DIGITAL LIBRARY
STANDARDS-BASED REFORM AND THE CHALLENGE OF 'LOOSE-COUPLING'
St. Patrick's College, Drumcondra (IRELAND)
About this paper:
Appears in: ICERI2011 Proceedings
Publication year: 2011
Pages: 4793-4803
ISBN: 978-84-615-3324-4
ISSN: 2340-1095
Conference name: 4th International Conference of Education, Research and Innovation
Dates: 14-16 November, 2011
Location: Madrid, Spain
Abstract:
It might be argued that countries, like Ireland, which tend to follow rather than herald international policy reforms, have the advantage of being able to learn from the experiences of the reform pioneers. In the case of standards-based reform, this could prove a wise course of action given the view of many eminent education commentators that increased performativity and accountability pose, not just issue-related problems about data analysis, warehousing, ‘teaching to the test’ and so forth, but challenges of the deepest and most fundamental sort about how schools are organised and led (Ball, 2003; Elmore, 2000; Lyotard, 1984). Significantly, it has been argued that as school systems try to operate in increasingly performance and accountability-driven environments, they need to learn “… not just different ways of doing things, but very different ways of thinking about the purposes of their work, and the skills and knowledge that go with those purposes” (Elmore, 2000, p. 35). This paper argues that this re-envisaging will necessitate a fundamental re-conceptualisation of teaching and learning, and, specifically, the role and function of formative assessment in transforming the pupil-teacher dialectic so that it is increasingly in line with social-constructivist principles.
Keywords:
Standards-based reform, school leadership, loose coupling.