The Nexus Of The Covid-19 Pandemic And Online Formative Assessment

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic brought much attention to the fact that teachers and students do not necessarily have to be physically present for teaching and learning to take place. Online teaching and learning have now become an integral part of the Ghanaian educational system. This leaves teachers with no option but to adopt an online mode of assessment to evaluate their lessons. Thus, this research investigates the perceived significance of online formative assessment, students’ attitudes towards online formative assessment and how they affect its acceptance, and teachers' attitudes towards online formative assessment and how they influence its adoption. A descriptive quantitative method was used to collect and analyze data from Mansoman Senior High School in the Ashanti region of Ghana, West Africa. The adoption of an Online Formative Assessment Model was proposed and tested using Partial Least Square-Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM). The findings revealed that teachers’ perceived significance of online formative assessment will not necessarily compel them to adopt it in class but students’ perceived significance of it will cause them to adopt it. Also, the teachers would like to adopt the online formative assessment when they have a positive attitudes towards it but students’ attitudes toward online formative assessment are inconsequential to their use and adoption of it.