ERIC Number: EJ1099499
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2016-Jun
Pages: 15
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-1059-0145
EISSN: N/A
Drawing and Writing in Digital Science Notebooks: Sources of Formative Assessment Data
Shelton, Angi; Smith, Andrew; Wiebe, Eric; Behrle, Courtney; Sirkin, Ruth; Lester, James
Journal of Science Education and Technology, v25 n3 p474-488 Jun 2016
Formative assessment strategies are used to direct instruction by establishing where learners' understanding is, how it is developing, informing teachers and students alike as to how they might get to their next set of goals of conceptual understanding. For the science classroom, one rich source of formative assessment data about scientific thinking and practice is in notebooks used during inquiry-oriented activities. In this study, the goal was to better understand how student knowledge was distributed between student drawings and writings about magnetism in notebooks, and how these findings might inform formative assessment strategies. Here, drawing and writing samples were extracted and evaluated from our digital science notebook, with embedded content and laboratories. Three drawings and five writing samples from 309 participants were analyzed using a common ten-dimensional rubric. Descriptive and inferential statistics revealed that fourth-grade student understanding of magnetism was distributed unevenly between writing and drawing. Case studies were then presented for two exemplar students. Based on the rubric we developed, students were able to articulate more of their knowledge through the drawing activities than through written word, but the combination of the two mediums provided the richest understanding of student conceptions and how they changed over the course of their investigations.
Descriptors: Formative Evaluation, Evaluation Methods, Science Instruction, Student Journals, Knowledge Level, Freehand Drawing, Journal Writing, Magnets, Student Evaluation, Writing (Composition), Scoring Rubrics, Statistical Analysis, Grade 4, Elementary School Students, Scientific Concepts, Case Studies
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: Grade 4; Intermediate Grades; Elementary Education
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A