How do teachers use national test results? Exploring testing policies, teacher practice and principals facilitating

Author(s):

Ann Elisabeth Gunnulfsen(presenting / submitting)Astrid Roe(presenting)

Conference:

ECER 2017

Network:

26. Educational Leadership

Format:

Paper

Session Information

26 SES 06 B, Teacher Leadership and Teachers' Dealings with Educational Leadership

Paper Session

Time:

2017-08-23

15:30-17:00

Room:

K6.02

Chair:

Sigríður Margrét Sigurðardóttir

Contribution

This paper aims to explore Norwegian lower secondary school teachers’ use of, and attitudes towards national test results at the local school level. Whether it is within high-stake or low-stake accountability contexts, teachers and school leaders seem to have varied experiences, knowledge and beliefs about how to make use of national test results. The accountability aspect of national testing policies and school leaders’ interference relate with studies in the field of accountability policies, which have found that teachers’ beliefs about and capacity for data use are disconnected to each other. (e.g. Datnow & Hubbard, 2016; Young, 2006; Ingram, Seashore Louis & Schroeder, 2004). Some experience they lack the ability to use the results to inform instruction, others find the test results irrelevant for their students (Author 1, In process).

The logic of accountability-driven development involves school leaders to interfere to improve teacher practice so that student performance comes closer to accountability targets (Hallinger, 2005). Hence, the question how teachers actually experience school leadership and requirements for making use of national test results at the local school level needs to be further investigated.

Accordingly, the paper addresses the following questions: (1) How do teachers perceive their principal’s facilitating work with national test results? (2) How do the teachers use the national test results - individually and in teacher teams? And (3) What attitudes do the teachers have towards national tests?

The Norwegian Accountability Context

National tests were introduced in Norway for the first time in 2004. Due to compelling criticism from researchers and public opinion to reduce the developing amount of league tables based on the results, the tests were reintroduced in Norway in 2007 after one year’s break in 2006 (Roe, Lie et al. 2005; Mausethagen, 2013). The relaunching of the tests took place with far less criticism, even though the public league table practice was continued. The relaunching included adjustments regarding reduction of subjects tested and the levels of students receiving the tests. These adjustments were made in order to meet the intention that the test results could serve as tools for formative assessment, and not only represent summative assessment.

Theoretical framework: According to Blase & Anderson (1995) the world of schools is a political world of power and influence, bargaining and negotiation. They claim that the micro politics of educational leadership affect the working world of teachers (Blase & Anderson, 1995). It has been stated that an important way to be effective in organizational settings is to cultivate and use one's social and political skill, and to build on the ability to influence, convince, and control others (Ferris et al., 2002; Mintzberg, 1983). The quality of school leadership is likely to be influenced by the degree of accomplished coherence between their own leadership agendas and the policy agenda set by the authorities (Youngs et al., 2011). In accomplished coherence, there is mutual influence and a principled combination of internal and external policy agendas (Seashore Louis & Robinson, 2012, p. 631). One of the reasons why reliance on outside-in approaches proves insufficient is that even when a policy is technically coherent or consistent it may not be experienced as such by school leaders and teachers in the local school (Honig and Hatch, 2004).

Method

This study is based on survey data from lower secondary teachers (N=176) in one Norwegian municipality. The population represents teachers in all the lower secondary schools in the chosen municipality. As selection criteria we looked at lower secondary public test scores in Norwegian municipalities. Based on national statistics of results on national tests, we selected a medium-sized municipality, which had during the last three years received a national and local reputation for doing systematic work on national test results. In the chosen municipality, the annual results have been compared with results from the ten largest municipalities in Norway, and the comparisons have revealed results in favor of this municipality. Although socioeconomic background varied, the majority of the population in this municipality represented a medium to high socioeconomic level. A total of 430 questionnaires were sent to all lower secondary teachers in the 14 lower secondary schools in a municipality known for having generally high score in national testing. We got 176 responses. In emails and in the comment field we received clarifications from teachers and school leaders about groups of teachers who were not relevant for the survey. We got corresponding responses on emails and in the comment field from the deputy managers who felt that they could not answer on behalf of the teachers or themselves. There is an average of three deputy managers in each school, and the selection was consequently reduced to approximately 300, which gave a response rate of about 55 %. In the analysis of the results we used the data program “Statistical Package for the Social Sciences” (SPSS). Firstly, we conducted an exploratory factor analysis to identify a possible set of latent constructs underlying the total set of measured variables, and to examine whether the concepts measured distinct/different aspects. Secondly, Cronbach's Alpha was used to estimate consistency within each concept. Thirdly, descriptive statistics were used to measure the distribution of responses for each item, and finally bivariate correlations were conducted to detect covariance between the teachers’ experiences with their principals and the teachers’ own practices and attitudes related to national tests. The results are based on the consistency within concepts regarding (1) ‘principals facilitating work with national tests, (2) teachers’ and (3) teacher teams’ work with national tests and (4) teacher-attitudes towards work with national tests.

