Bèta-docenten Ontwerpen Formatieve Evaluatie Tools voor SSI Vaardigheden

Socio-scientific issues (SSI) are incorporated in science education to promote 'scientific literacy'. SSI are controversial, complex and interdisciplinary problems with (major) consequences for society. In SSI lessons, students acquire certain skills (e.g., reasoning, argumentation, decision-making) to become responsible citizens.

However, practical experiences of teachers show that in SSI lessons the 'evaluation' of what has been learned is often skipped, or evaluation is only aimed at (subject-specific) knowledge learning objectives. Science teachers experience reluctance in making the development of SSI skills visible. Formative assessment can provide teachers with tools to make the evaluation of SSI skills, and especially their development during SSI lessons, visible. Formative assessment is a purposeful process of collecting data about student learning, interpreting these responses in order to make better decisions for further education, instruction and/or learning (Black & Wiliam, 2009). We make this formative process concrete in this project by making use of the cycle of formative evaluation (Gulikers & Baartman, 2017; www.formatievecycle.nl). This describes the formative process on the basis of five interrelated phases, with concrete behaviors that the teacher can do to shape this process: 1) clarify expectations. This means that the teacher clarifies learning goals and success criteria for and together with students; 2) using all sorts of but targeted strategies/tools/work forms to elicit reactions from students about where they are now in relation to the learning objectives; 3) analyzing these student reactions, this can be done on a student or class level; 4) communicating about these analyzes to and with the student (giving feedback), and 5) taking concrete follow-up action based on this to improve learning and/or teaching/lessons.

In this project, 4 secondary education science teachers in a professional learning community (PLC) develop SSI lessons for their own students and shape the process of formative evaluation (FE). The PLC also involves three researchers with expertise in SSI and/or formative evaluation. They support the teachers in the development, evaluation and improvement of the SSI lessons with FE in them. The following research questions are central:
1) How do teachers shape the formative process (i.e. the FE cycle) in their SSI lessons?
2) What barriers and added values do teachers experience when using FE in their SSI lessons to make visible and stimulate SSI skills and development?