INFLUENCE OF FORMATIVE ASSESSMENT CLASSROOM TECHNIQUES (FACTs) ON STUDENT’S OUTCOMES IN CHEMISTRY AT SECONDARY SCHOOL

Abstract

Assessment in many Central- and Eastern-European countries is dominated by summative assessment (SA). Simultaneously, researchers and educators from western Europe and the US proclaim the formative assessment (FA) as an important element of the educational process and advise including it into curricula and everyday teachers’ practice. The research presented herein reports an introduction of formative assessment classroom techniques (FACTs) during chemistry lessons at K7 level in Slovakia. In total 202 students participated in the research. They were divided randomly into a control (n=97) and an experimental (n=105) group, and the intervention covered 10 successive lessons. After the intervention, the student’s outcomes were compared using the test checking student’s knowledge and skills according to various domains of Bloom’s revised taxonomy. The results suggested a statistically significant increase in the score of the experimental group, and a detailed analysis revealed that the increase was significant in both lower- and higher-order cognitive skills area. Finally, the students’ reaction on the introduction of formative assessment was studied and showed their positive attitude towards the introduced method. Keywords: chemical education, formative assessment classroom techniques, higher-order cognitive skills, secondary school.