Lessons From School-Based Implementation of a Research-Based Formative Assessment System

• In Event: 31.075 - Promises and Challenges in Implementing Research-Based Formative Assessment in a Large Urban District: Mixed Methods Findings

Abstract

Purpose
This paper discusses findings from a year-long qualitative investigation of implementation of the formative assessment system in five K-8 urban schools. This research was designed to examine the context conditions that influence implementation of the formative assessment system, as well as how participants experienced the array of tools, resources and supports in different school settings.

Perspectives
Existing research on educational reform suggests that implementation of educational interventions involves a process of mutual adaptation that is “shaped over time by interactions between project goals and methods and the institutional setting” (McLaughlin, 1976, p. 340-341). The current study explores the way in which participants in different school contexts across the district negotiated the formative assessment system as part of local efforts to improve math achievement. The research questions guiding this study included: How do different school actors interpret the formative assessment tools, resources and supports? How do these factors influence implementation? How does implementation change over one year? What school factors appear to influence implementation?


Methods
To understand how local school conditions affect teachers’ opportunities to integrate ongoing formative assessment into practice within specific settings, this investigation used a qualitative case study approach. We constructed a rubric to guide a systematic evaluation of components deemed emblematic of adoption of the intervention, accounting for teacher practices in relation to the formative assessment cycle, engagement in grade-level meetings, and structural conditions within schools (e.g., school leadership support) that proved important for implementation in the earlier experimental study. In addition to evaluating participants’ responses to these areas, we coded and analyzed their responses to questions about the tools, resources, and supports provided to facilitate successful implementation.

Data sources included focus group interviews and individual interviews with teachers and school-based leaders at three time points across the year. We also conducted observations of in-school grade level meetings and school-based professional development sessions that occurred throughout the year. Field notes and exit memos were created from each school visit.

Results and Significance
The case studies highlight a range of school-based factors that both support and constrain a implementation. Issues pertaining to accountability, teacher autonomy, leadership support, amount of training, and incongruencies between teachers’ sense making of the formative assessment system and the district’s expectations around mathematics instruction were shown to influence OGAP implementation. These factors are illustrated in case studies through the lens of the school leaders’ role.

The findings can be useful for developers and providers of the formative assessment system as well as school districts in thinking about the commitments required to implement new interventions and customizing supports for school conditions. For the research community and policy makers, the findings add to the implementation and educational change literature about why and how content-focused educational interventions thrive or fail in complex urban educational settings.

Authors

• Adrianne Flack, University of Pennsylvania

• Katrina Morrison, University of Pennsylvania

• Brittany Hess, Consortium for Policy Research in Education

• Jill Pierce, Research for Action