With the already widespread nature of multiple-choice assessments and the increasing popularity of answer-until-correct, it is important to have methods available for exploring the validity of these types of assessments as they are developed. This work analyzes a 20-question multiple choice assessment covering introductory undergraduate chemistry…

Many undergraduate chemistry students hold alternate conceptions related to resonance--an important and fundamental topic of organic chemistry. To help address these alternate conceptions, an organic chemistry instructor could administer the resonance concept inventory (RCI), which is a multiple-choice assessment that was designed to identify…

Providing students with feedback on their performance is a critical part of enhancing student learning in chemistry and is often integrated into homework assignments, quizzes, and exams. However, not all feedback is created equal, and the type of feedback the student receives can dramatically alter the utility of the feedback to reinforce correct…

Multiple-choice (MC) exams are common in undergraduate general chemistry courses in the United States and are known for being difficult to construct. With their extensive use in the general chemistry classroom, it is important to ensure that these exams are valid measures of what chemistry students know and can do. One threat to MC exam validity…

Learning progressions (LPs) are novel models for the development of assessments in science education, that often use a scale to categorize students' levels of reasoning. Pictorial representations are important in chemistry teaching and learning, and also in LPs, but the differences between pictorial and verbal items in chemistry LPs is unclear. In…

The galvanic cell is a basic concept in electrochemistry. To assess mainland Chinese students' proficiency levels in galvanic cells, the Galvanic Cell Proficiency Level Assessment (GCPA) was developed based on the Rasch model. The GCPA was developed through a pilot test and consists of seven multiple-choice questions and four open questions. The…

The internet is prevalent in society today, and user-friendly web-based productivity tools are readily available for developing diagnostic instruments. This study sought to determine the affordances of a web-based diagnostic instrument on ionisation energy (wIEDI) based on the pen-and-paper version, the Ionisation Energy Diagnostic Instrument…

Misconceptions are the "the old, the bad, and the ugly" prior knowledge, ideas or conceptions that the learners have that hinder their further learning in science. Several types of misconceptions that undergraduate students hold about reaction coordinate diagrams (from here on we use the term "reaction coordinate diagrams" and…

Feedback is an important aspect of the learning process. The immediate feedback assessment technique (IF-AT®) form allows students to receive feedback on their answers during a testing event. Studies with introductory psychology students supported both perceived and real student learning gains when this form was used with testing. Knowing that…

Learning chemistry includes learning the language of chemistry (names, formulae, symbols, and chemical equations) which has to be done in connection with the other areas of chemical knowledge. In this study we investigate how French students understand and use names (of chemical species and common mixtures) and chemical formulae. We set a paper…

This paper describes the results achieved by high school seniors on an item which involves translation of the equation P = kT into a corresponding pictorial external representation. The majority of students (the classes of 2011, 2012 and 2013) did not give the correct answer to the multiple choice part of the translation item. They chose pictorial…

Science education research has revealed a number of student mental models for atomic structure, among which, the one based on Bohr's model seems to be the most dominant. The aim of the current study is to investigate the coherence of these models when students apply them for the explanation of a variety of situations. For this purpose, a set of…

We explored analogies used for introducing students to the concept of potential energy wells. Two analogy systems were developed, a spring system and a novel system consisting of electrostatic spheres. These two, distinct analogies were housed within an interactive tool that allowed students to manipulate the analogous systems and witness changes…

The current study examines the performance and achievement of students in the Systematic Qualitative Analyses of Cations (SQACs). We sought answers to questions such as, "What are the students' levels of performance?" and "What is the relation between the average scores for performance and achievement?." This was done by using…

Two-dimensional (2D) diagrams are essential in chemistry for conveying and communicating key knowledge about disciplinary phenomena. While experts are adept at identifying, interpreting, and manipulating these representations, novices often are not. Ongoing research efforts in the field suggest that students' effective use of concrete and virtual…