Deconstructing pre-service teachers’ perceptions of assessment in initial teacher education

With this study we explored 1st-year pre-service teachers’ (PSTs’) perceptions of assessment in an initial teacher education programme at a South African public university. Data were generated through a cross-sectional survey completed by 221 1st-year PSTs during an orientation programme held approximately 2 months after university entry, at a stage when participants had had only limited exposure to formal coursework on assessment. Descriptive analysis of closed items and thematic categorisation of open-ended responses showed that most participants associated assessment with tests, marks and the measurement of performance. Few understood assessment as formative, reflective or participatory. Interpreted through the apprenticeship of observation, the findings suggest that prior schooling experiences and a performance-oriented assessment culture continued to shape PSTs’ early conceptions of assessment. The study contributes to scholarship on assessment literacy by showing how inherited views of assessment may constrain the development of assessment as pedagogy. We argue for deliberate teacher education interventions that foreground formative assessment, feedback literacy and critical reflection on prior schooling experiences.