An Invitation to Participate in the Field Testing of Middle School and High School Science Assessment Items
AAAS Project 2061 is developing assessment items to measure middle and high school students' understanding of important science ideas from the National Science Education Standards and the AAAS Benchmarks for Science Literacy. We are recruiting middle and high school science teachers willing to field test our multiple-choice test items with their students in March, April, May, or June of 2010. Students must be in sixth through twelfth grade, but it is not necessary that they have had formal instruction on the topic being tested. As an incentive, each participating teacher will receive a copy of Volume 2 of the Atlas of Science Literacy or a $50 gift card from Borders or Barnes and
Noble. The assessment should take no longer than 45 minutes to complete.
The guidelines for participation are as follows:
. You must be a middle or high school science teacher.
. Your students must be in 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, or 12th grade.
. You must obtain permission to participate from the appropriate school or district personnel. Please do not register until you obtain permission.
. You must complete a short class information sheet after administering the test.
. You must return all testing materials, whether completed or not, to AAAS Project 2061 within four weeks of receiving the materials. (Pre-paid shipping envelopes will be provided to return the testing materials.)
This study is not intended to evaluate teachers or students. Individual student and teacher data will remain strictly confidential. Individual students will not be identifiable. Our only interest is to learn how students respond to these test items so that we can design test items that are valid measures of what middle and high school students know about important science ideas.
If you are willing to participate, please click the link below and complete the registration form that follows. After clicking on the link, you will be taken to a page that is very similar to this page. Participation in this study is limited, so registrations will be accepted on a first-come, first-served basis. If necessary, we will also adjust our selections to
achieve representation from urban, rural, and suburban schools from different parts of the country. Teachers who are selected to participate will be notified by email. Teachers who are not selected will be given priority for participating next year.
Click here if you are willing to participate: http://register.p2061.org.
If you have any questions about the study, please contact p2061assessment@aaas.org.
Cari F. Herrmann Abell, Ph.D.
Research Associate
AAAS/Project 2061
1200 New York Ave, NW
Washington, DC 20005
Tel: 202-326-6648
Fax: 202-842-5196
www.project2061.org
www.sciencematerialscenter.com