The Advanced Placement (AP) Descriptive Chemistry Website allows users to practice chemistry problems. This study involved the redesign of the Website using worked examples to enhance learner performance. The population sample for the study includes users (students and teachers) interested in learning descriptive chemistry materials. The users…

The development of the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills test involves input from educators across the state. The development process attempts to create an assessment that reflects the skills and content understanding of students at the tested grade level. This study attempts to determine other factors that can affect student performance on…

This study investigated the group invariance of equating results using a science achievement test. Examinees were divided into different subgroups based on the average composite score for test centers, whether they had taken a physics course, and self-reported science grade point average. The reason for dividing examinees into subgroups using such…

South Africa's education system is still deep in the throes of reform under its third Minister of Education since 1994. Poor communities, in particular those of rural Africans, bear the brunt of the past inequalities. The challenge was to explore the extent of the "gap" in students' scores by comparing the advantaged and disadvantaged…

The purpose of the study is to compare problem based learning (PBL) and lecture-based learning (LBL) in Hong Kong secondary students' science achievement. Secondary One students were divided into two groups: group A (n = 37), was taught two topics: "Human Reproduction" and "Density" through PBL; group B (n = 38) was taught the…

Southern Regional Education Board's (SREB's) "High Schools That Work" ("HSTW") initiative works with more than 1,100 schools in 30 states and the District of Columbia to improve school and classroom practices and prepare more students for success in postsecondary studies, advanced training and careers. Forty-nine Arkansas…

Reported is an investigation of the relationship among three selected instruments based on the responses of a sample of high school students. The instruments were the Nature of Science Scale (NOSS), the Science Support Scale (SSS), and the Test on the Social Aspects of Science (TSAS). All purport to measure "nature of science"…

Describes a final exam that is based on six papers from the primary chemical literature. Allows general chemistry students a chance to see a sample of the chemical literature and enables them to realize that the day-to-day use of chemistry requires a broad-brush approach - the simultaneous application of a myriad of concepts. Contains 12…

Describes development of 472 true-false scientific literacy test items with high content and item validity that test 240 key ideas in, and attitudes toward, science. Items are based on selected chapters of the 1989 American Association for the Advancement of Science report, entitled Science for All Americans. Appendix contains sample items.…

Presents a simple variation on multiple-choice testing that overcomes some of its drawbacks but still permits easy hand or machine grading. Gives student partial credit for partial knowledge and reduces frustration because students are no longer forced to choose between answers that they think might be correct. (JRH)

The work aims to improve the assessment of creative problem-solving in science education by employing language technologies and computational-statistical machine learning methods to grade students' natural language responses automatically. To evaluate constructs like creative problem-solving with validity, open-ended questions that elicit…

This paper presents the development and revision of a dual-response instrument entitled, "Student Understanding of Science and Scientific Inquiry" ("SUSSI"). Built on the most recent science education reform documents and existing literature on the nature of science, SUSSI blends Likert-type items and related open-ended questions to assess…

The purpose of this study was to examine how prior knowledge of cellular transport influenced how high school students in the USA viewed and interpreted graphic representations of this topic. The participants were Advanced Placement Biology students (n = 65); each participant had previously taken a biology course in high school. After assessing…

Computer administered tests are becoming increasingly prevalent as computer technology becomes more readily available on a large scale. For testing programs that utilize both computer and paper administrations, mode effects are problematic in that they can result in examinee scores that are artificially inflated or deflated. As such, researchers…

Studies of test dimensionality indicate that many large-scale science assessments measure multiple dimensions. These findings have reinforced the perspective that science achievement is an inherently dynamic process and that there is benefit in reporting subscores in science. A limitation with some of these studies is that they fail to indicate…