Teaching and Learning Research Initiative. Available from: New Zealand Council for Educational Research. P.O. Box 3237, Wellington 6140 New Zealand. Tel: +64-4384-7939; Fax: +64-4384-7933; e-mail: tlri@nzcer.org.nz; Web site: http://www.tlri.org.nz
New Zealand lacks valid and reliable evidence-based schedules with which to observe teachers' assessment for learning (AfL) practices. To date, classroom assessment observation schedules have mainly been derived theoretically, used in developing countries with conditions different from New Zealand classrooms (Kanjee & Hopfenbeck, personal communications), or restricted to particular curriculum areas such as science and mathematics (Ruiz-Primo, 2017), literacy (Parr & Hawe, 2009), and writing (Parr & Gadd, 2016). In this project the authors piloted and modified an observation schedule, and evaluated its usefulness and suitability in the New Zealand primary school teaching context. This schedule, which is called the Developing and Evaluation Measures of Formative Assessment Practice (DEMFAP) observation protocol, was developed in the US from comprehensive video evidence of classroom assessment. Rather than seek to develop another observation schedule, the authors piloted, adapted, and tailored the DEMFAP to gather information about a small sample of New Zealand primary school teachers' AfL practices. In this project the authors used DEMFAP to investigate whether and how this observation schedule could inform New Zealand primary teachers' AfL practice, provide a platform for professional learning and development, and potentially be useful as a research schedule in the New Zealand context.
