All Assessment resources
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about decay and decomposers. The probe can be used to determine whether students recognize the need for a biological agent to break down once-living material as it uses it for energy...
By Page Keeley, Francis Eberle and Chad Dorsey
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about the digestive system. The probe is designed to find out whether students realize a main function of the digestive system is to break food down into molecules that can be used b...
By Page Keeley and Joyce Tugel
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about mountain formation. The probe is designed to determine whether students recognize that some mountains are formed from the uplift of Earth’s crust over a long period of time a...
By Page Keeley
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about biological adaptation. The probe is designed to find out if students think animals intentionally adapt to a change in their environment. ...
By Page Keeley and Joyce Tugel
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about the transfer of matter and energy in ecosystems. The probe is designed to reveal whether students recognize that only matter is cycled through an ecosystem. ...
By Page Keeley
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about adaptation. The probe is designed to reveal whether students think individuals intentionally change their physical characteristics or behaviors in response to an environmental ...
By Page Keeley
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit children’s developing ideas about structure in living systems. The probe is designed to find out if students recognize that living things are made up of parts. ...
By Page Keeley
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about plant growth. The probe is designed to find out whether students recognize that plants use their stored food to grow in the absence of light. ...
By Page Keeley
Lesson Plan
The purpose of this assessment probe is to elicit students’ ideas about seeds. The probe is designed to find out what students think most seeds need to germinate. ...
By Page Keeley
Blog Post
Teaching About How Scientists Work—With a Focus on Claims-Evidence-Reasoning
By Matthew Bobrowsky
NSTA Press Book
Instructional Sequence Matters, Grades 9–12: Explore-Before-Explain in Physical Science
Instructional Sequence Matters, Grades 9–12 is the one-stop resource that will inspire you to reimagine your approach to high school physical science. The book discusses the 5E (Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate) as a specific pathw...
By Patrick Brown
Journal Article
This study examines what prior knowledge and misconceptions about evolutionary theory students bring with them into an introductory biological anthropology course. One hundred and fifty-three students completed short, anonymous surveys about evolutio...
By Kathryn King