understand which test does what. We know that assessment capability takes time to build. Eliza is principal of an urban intermediate school. She highlights that there is a time consideration around building teacher assessment capability with teachers who have different levels of assessment knowledge.
ent capable ol? Jennifer Charteris
It’s building the capability. For five years we’ve been working really, really hard on the constructional process . . . It takes time and energy and commitment to establish teacher practice and build that knowledge with teachers of different ages and stages and understandings. So, this is the biggest challenge – just the amount of work it takes to build that real clarity around assessment and build teacher consistency. Assessment capable students exercise the power to initiate learning and voice critique when an approach to learning is not working for them. In the classroom they co-produce agency in learning together and are encouraged to be learning resources for one another. Helen is principal of a rural school. She describes how she challenges the power structures in classrooms in her leadership work. For me it’s leading so that children can be in control of where they are at and where they are heading, and making sure that the teachers realise that. ‘Hey, this is something the kids can do’. So, it’s leading that change, really. Table 1. sets out features of assessment capable leadership. We generated these features through our research speaking with 38 Aotearoa school principals. The leadership features are not the characteristics of a single leader but produced through the relationships between principals, teachers, and students (and where relevant parents/whānau and the community).
Dianne Smardon
Table 1. Key assessment capability practices Features of assessment capable leadership • Leadership that encourages power sharing to develop student assessment capability • Leadership to address unethical and inappropriate student assessment • Leadership that encourages children to initiate of their own learning (agency) and use assessment so that they coconstruct learning with others • Leadership that leverages clear assessment principles on a day to day basis • Leadership that ensures accuracy of assessments • Leadership that develops teacher data literacy • Leadership that promotes assessment professional learning focus • Leadership that uses accurate information to enhance curriculum and teaching and strengthens teacher assessment capability • Leadership in assessment policy development and implementation • Leadership in promoting the collaborative use and communication of student achievement information • Leadership in critiquing different approaches to assessment • Leadership in ensuring balance in assessment approaches • Leadership that facilitates teachers’ leadership • Leadership that fosters collaboration around the use of data • Leadership for managing tensions between mandated accountability (reporting) and school-based decision making
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• Leadership for enabling a positive school assessment culture
These assessment capability practices could be a useful framework for you to explore with your colleagues. You could take a formative approach, where you use it to identify areas to further strengthen in your school. It could provide a reflective tool to think about how you and your colleagues can foster teacher leadership in these areas. We hope this article sparks a conversation around practices that support leader, teacher and student assessment capability in your school. Acknowledgement The authors wish to thank the Principals across New Zealand who contributed to this research.
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