Malaysian science teachers’ conceptions and practices of assessment: school-based assessments within a high-stakes examination system

After a prolonged reliance on external exams as the cornerstone of qualifications, the Malaysian government has eliminated two standardised exams in favour of school-based teacher-made assessments. A survey of Malaysian science teachers was carried out to determine if their beliefs and practices of assessment were well-aligned with this responsibility. Four primary conceptions and five practice factors were identified using the Teacher Conceptions of Assessment (TCoA-III) and Practices of Assessment (PRAI) inventories. A total of 236 teachers provided some data, with just 140 providing complete data. Expectation Maximisation imputation was used to impute missing values. Structural equation modelling found seven statistically significant paths from TCoA-III to PRAI factors: improvement conception robustly predicted diagnostic and improvement practices; the student accountability conception predicted exam preparation and ignoring assessment practices; the irrelevance conception predicted ignoring assessment practices; and the school accountability predicted school accountability practices. These results had strong similarity to Chinese teachers who work in a public exam-oriented system, suggesting that Malaysian teacher-made assessments are not strongly formative.