scholarly journals Development of an inventory for Alternative Conceptions among students in chemistry

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-11 ◽  
Author(s):  
Per-Odd Eggen ◽  
Jonas Persson ◽  
Elisabeth Egholm Jacobsen ◽  
Bjørn Hafskjold
Keyword(s):  
General Chemistry ◽  
Teaching Practices ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
Statistical Tests ◽  
Item Analysis ◽  
Alternative Conceptions ◽  
Concept Inventory ◽  
Present Context

A Chemistry concept inventory has been developed for assessing students learning and identifying the alternative conceptions that students may have in general chemistry. The conceptions in question are assumed to be mainly learned in school and to a less degree in student’s daily life. The inventory therefore aims at functioning as a tool for adjusting teaching practices in chemistry. The concept inventory presented here is mainly aimed at assessing students learning during general chemistry courses. The inventory has been administered and evaluated using statistical tests, focusing on both item analysis and on the entire test. The results indicate that the concept inventory is a reliable and discriminating tool in the present context.

scholarly journals Evaluation of a Chemistry Concept Inventory for general chemistry students at Finnish university

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 138-148
Author(s):  
Tiina Kiviniemi ◽  
Piia Nuora
Keyword(s):  
General Chemistry ◽  
Statistical Tests ◽  
Item Analysis ◽  
Concept Inventory ◽  
First Year ◽  
Student Knowledge ◽  
Chemistry Students ◽  
Chemical Concept ◽  
The University ◽  
University Setting

A chemistry concept inventory (Chemical Concept Inventory 3.0/CCI 3.0), previously developed for use in Norwegian universities, was tested and evaluated for use in a Finnish university setting. The test, designed to evaluate student knowledge and learning of chemistry concepts, was administered as both pre- and posttest in first year general chemistry courses at the University of Jyväskylä. The results were evaluated using different statistical tests, focusing both on individual item analysis and the entire test. Some individual questions were found to be not discriminating or reliable enough or too difficult, yet the results, as a whole, indicate that the concept inventory is a reliable and discriminating tool that can be used in the Finnish university context.

scholarly journals Identifying Informatively Easy and Informatively Hard Concepts

2022 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
R. Paul Wiegand ◽  
Anthony Bucci ◽  
Amruth N. Kumar ◽  
Jennifer Albert ◽  
Alessio Gaspar
Keyword(s):  
Performance Measures ◽  
Item Analysis ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Concept Inventory ◽  
Pareto Dominance ◽  
Dominance Relationships ◽  
Coevolutionary Computation ◽  
Introductory Computer Programming ◽  
Student Problem ◽  
Online Software

In this article, we leverage ideas from the theory of coevolutionary computation to analyze interactions of students with problems. We introduce the idea of informatively easy or hard concepts. Our approach is different from more traditional analyses of problem difficulty such as item analysis in the sense that we consider Pareto dominance relationships within the multidimensional structure of student–problem performance data rather than average performance measures. This method allows us to uncover not just the problems on which students are struggling but also the variety of difficulties different students face. Our approach is to apply methods from the Dimension Extraction Coevolutionary Algorithm to analyze problem-solving logs of students generated when they use an online software tutoring suite for introductory computer programming called problets . The results of our analysis not only have implications for how to scale up and improve adaptive tutoring software but also have the promise of contributing to the identification of common misconceptions held by students and thus, eventually, to the construction of a concept inventory for introductory programming.

scholarly journals Item Analysis of Final Test for the 9th Grade Students of SMPN 44 Surabaya in the Academic Year of 2019/2020

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 34-46
Author(s):  
Siti Fatimah ◽  
Achmad Bernhardo Elzamzami ◽  
Joko Slamet
Keyword(s):  
Test Scores ◽  
Item Difficulty ◽  
Statistical Tests ◽  
Item Analysis ◽  
Discrimination Power ◽  
Test Items ◽  
9Th Grade ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Microsoft Office ◽  
Academic Year

