Assessing Science Understanding
A Human Constructivist View
Edited by
Joel J. Mintzes
James H. Wandersee
Joseph D. Novak
Preface
.....meaning making is the fundamental adaptation of the human species and the driving force underlying all forms of conceptual change, whether that change occurs in the mind of the experienced professional scientist or a young child confronting the wonders of nature for the first time......
This book, together with its companion volume Teaching Science for Understanding: A Human Constructivist View (Mintzes, Wandersee & Novak, Eds. 1998, San Diego: Academic Press), offers a useful theoretical, empirical and practical guide for reflective science teachers who are committed to preparing scientifically literate and technologically responsible citizens in the twenty-first century. In writing and editing these books we have been motivated by an abiding conviction that success in the new century will demand substantially new ways of teaching, learning and assessing student progress in science education. Our views have been informed largely by the history and philosophy of science and education; by significant social, political and economic changes of the past 25 years, and by a strong commitment to a cognitive model of meaningful learning, knowledge restructuring, and conceptual change.
In Teaching Science for Understanding, we focused on a series of promising new intervention strategies that offer potentially powerful alternatives to traditional classroom instruction. These strategies represent a significant departure from previous practice, and reflect our newfound role in preparing students to become meaning makers and knowledge builders.
In this follow-up volume, we turn our attention to the fundamental problem of assessment. Our concern for assessment is founded on the central role of evaluation in promoting (or discouraging) conceptual understanding in the natural sciences. Novak [Chapter One] views assessment as the fifth essential commonplace in education, along with the teacher, the learner, the curriculum, and the social environment. As we view it , poor assessment practices in the elementary and secondary schools (and in colleges and universities) are clearly among the most significant impediments to understanding and conceptual change.
The view that "assessment drives learning" is perhaps the oldest adage in education; yet, until recently science educators have invested precious little time developing and testing new assessment strategies that complement and reinforce meaningful learning. As a result, we have witnessed a kind of progressive de-coupling [i.e. a "misalignment"] of instruction and assessment in science education. In the course of our work, we have seen many talented and conscientious science teachers who take substantial risks by implementing powerful new instructional practices, only inadvertently to discourage meaningful learning through inappropriate assessment strategies. This book is our attempt to begin addressing that problem.