General Resources for Assessing Student Learning
Resource lists include both print and online resources about assessing student learning.General Assessement Resources
Show me general assessment resources
Hide- Disciplinary Research Strategies for Assessment of Learning. [Ebert-May, Batzli and Lim, 2003] This article from BioScience discusses the uses of systematic strategies derived from discipline-based science research to design problems to assess students' understanding of the carbon cycle in two introductory biology courses for science majors. Diagnostic problems provide data on students' understanding and misconceptions. In-class instruction, problems, and laboratories were designed to focus on student misconceptions and provided formative assessment. Assessment strategies enabled the collection, analyzing, and reporting of data that will influence future instruction. (citation and description)
- Assessment - A Way of Thinking about Learning - Now and in the Future.. [Heady, 2000] This article from the Journal of College Science Teaching explains the phrase, "What is Assessment?" The article lists principles of assessment including standards and goals, trust, and incorporation of assessment research into practice and policy as the ideal components of assessment practice. The author also recommends the use of scoring rubrics for student assessment. (citation and description)
- Research Methodologies in Science Education: Undergraduate Research Mentoring, Teacher Workshops, and K-12 Outreach Activities. [Kurdziel and Libarkin, 2002] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education examines which characteristics are central to quality research experiences for undergraduates and science teachers, what mentors can do to improve the research experiences of undergraduates in the laboratory, and what strategies have been demonstrated to be effective for the professional development of science teachers. The article also discusses ways to determine the effectiveness of teacher workshops and the types and usefulness of outreach activities between scientists and the K-12 educational community. (Full Text Online)
- Research Methodologies in Science Education - Strategies for Productive Assessment. [Libarkin and Kurdziel, 2001] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education provides guidelines that help interpret published education research, apply this research to a classroom, and engage in research endeavors. The purpose of this article is to serve as a medium for highlighting the most important, useful, or easily applied techniques, with additional guidelines for what to look for in literature reviews. (Full Text Online)
- Research Methodologies in Science Education - Assessing Students' Alternative Conceptions. [Libarkin and Kurdziel, 2001] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education explores what some of the barriers are to achieving a higher level of student understanding in the geosciences. It discusses instructional strategies that will help students achieve a conceptual understanding of fundamental geoscience concepts and how to assess whether students have reached a deep conceptual understanding. (Full Text Online)
- Research Methodologies in Science Education: The Qualitative-Quantitative Debate. [Libarkin and Kurdziel, 2002] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education discusses when it is appropriate to use qualitative techniques and when quantitative techniques are more suitable to a study. Topics that are used to help illustrate the difference between techniques include assessment objectives and mixed methodology research. An example study is provided to help the reader understand the differences. (Full Text Online)
- Research Methodologies in Science Education: Qualitative Data. [Libarkin and Kurdziel, 2002] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education describes the work of a graduate student in geology who used a qualitative approach in an introductory geology class to determine how the course affects student learning. The article includes a brief description of what qualitative data is with examples of different approaches to collecting this data. The author concludes with a checklist to aid in the design of a qualitative research. (Full Text Online)
- Development of an Assessment of Student Conception of the Nature of Science. [Libarkin, 2001] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education provides information about a study that used a Likert-scale instrument to determine the effectiveness of science courses for non-majors. Results from 991 students permitted a statistical analysis of this instrument's validity and reliability. Examples from two courses, one laboratory-based and the other grounded in collaborative learning, are provided to demonstrate the utility of these types of scales in assessing both prior knowledge and course outcomes. (citation and description)
Geoscience Assessment Resources
- Effects of Student-Generated Diagrams versus Student-Generated Summaries on Conceptual Understanding of Causal and Dynamic Knowledge in Plate Tectonics. Gobert and Clement, 1999 This article examines the beneficial effects of student-generated diagrams as assessment tools versus student-generated summaries on conceptual understanding on the topic of plate tectonics. (citation and description)
- NSF Geosciences Beyond 2000: Understanding and Predicting Earth's Environment and Habitability. This National Science Foundation (NSF) webpage presents a document outlining a long-range strategy to advance and integrate scientific knowledge across the broad range of geosciences. Developed by the Advisory Committee for Geosciences, the report discusses planning activities to evaluate opportunities and requirements for research, education, and infrastructure. Topics discussed include the context for a decade of discovery, a vision for the decade ahead, the research agenda, the education agenda, and the implementation agenda. (more info)