This research was conducted by focusing on the formulated question regarding the test scores validity, reliability and item analysis involving the discrimination power and index difficulty in order to provide detail information leading to the improvement of test items construction. The quality of each particular item was analyzed in terms of item difficulty, item discrimination and distractor analysis. The statistical tests were used to compute the reliability of the test by applying The Kuder-Richardson Formula (KR20). The analysis of 50 test items was computed using Microsoft Office Excel. A descriptive method was applied to describe and examined the data. The research findings showed the test fulfilled the criteria of having content validity which was categorized as a low validity. Meanwhile, the reliability value of the test scores was 0.521010831 (0.52) categorized as lower reliability and revision of test. Through the 50 items examined, there were 21 items that were in need of improvement which were classified into “easy” for the index difficulty and “poor” category for the discriminability by the total 26 items (52%). It means more than 50% of the test items need to be revised as the items do not meet the criteria. It is suggested that in order to measure students’ performance effectively, essential improvement need to be evaluated where items with “poor” discrimination index should be reviewed.    

Assessing TA buy-in to expectations and alignment of actual teaching practices in a transformed general chemistry laboratory course

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 189-208 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erin M. Duffy ◽  
Melanie M. Cooper
Keyword(s):  
General Chemistry ◽  
Teaching Practices ◽  
The United States ◽  
Chemistry Laboratory ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Undergraduate Level ◽  
General Chemistry Laboratory ◽  
Laboratory Courses ◽  
Video Observations ◽  
Actual Teaching

Inquiry-style laboratory courses, in which students engage in open-ended projects rather than a prescribed set of experimental steps (“cookbooks”), are becoming increasingly popular at the undergraduate level. Reformed curricula require reforms in training teachers; in the case of large universities, laboratory instructors are typically graduate teaching assistants (TAs). The General Chemistry Laboratory courses at a large, public, research-intensive university in the Midwestern region of the United States recently underwent a transformation from a “cookbook” to a project-based lab, and despite efforts to improve training, TAs continue to express difficulty teaching the course. To determine the source of these difficulties, we conducted multiple video observations and semi-structured interviews with seven TAs throughout one semester. We report TAs’ beliefs about what is expected of them, their philosophical alignment to perceived expectations, and a comparison of the Lab Coordinator's expectations to TAs’ actual teaching practices. We found that the TAs generally agreed with behaviors they were expected to perform, but responses to actions they were not supposed to do indicated that they were unsure of what the Lab Coordinator expected and personally believed that an ideal TA would perform those actions. This work highlights a need to clearly communicate the aims and expectations in a course and the rationale for those choices.

Development of an Assessment Scale for Commencing Home-Visit Nursing in Japan: Examining the Construct

2019 ◽  
Vol 31 (3) ◽  
pp. 186-192
Author(s):  
Naoko Shimohigoshi ◽  
Rika Yatsushiro
Keyword(s):  
Factor Analysis ◽  
Medical Treatment ◽  
Home Visit ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
Item Analysis ◽  
Postal Survey ◽  
Assessment Scale ◽  
Medical Support ◽  
Care Managers ◽  
Physical Changes

This study examined the assessment criteria based on which care managers (CMs) decide to commence home-visit nursing to develop a common assessment scale to guide CMs in making sound decisions about whether to commence home-visit nursing. For this purpose, we conducted a postal survey of 200 CMs. After removing 17 items from the questionnaire based on item analysis, we analyzed the remaining factors to confirm construct validity. This factor analysis identified 96 items comprising the following four factors: (1) the daily life condition of users and the support required by them, (2) strengthening medical support, (3) scheduling medical treatment/management or recuperation, and (4) preparing for users’ mental and physical changes and preventing the deterioration of the situation. The results of the study indicate the first step in the process of developing a common assessment scale; in this study, we clarified the general factors that underpin a decision to commence home-visit nursing and the relationships among the items for each factor.

scholarly journals Development and Validation of the Homeostasis Concept Inventory

