Constructing Explanations in Science: Informal Formative Assessment Practices Among Science Teachers of English Learners

Research in Science Education - Informal formative assessments (IFAs) are classroom interactions teachers use to gather information about their students’ learning, interpret it, and act on...     

Supporting Argumentation Through Students' Questions: Case Studies in Science Classrooms

This study explores how student-generated questions can support argumentation in science. Students were asked to discuss which of two graphs showing the change in temperature with time when ice is heated to steam was correct. Four classes of students, aged 12–14 years, from two countries, first wrote questions about the phenomenon. Then, working in groups with members who differed in their views, they discussed possible answers. To help them structure their arguments, students were given a sheet with prompts to guide their thinking and another sheet on which to represent their argument diagrammatically. One group of students from each class was audiotaped. Data from both students' written work and the taped oral discourse were then analyzed for types of questions asked, the content and function of their talk, and the quality of arguments elicited. To illustrate the dynamic interaction between students' questions and the evolution of their arguments, the discourse of one group is presented as a case study and comparative analyses made with the discourse from the other three groups. Emerging from our analysis is a tentative explanatory model of how different forms of interaction and, in particular, questioning are needed for productive argumentation to occur.     

Validation of Automated Scoring for a Formative Assessment that Employs Scientific Argumentation

Scientific argumentation is one of the core practices for teachers to implement in science classrooms. We developed a computer-based formative assessment to support students’ construction and revision of scientific arguments. The assessment is built upon automated scoring of students’ arguments and provides feedback to students and teachers. Preliminary validity evidence was collected in this study to support the use of automated scoring in this formative assessment. The results showed satisfactory psychometric properties related to this formative assessment. The automated scores showed satisfactory agreement with human scores, but small discrepancies still existed. Automated scores and feedback encouraged students to revise their answers. Students’ scientific argumentation skills improved during the revision process. These findings provided preliminary evident to support the use of automated scoring in the formative assessment to diagnose and enhance students’ argumentation skills in the context of climate change in secondary school science classrooms.     

Preparing Teachers to Make the Formative Assessment Process Integral to Science Teaching and Learning

Formative assessment provides a means to successfully scaffold learning. Unfortunately, few teachers understand the pedagogical implications of such scaffolding or their role in utilizing formative assessments. The purpose of our study was to develop an understanding of the experience of being a teacher that is seeking to improve learning through formative assessment and using that understanding to improve our practices in teacher education. Three categories emerged from the data analysis: (1) questioning the validity of tacit pedagogical understandings, (2) understanding the experiences of the students, and (3) exploring the need to develop a more reflexive classroom. The findings from this study are useful for persons seeking to prepare teachers to guide science learning.     

Oral Interactions in Secondary Science Classrooms: a Grounded Approach to Identifying Oral Feedback Types and Practices

Feedback is an important practice in promoting learning. This study examines teachers’ oral feedback practices, with an analysis grounded in students’ perceptions of what helps them learn. Based on 38 hours of lesson observations, interviews with 10 teachers and 84 students, we identify how teachers conceptualise and practice oral feedback. Based on student interviews, three main types of oral interaction were found to constitute feedback: discrepancy, success criteria comments and open questions. Current practices appear to address the feedback dimensions of ‘How am I going?’ and ‘Where to next?’, but seem to be lacking with respect to addressing the question related to ‘Where am I going?’ Feedback is infrequently used by science teachers compared with other types of oral interaction and the feedback types most frequently reported by students to help learning were used least often. Teachers used oral feedback types differently in whole class and small group situations. We use findings to elaborate an ideal-typical model of feedback practices, with divergent practices involving more frequent use of oral feedback, focusing on learning rather than task. The study concludes with implications for practice in teaching and teacher education.

     

高校教师对形成性评价的建议与看法

为了解我国高校教师对形成性评价的认识情况,为高校开展形成性评价提供参考,通过问卷调查全国19所高校385位教师对形成性评价的认识、意见和建议。结果显示,93.25%的教师认为形成性评价有助于了解学生的学习情况,75.06%的教师更支持使用形成性评价,尤其是教龄在20年以上、课堂结束会进行小测的教师,71.17%的教师认为形成性评价成绩应计入学业成绩。由此得出结论：多数教师认同将形成性评价作为学业评价的主要方式。要做好形成性评价,须探索多种评价手段,增进教师对其的理解和认知。     

The Intersection of Inquiry-Based Science and Language: Preparing Teachers for ELL Classrooms

As teacher educators, we are tasked with preparing prospective teachers to enter a field that has undergone significant changes in student population and policy since we were K-12 teachers. With the emphasis placed on connections, mathematics integration, and communication by the New Generation Science Standards (NGSS) (Achieve in Next generation science standards, 2012), more research is needed on how teachers can accomplish this integration (Bunch in Rev Res Educ 37:298–341, 2013; Lee et al. in Educ Res 42(4):223–233, 2013). Science teacher educators, in response to the NGSS, recognize that it is necessary for pre-service and in-service teachers to know more about how instructional strategies in language and science can complement one another. Our purpose in this study was to explore a model of integration that can be used in classrooms. To do this, we examined the change in science content knowledge and academic vocabulary for English language learners (ELLs) as they engaged in inquiry-based science experience utilizing the 5R Instructional Model. Two units, erosion and wind turbines, were developed using the 5R Instructional Model and taught during two different years in a summer school program for ELLs. We analyzed data from interviews to assess change in conceptual understanding and science academic vocabulary over the 60 h of instruction. The statistics show a clear trend of growth supporting our claim that ELLs did construct more sophisticated understanding of the topics and use more language to communicate their knowledge. As science teacher educators seek ways to prepare elementary teachers to help preK-12 students to learn science and develop the language of science, the 5R Instructional Model is one pathway.     

