The Assessment of Science Learning in Schools in Hong Kong: the status quo and future directions

Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 1, Issue 2, Article 2 (Dec., 2000)
CHENG May Hung, May; SO Wing Mui, Winnie; CHEUNG Wing Ming, Francis
The Assessment of Science Learning in Schools in Hong Kong: the status quo and future directions

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Examples of alternative forms and timing of science assessment
In order to promote the use of formative assessment in science teaching, Black (1998b) suggested that providing a variety of feasible implementation examples is important. With this suggestion in mind, a review on the possible variety of assessment tasks is made. The science teachers may then consider to implement any of the tasks with a formative purpose of improving learning and teaching.

Ten items that may illustrate the variety of forms of science assessment are summarized. While items (1) to (5) may be more commonly employed, teachers in Hong Kong may less frequently use items (6) to (10). Although they are specific examples of tasks, it does not mean that they are discrete in terms of areas of learning each assess and the information about student that each may reflect.

1. "Paper test"
is a test based on the teaching objectives and teaching materials used by the teacher.

2. "Oral test"
requires students to give verbal answers to the questions asked by teachers. For example, a teacher may present a picture of a computer to a selected number of students and ask them whether they consider it to be a living organism so as to obtain students' prior view before teaching the topic living organism.

3. "Experiment"
assesses students' ability in handling practical experimental operations and solving problems.

4. "Field study"
gives students chances to visit places outside school, like collecting data at a mangrove habitat or interviewing technicians at a factory.

5. "Data collection"
shows how students collect, organize, and analyze data as well as apply the knowledge derived from the data collection processes. For example, after teaching a topic on electricity, the teacher may ask students to record data about the usage of electricity in their own homes by reading either the meter or the electricity bill and calculate the amount of current consumed as well as the payments to be made.

6. "Report"
in both oral and written forms, is to evaluate students' reading comprehension, observation, experimentation and investigation.

7. "Project"
aims at assessing students as they were involved in the investigation of a topic from a scientific point of view or the design and production of an object based on their science knowledge, for example, students may design a home for the future. Projects may reveal the students' knowledge, skills and inquiry attitude. While experiment, data collection and report can be taken as independent assessment tasks, they may also constitute part of a project.

8. "Portfolio"
may include a collection of the work done by students. This may include their experimental reports, notes, projects and even letters that explain scientific concepts as suggested in Farrell-Childers and Lowry (1997).

9. "Performance"
refers to assessments based on the acting performance of students. For example, the students may act in the form of a story of their science project or investigations.

10. "Classroom interaction"
refers to the dialogue between students and teachers during the lessons. The responses of students may provide information to the teacher about their levels of understandings and form part of the formative assessment. Though there are student-teacher interactions, teachers may not be always aware that this is actually a form of interactive assessment which serves a purpose of improving teaching and learning as referred to Bell and Cowie (1997).

The above items may be assessed by the teacher, and may also be self assessed by students. Students may look into their own learning, achievements and behaviours. Moreover, these items can also be peer assessed meaning that students exchange feedback and comment among peers of their respective behaviour or pieces of work. These assessments can be carried out at different times for different purposes. Consistent with a constructivist view of learning (Appleton,1997), the teacher needs to assess students continuously in the process of teaching in order to obtain a better understanding of what they learnt and how learning occurred. Eliciting children's questions and explanations at different stages of teaching was found to be informative for the science teacher and has also helped the children to construct their own science understandings (Gibson, 1998). Hence, assessment at different stages of teaching may facilitate both teaching and learning process. First of all, assessment can be done prior to the teaching of a particular topic. Pre-tests that aim at investigating whether students have acquired the basic skills related to the topic may be conducted. These tests can be a form of diagnostic assessment or serve the purpose of helping teachers to have a better understanding of pupils' preconceptions.

Assessment can also be held during the teaching. Assessments conducted when an activity is almost or already completed carried several objectives. They may provide information about whether it is an appropriate time for the activity to terminate. Besides, it is helpful to look into the conceptual development among students and how they solve the problems during their learning process. These belong to formative assessment and provide teachers with the information about students' learning. With this information, teachers may adjust their teaching according to the needs of students and may in turn improve the quality of teaching.

Similarly, it is possible to invite students to carry out self-assessment in between or at the time nearing the end of the teaching of a topic or unit. Students may complete self-tests so as to get an understanding in accordance with their own strengths, then find out and improve their weaknesses.

Last but not least, science assessment can be held after the teaching. It aims at assessing the academic achievements of students in learning a unit and results are represented by a grade. This is the most common form of summative assessment in Hong Kong at present.

The above review does not preclude summative assessment as a viable strategy in reflecting and facilitating students' achievement in science. This review, however, suggests a shift in the emphasis from summative assessment to the currently widely ignored importance of formative assessment. It is believed that both forms of assessment have a role to play in facilitating students' learning as suggested by Biggs (1998). Formative assessment has a particular close linkage with education purposes that develop self and life-long learning among students. As suggested by Dougherty (1997), in a "5E instructional model", formative assessment is involved in all the stages of engage, explore, explain, elaborate and evaluate. The teacher may assess the three aspects of learning science, namely knowing science, doing science, talking science and acquiring science attitudes and values (Lee and Fradd, 1998) or the content, skills and problem solving ability of the students (Meng, 1990) at each or any of the five stages. In other words, this assessment information will facilitate the teacher to design subsequent teaching strategies and will also help the student to gain constructive information about his/her own learning. The role of summative assessment will be at the last stage of teaching, evaluate, when a picture about how well the student has achieved in a certain topic is obtained.

1.	"Paper test"	is a test based on the teaching objectives and teaching materials used by the teacher.
2.	"Oral test"	requires students to give verbal answers to the questions asked by teachers. For example, a teacher may present a picture of a computer to a selected number of students and ask them whether they consider it to be a living organism so as to obtain students' prior view before teaching the topic living organism.
3.	"Experiment"	assesses students' ability in handling practical experimental operations and solving problems.
4.	"Field study"	gives students chances to visit places outside school, like collecting data at a mangrove habitat or interviewing technicians at a factory.
5.	"Data collection"	shows how students collect, organize, and analyze data as well as apply the knowledge derived from the data collection processes. For example, after teaching a topic on electricity, the teacher may ask students to record data about the usage of electricity in their own homes by reading either the meter or the electricity bill and calculate the amount of current consumed as well as the payments to be made.
6.	"Report"	in both oral and written forms, is to evaluate students' reading comprehension, observation, experimentation and investigation.
7.	"Project"	aims at assessing students as they were involved in the investigation of a topic from a scientific point of view or the design and production of an object based on their science knowledge, for example, students may design a home for the future. Projects may reveal the students' knowledge, skills and inquiry attitude. While experiment, data collection and report can be taken as independent assessment tasks, they may also constitute part of a project.
8.	"Portfolio"	may include a collection of the work done by students. This may include their experimental reports, notes, projects and even letters that explain scientific concepts as suggested in Farrell-Childers and Lowry (1997).
9.	"Performance"	refers to assessments based on the acting performance of students. For example, the students may act in the form of a story of their science project or investigations.
10.	"Classroom interaction"	refers to the dialogue between students and teachers during the lessons. The responses of students may provide information to the teacher about their levels of understandings and form part of the formative assessment. Though there are student-teacher interactions, teachers may not be always aware that this is actually a form of interactive assessment which serves a purpose of improving teaching and learning as referred to Bell and Cowie (1997).