The mediating role of textbooks in high-stakes assessment reform

Whenever high-stakes assessment/curriculum reforms take place, new textbooks appear on the market. These textbooks inevitably play a significant mediating role in the implementation of any reform and on teaching and learning. This paper reports on a small-scale study which attempts to investigate the role of textbooks in the mediation of a high-stakes assessment reform: the introduction of school-based assessment (SBA) as part of the 2007 Hong Kong Certificate of Education Examination in English Language. The introduction of SBA represented a major challenge for teachers accustomed to a system of external examinations and 'teaching to the test'. The paper examines the extent to which SBA textbooks align with the SBA principles and rationales. It then investigates the extent to which teachers rely on textbooks to prepare their students for SBA and the kind of materials that teachers feel they need most in order to prepare their students for SBA.