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[Phys-l] Demonstrated Value of Formative Pre/post Testing



Physics educators may or may not be interested in a recent post "Demonstrated Value of Formative Pre/post Testing" [Hake (2008)]. The abstract reads:

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ABSTRACT: Carnegie Conversations subscriber Fabian Nabangi, responding to Carnegie senior scholar Lloyd Bond's anecdotal illustration of the value of pre/post testing (PPT), suggested that three conditions must all be present before PPT can be of any value and be used by accrediting organizations. Nabangi's conditions and their approximate prevalence in formative PPT currently being undertaken in undergraduate astronomy, biology, chemistry, economics, engineering, geoscience, math, and physics are as follows: (a) "students score higher on the posttests than on pretests": almost always (but just barely for passive-student lecture courses in conceptually difficult subjects); (b) "posttest scores are a component of the final grade": often the case in physics; and (c) "administrators reward teachers whose innovative pedagogy yields relatively high pre-to-posttest gains": *almost never*. Considering the latter circumstance, Nabangi would presumably regard almost all the above indicated PPT to be of no value, contradicting the fact that PPT has at least partially stimulated the reform of introductory physics courses at e.g., Harvard, North Carolina State University, MIT, University of Colorado at Boulder, and California Polytechnic State University at San Luis Obispo. As regards Nabangi's admonition against the use of PPT by accrediting organizations unless conditions "a," "b," and "c" are present, I think that, even if those conditions were present, accrediting organizations should avoid use PPT in summative accreditation, lest "Campbell's Law" raise its ugly head.
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To access the complete 18 kB post please click on <http://tinyurl.com/ysm6se>.

Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
24245 Hatteras Street, Woodland Hills, CA 91367
<rrhake@earthlink.net>
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~hake>
<http://www.physics.indiana.edu/~sdi>

REFERENCES
Hake, R.R. 2008. "Demonstrated Value of Formative Pre/post Testing," online at the OPEN AERA-J archives <http://tinyurl.com/ysm6se>. Post of 7 Jan 2008 to AERA-J, AERA-L, PhysLrnR, and POD. Abstract only to AERA-C, AERA-D, AERA-I, AERA-K, AP-Physics, ARN-L, ASSESS, Biopi-L, Biolab (rejected), Chemed-L, DrEd, EdResMeth, EvalTalk, IFETS, ITForum (rejected), Math-Learn, Math-Teach, NetGold, PBL, Physhare, Phys-L, PsychTeacher (rejected), RUME, SCILISTSERV, STLHE-L, TeachingEdPsych, TIPS, and WBTOLL.