Expected Outcomes

Different practices and high confidence Preliminary findings show that the teachers and teacher-teams, to a large extent, seem to make use of national test results differently. Their experiences with the principal’s facilitating work with national tests also varies. The teachers’ experience confidence from their principals in how they work with basic skills. However, it is not identified whether this confidence relates to or contributes to systematic work with national test results. Hence, confidence might as well be a case of indifference. Principals ‘clearness’ matters Moreover, the findings show that when the principals are perceived as facilitating with clear expectations and dialogue, it correlates highly with teachers’ systematic work with the test results. Equivalent results are illuminated regarding teacher-teams’ work with national test results. The ‘clearer’ the principal is, the more systematic the teachers and teacher-teams work with the results, and contrasting; if the principal is not clear about this work, the correlations are high regarding indifferent practice and attitudes to the work with national test results. This can be explained in the teachers’ and the principals’ perceived coherence of policy intentions (Youngs et al., 2011), and a question of power and influence (Blase & Anderson, 1995). National test results matter less on individual teacher level Mostly the test results function as a ‘trigger’ to focus on school quality at a collective level. Teachers and teacher-teams seem to perceive they lack information and understanding of how to use the results in the direct work with enhancing individual student learning. It seems to be a ‘hybrid accountability-situation’ in the Norwegian context. A focus on the school’s quality is triggered by the results. According to Mons & Dupriez (2014), this would for example be a matter of instructing the organization to confront their results to foster changes in practices, beliefs or identities.

References

Author 1, In review. Author 1 & Colleague, 2016 Blase, J., & Anderson, G. (1995). The micropolitics of educational leadership: From control to empowerment. Teachers College Press, Columbia University, 1234 Amsterdam Ave., New York, NY 10027. Datnow, A., & Hubbard, L. (2016). Teacher capacity for and beliefs about data-driven decision making: A literature review of international research. Journal of Educational Change, 17(1), 7-28. Ferris, G. R., Anthony, W. P., Kolodinsky, R. W., Gilmore, D. C., & Harvey, M. G. (2002). Development of political skill. Rethinking management education for the 21st century, 3-25. Hallinger, P. (2005). Instructional leadership and the school principal: A passing fancy that refuses to fade away. Leadership and policy in schools, 4(3), 221-239. Honig, M. I., & Hatch, T. C. (2004). Crafting coherence: How schools strategically manage multiple, external demands. Educational Researcher, 33(8), 16-30. Ingram, D., Seashore Louis, K., & Schroeder, R. (2004). Accountability policies and teacher decision making: Barriers to the use of data to improve practice. Teachers College Record, 106(6), 1258-1287. Lie, S., Roe, A., Kjærnsli, M., & Turmo, A. (2001). Godt rustet for framtida?: norske 15-åringers kompetanse i lesing og realfag i et internasjonalt perspektiv. Institutt for lærerutdanning og skoleutvikling, Universitetet i Oslo. Mausethagen, S., Skedsmo, G., & Prøitz, T. (2016). Ansvarliggjøring og nye organisasjonsrutiner i skolen – rom for læring? (Emerging ccountability and the introduction of new organisational routines in the school system: room for learning?). Nordiske organisasjonsstudier, 18(2). Mintzberg, H. (1983). Power in and around organizations (Vol. 142). EnglewooCliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Downloaded: 2. Desember 2016: http://digitool.Library.McGill.CA:80/R/-?func=dbin-jump-full&object_id=134841&silo_library=GEN01 Seashore Louis, K., & Robinson, V. M. (2012). External mandates and instructional leadership: school leaders as mediating agents. Journal of Educational Administration, 50(5), 629-665. Young, V. (2006). Teachers’ use of data: Loose coupling, agenda setting, and team norms. American Journal of Education 112(4), 521–48. Youngs, P., Holdgreve-Resendez, R. T., & Qian, H. (2011). The role of instructional program coherence in beginning elementary teachers' induction experiences. The Elementary School Journal, 111(3), 455-476

Author Information

Ann Elisabeth Gunnulfsen (presenting / submitting)

University of Oslo

Hokksund

Astrid Roe (presenting)

University of Oslo

Oslo

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