A dog of a QCAT : collateral effects of mandated English assessment in the Torres Strait
Exley, Beryl E. (2010) A dog of a QCAT : collateral effects of mandated English assessment in the Torres Strait. Australian Journal of Indigenous Education, 39, pp. 1-10.
This paper critiques a 2008 Queensland Studies Authority (QSA) assessment initiative known as Queensland Comparable Assessment Tasks, or QCATs. The rhetoric is that these centrally devised assessment tasks will provide information about how well students can apply what they know, understand and can do in different contexts (QSA, 2009). The QCATs are described as ‘authentic, performance-based assessment’ that involves a ‘meaningful problem’, ‘emphasises critical thinking and reasoning’ and ‘provides students with every opportunity to do their best work’ (QSA, 2009). From my viewpoint as a teacher, I detail my professional concerns with implementing the 2008 middle primary English QCAT in one case study Torres Strait Island community. Specifically I ask ‘QCATs: Comparable with what?’ and ‘QCATs: Whose authentic assessment?’. I predict the possible collateral effects of implementing this English assessment in this remote Indigenous community, concluding, rather than being an example of quality assessment, colloquially speaking, it is nothing more than a ‘dog’.
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|Item Type:||Journal Article|
|Keywords:||QCATs, Torres Strait Islander education, literacy assessment|
|Subjects:||Australian and New Zealand Standard Research Classification > EDUCATION (130000) > SPECIALIST STUDIES IN EDUCATION (130300) > Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education (130301)|
|Divisions:||Current > Research Centres > Office of Education Research
Current > QUT Faculties and Divisions > Faculty of Education
Past > Schools > School of Cultural & Language Studies in Education
|Copyright Owner:||Copyright 2010 Beryl E. Exley|
|Deposited On:||13 Sep 2010 01:06|
|Last Modified:||23 Oct 2013 01:48|
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