This study investigated the Senior High School (SHS) teachers’ formative assessment practices in the Mampong Municipality of Ghana. Three research questions guided the study: What is SHS teachers’ knowledge of formative assessment? What are SHS teachers’ formative assessment practices? How does formative assessment contribute to improvement in teaching and learning? Stratified and simple random sampling methods were used to select 80 teachers from the four public SHSs in the Municipality for the study. The study used a questionnaire for data collection. The study revealed that about half of the teachers lacked the conception of formative assessment and its sub-concepts. Generally, the teachers were involved in certain practices which unknown to them were formative assessment practices. They saw these practices as norms and daily routines that needed to be done as part of the teaching and learning procedures. To them, these practices contributed to improvement in teaching and learning. From the findings, the researchers recommended that, to increase the understanding of SHS teachers on formative assessment and its sub-concepts, pre-service teacher training must place much emphasis on the theory and practice of formative assessment and in-service training activities should be organised for teachers already in the field. Stakeholders of education need to give this the needed support.
Keywords: Assessment, Continuous Assessment, School-based assessment, Senior High School, Summative Assessment, formative assessment practices
