Teachers’ Conceptions of English Language Assessment in Iranian Junior High Schools

Since the 2012 Iranian Education Reform, major changes have been applied to the English assessment system and methods. After a decade, the efficacy and validity of these revisions and modifications are yet unclear. In the Iranian education system, teachers are the main agents of designing and conducting English assessments. It is believed that analyzing their beliefs and attitudes will provide valuable information regarding the current language assessment status. Therefore, the present study was concerned with investigating the Iranian EFL junior high school teachers’ conceptions of English assessment. It also attempted to explore the relationship between teachers’ experiences and their conceptions of assessment. To this end, the data were collected using the abridged version of the Teachers’ Conception of Assessment (TCoA) Inventory. Ninety-six English teachers of junior high schools in Iran were selected through convenience sampling to answer the TCoA inventory. The results of the descriptive statistics indicated that “Improvement” (M=4.19) and “School Accountability” (M=4.05) were endorsed more than other purposes of assessment. Furthermore, the Kruskal-Wallis test showed that the EFL teachers’ conceptions differed by their level of teaching experience only in the case of the “control” construct. The low experience group of English teachers had the least mean score for the controlling aspect of assessment. The results of the study were used to suggest practical implications to educational policymakers to improve the English assessment in the Iranian junior high schools.