Formative assessment in English language teaching: exploring the enactment practices of teachers within three primary schools in Singapore

ABSTRACT

This article explores formative assessment enactment practices of six lower primary teachers within three primary schools in Singapore. Using a case study approach, data from interviews and lesson observations were examined to determine teachers’ formative assessment enactment practices and the influences to their enactment attempts. Findings from the study suggest formative assessment implementation to be complex when the teachers conceptualized and then enacted their practice. The teachers were found to play out processes and practices related to formative assessment based on interpretations they held. The teachers’ institutional, social and cultural settings were also found to influence their enactment practices. The study discusses evidences drawn before outlining implications for formative assessment implementation in schools.

KEYWORDS:

• Formative assessment
• enactment
• teacher practices
• english language
• Singapore

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Kiren Kaur

Dr Kiren Kaur is a lecturer in the English Language and Literature Department at the National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. She specialises in methodology courses in the university. She has considerable teaching experience with young EL learners as well as with pre-service and in-service teachers in teacher development. Her areas of interest cover oral communication instruction, reading and writing pedagogy and assessment literacy and she has written articles and book chapters in these areas of interest.