Science Teachers' Elicitation Practices: Insights for Formative Assessment

In evaluating teachers' instructional decisions during instruction, it is clear that the nature of their elicitation is crucial for student learning. When instructional decisions are informed by information about students' conceptual understanding, significant learning is possible. This article examined the elicitation practices of two high school science teachers who indicated that they made instructional decisions based on the elicited evidence of students' knowledge but whose elicitation practices were characteristic of low-level elicitation. The teachers focused on students' responses that used canonical terms and expressed acceptable knowledge. The teachers demonstrated low-level responsiveness because they did not have full access to students' knowledge. The elicited evidence of students' knowledge that was used in making instructional decisions was not representative of students' conceptual understanding. There was, thus, a mismatch between the teachers' perspectives about their formative assessment practice and what is considered effective formative assessment.     

The Laboratory as a Vehicle for Enhancing Argumentation Among Pre-Service Science Teachers

Science & Education - A study was conducted on how scientific laboratory lessons contribute to building arguments, both cognitively and socially. The population consisted of 12 second-year...     

Roles of Teachers in Orchestrating Learning in Elementary Science Classrooms

This study delves into the different roles that elementary science teachers play in the classroom to orchestrate science learning opportunities for students. Examining the classroom practices of three elementary science teachers in Singapore, we found that teachers shuttle between four key roles in enabling student learning in science. Teachers can play the role of (1) dispenser of knowledge (giver), (2) mentor of learning (advisor), (3) monitor of students’ activities (police), and (4) partner in inquiry (colearner). These roles are dynamic, and while teachers show a preference for one of the four roles, factors such as the nature of the task, the types of students, as well as the availability of time and resources affect the role that teachers adopt. The roles that teachers play in the classroom have implications for the practice of science as inquiry in the classroom as well as the identities that teachers and students form in the science learning process.     

A Model of Formative Assessment in Science Education

This paper reports on the findings of a 2-year research project into the process of formative assessment in the science classrooms of 10 teachers. Formative assessment is defined as the process used by teachers and students to recognise and respond to student learning in order to enhance that learning, during the learning. The findings indicate that the teachers used two kinds of formative assessment, planned and interactive. Planned formative assessment involved the teachers eliciting and interpreting assessment information and then taking action. It tended to be carried out with the whole class. Interactive formative assessment involved the teachers in noticing, recognising and responding, and tended to be carried out with some individual students or small groups. This paper discusses these two types of formative assessment, how they are related, how they are integral to teaching and learning processes, and how they are dependent on teachers' pedagogical knowledge.     

形成性评价中的教师角色与策略研究

形成性评价对学习的促进作用在我国各学段的教育教学中受到重视。在实际教学中,该评价方法引起教师角色的变化和具体的评价实施策略是实现形成性评价促学价值的关键。教师需要改变传统教学中知识传授者的角色,转变为教学与评价活动的设计者和组织者,学生表现的观察者和诊断者,以及提高学生学习的推动者。通过师生共设与分享学习目标和评价标准,全面收集和准确解读学生信息,做出学生乐于接受并据此调整学习的有效反馈等策略,提升学生学习效果和促进其终身学习能力的发展。     

科学论证教学的评价框架与实践述评

论证教学是指让学生通过确立主张,运用多种证据进行论证和相互说服,从而达成学习目标的教学方式.近年来,论证教学在全球科学教育界受到广泛关注.通过对68篇相关的国际核心文献进行系统化的检索、筛选与编码,研究结果显示,已有的论证教学评价研究主要集中在开发评价工具和聚焦课程与教学的评价两个方面,这两方面又分为评价维度、评价工具...     

Teacher Roles of Questioning in Early Elementary Science Classrooms: A Framework Promoting Student Cognitive Complexities in Argumentation

The purpose of this study was to investigate the various roles that early elementary teachers adopt when questioning, to scaffold dialogic interaction and students’ cognitive responses for argumentative practices over time. Teacher questioning is a pivotal contributing factor that shapes the role teachers play in promoting dialogic interaction in argumentative practice and that different roles serve different functions for promoting students’ conceptual understanding. The multiple-case study was designed as a follow-up study after a 4-year professional development program that emphasized an argument-based inquiry approach. Data sources included 30 lessons focusing on whole class discussion from three early elementary teachers’ classes. Data were analyzed through two approaches: (1) constant comparative method and (2) enumerative approach. This study conceptualized four critical roles of teacher questioning—dispenser, moderator, coach, and participant—in light of the ownership of ideas and activities. The findings revealed two salient changes in teachers’ use of questions and the relationships between teachers’ question-asking and students’ cognitive responses: (1) teachers increasingly used multiple roles in establishing argumentative discourse as they persistently implemented an argument-based inquiry approach, and (2) as teachers used multiple roles in establishing patterns of questioning and framing classroom interactions, higher levels of student cognitive responses were promoted. This study suggests that an essential component of teacher professional development should include the study of the various roles that teachers can play when questioning for establishing dialogic interaction in argumentation and that this development should consist of ongoing training with systematic support.     

形成性评价在科普场馆学习中的应用

随着现代教育理论的深度发展,场馆学习在现代教育体系中的地位不断上升,成为非正式学习的重要场所。相较于国内科普场馆的STEM课程普遍缺乏过程性评价的现状,国外科普场馆的STEM课程设计似乎有许多我们可以学习借鉴的地方。     

形成性评价对英语口语学习策略的影响

实验采用问卷调查、周记等为研究工具,对非英语专业大学生进行了为期一个学期的形成性评价教学与终结性评价教学对比研究,探讨形成性评价对学生口语学习策略的促进作用,对比形成性评价教学与终结性评价教学对学习成绩的影响。