- A Comparison of Approaches and Instruments for Evaluating a Geological Sciences Research Experiences Program. [Burnley, Evans and Jarrett, 2002] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education presents efforts to construct a new survey instrument to detect changes in knowledge of science and attitudes regarding science. Participants for this study are enrolled in a summer Research Experiences for Undergraduates program run by the Atlanta Consortium for Research in the Earth Sciences. The article studies the use of open-ended questions regarding the nature of science. (Full Text Online)
- Climate Change: Confronting Student Ideas. [Ebert-May et al., 2004] This journal article from Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment discusses student-centered, inquiry-based instructional strategies and learning goals for helping students learn about climate change. In this study, students confront their current ideas about global warming by exploring the question, "Where does the carbon go?" Assessments probe the students' understanding and misconceptions before, during, and after instruction to evaluate the effectiveness of teaching and learning. (citation and description)
- Visualization for learners: A framework for adapting scientists' tools. [Edelson and Gordin, 1998] This article in Computers and Geosciences addresses the value of scientific investigation tools for education. Tools developed for experts can become educational assets for learners, but must be bridged for use by the learners. The article discusses bridging strategies including motivation context, activities, data selection, interface and support for learning. These strategies are designed to provide learners with enough of the hidden context and knowledge that experts bring to their tasks to enable them to use scientific tools as learning resources. In the article, this framework is applied to the design of ClimateWatcher, a scientific visualization environment for the investigation of issues related to global climate and climate change. ClimateWatcher is now in use in middle school, high school and university settings. (citation and description)
- Research Methodologies in Science Education: Visualization and the Geosciences. [Libarkin and Brick, 2002] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education provides information about what methods are most useful in teaching students visualization skills, as well as what types of future research can ensure that accessible educational strategies will be effective for enhancing spatial and visualization skills. (Full Text Online)
- Design and Assessment of an Interactive Digital Tutorial for Undergraduate-Level Sandstone Petrology. [Milliken et al., 2003] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education discusses a digital interactive tutorial that provides undergraduate students with a 'virtual microscope' for learning sandstone petrology. The goal of the ‘virtual microscope’ is to give students a similar learning experience viewing thin sections that they would gain if they were using an actual microscope. The educational value of the instrument was assessed by comparing the results when one class used the tool for lab exercises and another class did not. (Full Text Online)
- Design, Implementation, and Assessment of an Earth Systems Science Course for Secondary Teachers. [Owens et al., 2004] This article in the Journal of Geoscience Education provides information about a course offered at the University of Maine's Department of Earth Sciences for secondary science teachers. This course integrated instruction in curriculum design, pedagogy, assessment and research design to help teachers teach more effectively in earth systems science. (Full Text Online)
Other Relevent Resources on Assessment
- Guiding Principles for Mathematics and Science Education Research Methods: Report of a Workshop . This report presents a brief review of research methods employed in recent studies and proposes a number of guiding principles for designing and evaluating future research proposals in the area of mathematics and science education. (more info)
- User-Friendly Handbook for Mixed Method Evaluations. This National Science Foundation (NSF) on-line handbook provides information and guidelines about planning and managing useful evaluations for grantees of the NSF's Directorate on Education and Human Resources. The handbook was created to provide information on qualitative techniques and discuss how they can be combined effectively with quantitative measures. Mixed method evaluations have been found to be effective. This resource includes an annotated bibliography and glossary. (more info)
- Epistemologically Authentic Inquiry in Schools: A Theoretical Framework for Evaluating Inquiry Tasks. [Chinn and Malhotra, 2002] This article in Science Education presents a theoretical framework for evaluating inquiry tasks in terms of how similar they are to authentic science. The article is divided into two parts: A theoretical analysis of authentic scientific reasoning, and the application of this theoretical framework to provide a quantitative analysis of two groups on inquiry tasks in science textbooks and developed by education and psychology researchers. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of analysis for research, assessment, and instruction. (citation and description)
- Gauging Students' Learning in the Classroom. [Heady, 2001] This article from the Journal of College Science Teaching describes one teacher's experience with using Elaine Seymour's Student Assessment of learning in her introductory biology classes. (citation and description)
This is a collection of resources intended to help faculty in teaching or designing courses and activities related to observing and assessing student learning. Resources include activities, tools, literature and references. Contribute a resource to this collection.