مرکز منطقه ای اطلاع رساني علوم و فناوري - THE EFFECT OF THE ALTERNATIVE ASSESSMENT APPROACHES BASED EDUCATION DURING THE LIGHT UNIT OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY CLASS IN 7TH GRADE ON THE ACADEMIC ACHIEVEMENTS AND ATTITUDES OF STUDENTS

Abstract :

This study was conducted to identify the effects of the alternative assessment approaches based education during the Light unit of Science and Technology class in 7th grade on the academic achievements and attitudes of students. The study conducted in Izmir region during the second semester of 2014-2015 academic years incorporated a total of 53 7th-grade students, of which 25 were in the experiment group and 28 were in the control group. During the survey, the Light unit of the curriculum was taught to the students of the experiment group with the use of alternative assessment approaches (concept maps, concept cartoons, semantic features analysis, diagnostic trees, structural communication grid, crossword puzzles, posters and science journals) developed by the researchers to supplement the current curriculum and generally presented as worksheets, while the unit was taught to the students of control group using only current curriculum. Academic Achievement Test was implemented in order to evaluate the achievements degree of both experiment and control group students in relation to the Science and Technology class and Science Attitude Scale was implemented in terms of pre-test and post-test in order to evaluate the attitude towards the Science and Technology class. In this regard, it can be pointed out that a quasi-experimental research design with a pre-test and post-test control group was implemented during the study. According to the data obtained from the study, statistically significant difference between the post-test results of experiment group and control group students was observed in favor of the experiment group students. In terms of the attitude towards the Science and Technology class, being another variable of this study, a significant difference between the post-test results of both groups was observed in favor of the experiment group students. Based on these conclusions, certain recommendations were made in relation to the use of alternative assessment approaches as a learning tool in science classes