Short Student Biography:
JOSEPH MUSYIMI MWANDIKWA was born in 1980 at now Kitui County. He went to Kaundu
primary school and did K.C.P.E in 1996.He joined TyaaKamuthale secondary school and did K.C.S.E in
1999.He then joined Thogoto teacher training college where he was awarded p1 certificate. He did his
bachelor’s degree in the University of Nairobi from 2011 to 2015. He was employed by teachers service
commission in the year 2005 up to now. In the year 2014 he was promoted to deputy head teacher and
2015 promoted to head teacher. He joined university of Nairobi for masters which he is about to graduate.
Project Summary
TITLE OF THE THESIS: INFLUENCE OF FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT ON ACHIEVEMENT IN BUSINESS STUDIES IN PUBLIC
SECONDARY SCHOOLS IN KITUI COUNTY, KENYA
Abstract:
Authentic formative assessment is a kind of alternativeassessment whereby teachers ask learners to
do real life activities to demonstrate right application of required knowledge and skills.Formative
assessment involves engaging in real world tasks or meaningful questions in which learners are
required to use knowledge and skills acquired to improve performance effectively and creatively.
Teachers assign learners tasks which are the same as the problems faced in real life
situation.Formative assessment helps teachers and learners identify what the learners can do
effectively and what they cannot do well. It is investigative in nature. Formative assessment requires
learners to make decisions on their own learning by answering the following questions; where do I
want to go? How far have I gone? How do I complete the journey? Formative assessment helps
teachers to know the progress of the learners and areas of difficulty. This helps teachers to make
instructional adjustments such as remedial teaching, varying methods of teaching and providing
learners with more engaging tasks. The mentioned activities lead to improved performance of
learners. The performance of business Studies has been dropping since 2013 to 2017 with means of
47.12 and 31.06 respectively. Still the performance is very poor in Mumoni Sub County. This
aroused the curiosity of the researcher to conduct the study on influence of formative assessment on
achievement in public secondary schools in Mumoni Sub County. The researcher wants to determine
whether assignments, feedback, continuous assessment tests and their frequency influence the
learner’s performance in Business Studies. The Vygotsky’s social constructive theory guided this
study. Vygotsky argued that human mind is constructed through interactions with the environment or
world. Vygotsky stated that, a child entirely dependents on other people during early stages as they
present variety of tasks and engaging the child in his or her sociocultural environment. This study
used mixed design that is descriptive research design and experimental design. A descriptive survey
design involves application of questionnaires or conducting interviews to a representative sample to
collect information from a common group. Pretest and posttest technique were used. The researcher
used stratified random sampling technique to select sample group. Descriptive survey research is
reported by use of frequency distribution tables, percentages and then tabulating them accordingly.
Teachers should vary their teaching strategies and also give authentic tasks to meet learners’
differences. Integration of teaching, learning and assessment helps learners to grasp new concepts
easily and apply them to solve real life problems. Teachers should offer timely feedback to learners
to know their strong and weak areas, make decisions on how to improve weak areas and evaluate
their progress. Feedback should always motivate learners to study tirelessly. It should provoke
students to learn. Assignments and continuous assessment tests should consist of authentic tasks
which gives learners an opportunity to practice learnt concepts. Assignments and CATs should
provide learners with chance to practice learnt skills and knowledge to solve real life problems in
order to construct new knowledge. Assignments and CATs should be offered in a friendly
environment to enhance motivation of learners to study Business studies. Business studies teachers
should offer variety of formative assessment techniques to motivate learners and enhance learning
process by providing a more focused application for learners. Teachers should provide a well-
designed assignments and CATs with carefully planned authentic tasks to motivate learners to learn
Business studies. To be effective all formative assessment tools should be informative. They should
help the teacher to monitor learner’s progress and point out areas’ students did not grasp the concept
well. They should identify student’s individual differences for the teachers to vary instructional
strategies to meet learner’s differences. Offering many formative assessments gives students an
opportunity to practice learnt concepts leading to mastery of the concepts hence improved academic
achievement. As students perform authentic tasks in solving problems in real world situation, they
construct new knowledge