2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. ar35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jenny L. McFarland ◽  
Rebecca M. Price ◽  
Mary Pat Wenderoth ◽  
Patrícia Martinková ◽  
William Cliff ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Undergraduate Students ◽  
English Language ◽  
Item Analysis ◽  
Concept Inventory ◽  
Validity And Reliability ◽  
Gender Biases ◽  
Item Functioning ◽  
Differential Item Analysis ◽  
Concept Framework ◽  
Better Than

We present the Homeostasis Concept Inventory (HCI), a 20-item multiple-choice instrument that assesses how well undergraduates understand this critical physiological concept. We used an iterative process to develop a set of questions based on elements in the Homeostasis Concept Framework. This process involved faculty experts and undergraduate students from associate’s colleges, primarily undergraduate institutions, regional and research-intensive universities, and professional schools. Statistical results provided strong evidence for the validity and reliability of the HCI. We found that graduate students performed better than undergraduates, biology majors performed better than nonmajors, and students performed better after receiving instruction about homeostasis. We used differential item analysis to assess whether students from different genders, races/ethnicities, and English language status performed differently on individual items of the HCI. We found no evidence of differential item functioning, suggesting that the items do not incorporate cultural or gender biases that would impact students’ performance on the test. Instructors can use the HCI to guide their teaching and student learning of homeostasis, a core concept of physiology.

scholarly journals Students’ Creativity in Geometry Course : How a Mystery Box Game Plays Important Role

2017 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-95
Author(s):  
Wanda Nugroho Yanuarto
Keyword(s):  
Data Reduction ◽  
Daily Life ◽  
Mathematical Thinking ◽  
Alternative Conceptions ◽  
Mathematical Education ◽  
Data Presentation ◽  
Class A ◽  
Central Java ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Academic Year

The purpose of this study are encouraging students’ creativity by mystery box games and become more aware of their mathematical thinking. The situational problem as the starting point helps students to relate what they learn to problems in daily life, and construct and interpret geometry that are related to real situations, and this helps to correct their alternative conceptions in geometry courseto encourage students’ creativity in Geometry Course. There are three abilities to encouraging students’creativity, they are synthetic ability, analytic ability, and practical ability. The subjects of this research is the students of the 1st semester of 2014 academic year class A of mathematical education of Muhammadiyah University of Purwokerto, Central Java, Indonesia. The data of this research is through observation sheet, recording videos, portofolios, and questionnaires. Those data was analyzed through data reduction, data presentation, and conclusion. This study shows that to encouraging students’ creativity can analyzed by mystery box in Geometry Course.

Application and testing of a framework for characterizing the quality of scientific reasoning in chemistry students' writing on ocean acidification

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (3) ◽  
pp. 484-494 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alena Moon ◽  
Robert Moeller ◽  
Anne Ruggles Gere ◽  
Ginger V. Shultz
Keyword(s):  
General Chemistry ◽  
Ocean Acidification ◽  
Scientific Reasoning ◽  
Ways Of Knowing ◽  
Alternative Conceptions ◽  
Writing To Learn ◽  
Chemistry Students ◽  
Scientific Accuracy ◽  
Science Educators

Science educators recognize the need to teach scientific ways of knowing and reasoning in addition to scientific knowledge. However, characterizing and assessing scientific ways of knowing and reasoning is challenging. Writing-to-learn offers one way of eliciting and supporting students’ reasoning; further, writing serves to externalize and make traceable students’ reasoning. For this reason, it is a useful formative assessment of scientific reasoning. The utility hinges on researchers’ ability to understand what students can do and think from their writing. Given the challenges in assessing students’ writing, this research offers an adapted framework for assessing students’ scientific reasoning evident in writing. This work will introduce an adapted framework and show an application to general chemistry students’ argumentative writing about ocean acidification. We provide evidence that this framework can be used to validly estimate the quality of students’ reasoning. We argue that this framework offers some affordances that overcome challenges reported in the literature. It serves to define scientific reasoning in a domain-general way by breaking it down into its components, but in a way that can produce a composite score that tells us about how students reason using chemistry content. Further, the framework provides a way to characterize the scientific accuracy of students’ reasoning that can inform instructors’ treatment of alternative conceptions.

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