The Ethics of Assessments in the Classroom

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Recommended: Essays on ethical issues in assessment in education

Examining teacher ethical dilemmas in classroom assessment

Pope, N., Green, S., Johnson, R., & Mitchell, M. (2009). Examining teacher ethical dilemmas in classroom assessment. Teaching and Teacher Education , 25 (5), 778-782.

Précis

Pope, Green, Johnson, & Mitchell (2009) suggest that we need further research and discussion around ethics and assessment in the classroom. Many ethic dilemmas are faced by teachers however little has been researched around ethics and assessment. Teachers spend one third of the time in assessment related activities and do so with no clear guidelines of the ethical dilemmas involved. There is a need for pre-service teachers to undertake training and discussion around ethical conflicts and dilemma around assessment as it appears that ethical reasoning does not develop on the job. The group study of in service teachers highlighted the dilemmas around ethics and assessment. In discussing a scenario where there is no right or wrong answers teacher responses were grouped based on two principles of ‘do no harm’ and ‘score pollution’. Although responses varied greatly, score pollution rated highest with institutional requirements vs. students needs being the greatest concern around conflicting elements. Ethical conflict based around institutional expectations is described as unavoidable, as institutions deal with the abstract and teachers deal with the person. Within Institutional requirements teachers see ethical conflict where rules from the governing body do not match with what the teachers sees as meeting the need of the student. As demands of large-scale assessment increase so does the focus on the practice. Students need to be the priority and teacher’s lack formal training. Research, cle...

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...ics/codeofethics.stm

O’Neill, J., & Bourke, R. (2010). Educating teachers about a code of ethical conduct. Ethics and Education , 4 (2), 159-172.

Peterson, M. (2005). The Ethical Dilemmas of High-Stakes Testing and Issues for Teacher Preparation Programs. Journal of College and Character , 6 (7).

Pope, N., Green, S., Johnson, R., & Mitchell, M. (2009). Examining teacher ethical dilemmas in classroom assessment. Teaching and Teacher Education , 25 (5), 778-782.

Schmeiser, C. (1995). Ethics in Assessment. Eric Digest .

The Joint Committee on Standards for Educational Evaluation. (2003). The student evaluation standards; How to improve student evaluations. Thousand Oaks, California: Corwin Press.

Winthrop University. (2011, August). Faculty & staff profiles. Retrieved August 2011, from Winthrop University: http://www.winthrop.edu/coe/faculty/default.aspx?id=11015

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