Teachers’ Perception of Alternative Assessment Practices in Public Senior High Schools in Sefwi Wiawso Municipality, Ghana
Abstract
This study explores teachers’ perceptions of alternative assessment practices in public senior high schools in the Sefwi Wiawso Municipality, Ghana. The study is grounded in a positivist paradigm and informed by constructivist learning theory and cognitive development theory. A descriptive survey design and a quantitative approach were employed. The study population comprised 210 teachers from public senior high schools in the municipality, all of whom were selected using a census approach. Data were collected using a self-constructed questionnaire aligned with the research objectives, with reliability coefficients ranging from 0.88 to 0.97. Descriptive statistics (frequencies and percentages) and inferential statistics (one-sample t-tests) were used to analyse the data. The findings revealed that teachers held favourable perceptions of alternative assessment. Additionally, teachers reported using the results of alternative assessments to design appropriate learning strategies, encourage students to take responsibility for their learning, and promote self-reflection. The study recommends improving the teacher-student ratio to reduce large class sizes, which make alternative assessment tasks time-consuming and challenging. Also, school authorities should allocate sufficient funds to heads of departments to procure essential logistics and resources, and to finance alternative assessment activities and projects that support students' knowledge and skills development
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