A Study On Monitoring Of School-Inside Testing

My research is based on an assumption that a perfect testing system must to be a balance one. The balance is fulfilled by many kinds of system arrangement, however this dissertation concern on two of them: (a) The balance must be based on the restriction, must be fulfilled by the balance between the practice and the monitoring of test. (b) The information need of many kinds of governance level about student's achievement must be met, and the balance is just among national education quality monitoring, the local high stake testing and the school-inside testing.The focus of my dissertation is the construction of the model of the school-inside testing monitoring system. Based the assumption above, I try to answer how, who and rely on what to construct the model of the school-inside testing monitoring system. There are four research area from these three questions: to reconstruct the quality standards of the school-inside testing, to develop school-inside testing monitoring mechanism, to create an independent organization on school-inside testing monitoring, to improve teachers' assessment literacy.In prologue, I suggest that test is merely a tool which can be used to improve or obstruct the educational reform. To make test improve education, there must be effective monitoring. In this part, I define the topic, content and methods of my research.Chapter One discusses the value, status and problems of school-inside test. In today's testing management there is an important trend that is to develop a balance test system. The balance means that the different level in testing governance is balanced, that is to say that the central government, local and the school have the equal right on test business. School-inside testing has its value and important status in the testing system. In China, the balance in testing management is lost; school-inside testing is just a part of the external testing system and the quality is poor, then the school-inside testing monitoring should be a vital part in testing monitoring system. This chapter concentrates on the context of the test monitor and the definition of the research.In Chapter Two, I focus the reconstruction of the standards of the school-inside test quality. Some of the test quality standards are based on psychometric and can not match the educational assessment, and either the quality standards of the large-scale test. The practice and theory of the reconstruction of standards bring us a lot of important insight in reconstruction of the school-inside testing standards. However, two trend in educational assessment, that is Standards-Based Assessment and Assessment for Learning, make curriculum validity and consequential validity become very important, they are also the foundation of quality standards of school-inside testing.Chapter Three explores the development of the school-inside testing monitoring mechanisms. The law can not fulfill itself; the perfect standards should be well implemented. The implement of the school test monitor needs system tools. The monitoring of the high-stake tests, monitoring of the testing on districts and school level in Nebraska state, American, and monitoring in social public business (protection for consumers, for example) can bring some insights for the construction of the model of the school-inside testing monitoring system. The school-inside testing monitoring mechanism includes: review mechanism, supervise mechanism, allege mechanism and the reporting mechanism.Chapter Four considers the creation of independent testing monitoring organization. The potential auditor of school-inside testing includes: government, teachers, students, parents and the publics. In review of the history, there are some problems in these auditors, so to create an independent testing monitoring organization is an alternative now. This trend becomes more and more obvious since the public management movement. However, the function of the independent testing monitoring organization is limited in China, the better alternative is the cooperation in school-inside testing monitoring between independent testing monitoring organization and the government.In Chapter Five, I suggest to improve the teachers' assessment literacy. The school-inside testing monitoring system is a quality guard system; teachers (besides school leaders) are the deciders of the school-inside testing quality, so they are the important body of school-inside testing monitoring. Teachers' assessment literacy are very poor, they can not take the responsibility of the testing monitoring or the testing quality assurance, because we can not know the importance of the teachers' assessment literacy in teaching, and either in teachers preparing, then the teachers do not have monitor ability. Then the improvement of the teachers' assessment literacy is the key parts of the school-inside testing monitoring system. To improving the teachers' assessment literacy, we must to remove the obstructer in teachers' development, to improve our teacher education program, and change the teachers' daily assessment practice.