Assessing Children’s Career Aspirations

Journal Article | March 2008

In the past several years, Science and Children has invited preservice and inservice teachers to participate in national studies of students’ ideas about scientists (Barman 1997), animals (Barman et al. 2000), and…

Science Sampler: Differentiated assessment

Journal Article | November 2006

One of the goals of science education is to encourage students to think and reason at increasingly higher levels. In order to accomplish this goal, the authors created a unique form of assessment that not only…

Embed Assessment in Your Teaching

Journal Article | February 2003

Broadly defined, embedded assessment using performance tasks requires students to write, read, and solve problems in genuine, rather than artificial ways. It is as an ongoing, cyclical process in which teachers gather…

Assessing Student Participation in the Classroom

Journal Article | August 2001

We know that students should participate constructively in the classroom. In fact, most of us probably agree that a significant portion of a student’s grade should come from his or her participation. However, like many…

Assessing Student Understanding with Technology

Journal Article | May 2006

Most science teachers are amazed when grading tests and quizzes, often wondering how and why students have reached a conclusion, particularly when students fail to provide a detailed account of their logic. Ideally, a…

Idea Bank: Interview Assessment

Journal Article | February 2005

Do you worry that your high school chemistry students are not learning enough from lab activities? If so, it is possible that they aren't learning enough from writing basic lab reports. To encourage concept retention…

Score One for Alternative Assessment

Journal Article | August 2006

"What conventional testing hides is the enormous misunderstanding that many students have about things the generic standardized tests say they 'know'...students possess a great deal of knowledge that hides a great deal…

The Prepared Practitioner: An Assessment Primer

Journal Article | March 2009

Although the title of this month’s column may make your skin crawl—read on. Everyone should understand a few basics about the “A” word. Being able to distinguish formative from summative assessment and criterion-based…

In Praise of Performance-Based Assessments

Journal Article | March 2008

Performance-based assessments are tasks conducted by students that enable them to demonstrate what they know about a given topic. The difference between this type of “test” versus the traditional method is that students…

Science Sampler: Assessment for All

Journal Article | December 2004

There are many ways of assessing students and the work they do, and many ways of getting them ready for those assessments. Special needs students provide an extra challenge to educators because they have difficulty…

Formative Assessment Probes: Constructing Cl-Ev-R Explanations to Formative Assessment Probes

Journal Article | October 2015

This column focuses on promoting learning through assessment. This month’s issue discusses the formative assessment classroom technique C-E-O-SE.

How Does Student Performance on Formative Assessments Relate to Learning Assessed by Exams?

Journal Article | June 2007

A retrospective analysis examines the relationships between formative assessments and exam grades in two undergraduate geoscience courses. Pair and group-work grades correlate weakly with individual exam grades. Exam…