Man In India, 96 (1-2) : 39-47 © Serials Publications
Address for communication: Rohaya Talib, Faculty of Education, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia,
Malaysia, E-mail: rohayatalib@utm.my
ASSESSMENT FOR LEARNING : SUPERVISORY FEEDBACK
PRACTICE IN HIGHER EDUCATION
Rohaya Talib, Hawa Syamsina Md Supie, Mohd Zaki Kamsah,
Hamimah Abu Naim and Sanitah Mohd Yusof
Assessment for learning is a term used to denote a continuous assessment of student’s progress
with accompanying feedback to improve learning. So, this paper aims to investigate the assessment
feedback (AFB) practices among supervisors in one of Higher Education (HE) institutions in
Malaysia on three specific dimensions; Timeliness, Meaningfulness and Specificity. It also
examined the significant mean difference of perceived Supervisory AFB practices in relation to
postgraduate (PG) students’ gender, mode of study (MOS) and field of study (FOS) using cross-
sectional survey design. A total of 306 PG students who were currently pursuing their research
studies have been selected using multistage cluster sampling technique. A self-developed instrument
known as Supervisory Assessment Feedback Questionnaire (reliability index .92) which consisted
of 38 items was used to collect the data. Overall result shown that Supervisory AFB practices
were at the highest level for Meaningfulness (M=4.35, SD = .69), followed by Timeliness (M=4.35,
SD =.69) and finally Specificity (M=3.85, SD= .53). The AFB forms practiced among supervisors
resulted in verbal form (M=2.87, SD= .69) higher compared to written (M=2.77, SD= .71)
meanwhile the PG students’ preferences were in both. Besides, the supervisory AFB practiced
seems to be significantly differed on gender factor. In summary, these results revealed some
insight to be considered in order to establish an effective Supervisory AFB practice in Malaysian
HE.
Keywords: Assessment for Learning, Supervisory Assessment Feedback Practice, Higher Education
Introduction
Assessment for learning (formative assessment) is vital to ensure the quality of
teaching and learning particularly in Higher Education (HE). The continuous/
regular mode of checking student’s progress with accompanying feedback is to
improve the student’s performance. Basically, the aim of feedback is to assist the
gap between the actual level of performance and the anticipated learning objective
to be spanned (Lizzio & Wilson, 2008). Within the socio-constructivist paradigm,
feedback is seen as facilitative which involves establishment of comments and
suggestions to empower students to make their own particular amendments and
through the dialogue which helps students to advance with firsthand comprehension.
According to Berry (2008), when assessment is for learning, it takes a greater
significance to incorporate social communication between the instructor and
students while Brown (2004) stated that assessment for learning is fundamental
when the impacts of feedback practices are based on progressiveness as opposed
to being judgmental.