Developing Model-Based Reasoning Assessment Tasks to Investigate the Efficacy of High School Biology Instructional Materials

• In Event: Item Development

Abstract

This assessment development effort is part of a larger study to investigate the impact of a high school biology model-based instructional materials. The goal is to create tasks that measure students’ and teachers’ ability to use model-based reasoning to make sense of phenomena. Four tasks were pilot tested along with content-focused, multiple-choice items with high school students and crowdsourced adults. Rasch modeling was used to investigate the relative difficulties of the items within the tasks. The results showed that items requiring respondents to write model-based explanations or evaluate whether data support a model were more difficult than items asking respondents to predict or identify patterns. Additionally, the results indicate that performance on the task may depend on the task context.

Authors

• Cari F. Herrmann-Abell, BSCS Science Learning

• Brian Matthew Donovan, BSCS Science Learning

• Emily Harris, BSCS Science Learning

• Jeffrey Snowden, BSCS Science Learning

• Molly A.M. Stuhlsatz, BSCS Science Learning

• Christopher D. Wilson, Biological Sciences Curriculum Study