Changing Assessments: Alternative Views of Aptitude, Achievement and Instruction

343 Pages·1992·14.08 MB·English

by  Bernard R. Gifford (auth.)

CHANGING ASSESSMENTS
Evaluation in Education and
Human Services
Editors:
George F. Madaus, Boston College, Chestnut
Hill, MA, U.S.A.
Daniel L. Stufflebeam, Western Michigan
University, Kalamazoo, MI, U.S.A.
National Commission on Testing
and Public Policy
Gifford, B.; Test Policy and the Politics of
Opportunity Allocation: The Workplace and
the Law
Gifford, B.; Test Policy and Test Performance:
Education, Language, and Culture
Gifford, B., and Wing, L.: Test Policy in
Defense
CHANGING ASSESSMENTS
Alternative Views of Aptitude,
Achievement and Instruction
Edited by
Bernard R. Gifford
University of California, Berkeley
and
Mary Catherine O'Connor
Boston University
~.
"
Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Changing assessments : alternative views of aptitude, achievement, and
instruction / edited by Bernard R. Gifford and Mary Catherine
O'Connor.
p. em. - (Evaluation in edueation and human services)
lncludes bibliographieal referenees and index.
ISBN 978-94-010-5318-1 ISBN 978-94-011-2968-8 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-94-011-2968-8
1. Edueational tests and measurements-United States. 2. Ability
-Testing. 1. Gifford, Bernard R. II. O'Connor, Mary Catherine.
III. Series.
LB30S1.C448 1992
371.2 '6-de20 91-3S093
CIP
Copyright © 1992 by Springer Science+Business Media New York
Originally published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 1992
Softcover reprint ofthe hardcover Ist edition 1992
Ali rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form orby any means, mechanical, photo-copying, recording,
or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher,
Springer Science+Business Media, LLC.
Printed an acid-free paper.
Contents
Contributors vii
Introduction
Bernard R. Gifford 1
Rethinking Aptitude, Achievement, and Instruction:
Cognitive Science Research and
the Framing of Assessment Policy
Mary Catherine 0' Connor 9
Assessing the Thinking Curriculum:
New Tools for Educational Reform
Lauren B. Resnick and Daniel P. Resnick 37
Assessment in Context:
The Alternative to Standardized Testing
Howard Gardner 77
Interactive Learning Environments:
A New Look at Assessment and Instruction
Ann L. Brown, Joseph C. Campione, Lynne S. Webber,
and Kate McGilly 121
vi
CAT: A Program of Comprehensive Abilities Testing
Robert J. Sternberg 213
CommentaIy:
Understanding What We Measure and
Measuring What We Understand
James W. Pellegrino 275
CommentaIy:
What Policy Makers Who Mandate Tests Should Know
About the New Psychology of
Intellectual Ability and Learning
Lorrie A. Shepard 301
Index 329
Contributors
Ann L. Brown is the Evelyn Lois Corey Faculty Fellow in Instruction at the
School of Education at the University of California, Berkeley. She received her
Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of London. Since 1978 Brown was
professor of Psychology and Senior Scientist at the Center for the Study of
Reading at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Brown is highly
regarded as a leading authority on child development, the psychology of reading,
and metacognition. She has well over 100 published articles that are widely cited
in the field. Since 1971 she has served as a consultant editor on the boards of six
professional journals and is presently an Associate Editor of Cognition and
Instruction. Dr. Brown has served as President of Division 7 of the American
Psychological Society and is currently Vice-President of the prestigious National
Academy of Education.
Joseph C. Campione is a professor at the School of Education at the
University of California, Berkeley, where he is also the director of the joint
program in special education. Dr. Campione received his Ph.D. in Psychology
from the University of Connecticut in 1965. Dr. Campione was professor of
Psychology and Research Professor at the Center for the Study of Reading and
Cognition at the University of Illinois, Champaign, since 1976. Dr.
Campione's research and his more than 90 published works focus on learning
strategies of educationally at-risk children, transfer of training, metacognition,
and issues of assessment and instruction.
Howard Gardner is a research psychologist in Boston. He investigates human
cognitive capacities, particularly those central to the arts, in normal children,
gifted children, and brain-damaged adults. He is the author of over 250 articles in
professional journals and wide-circulation periodicals. Among his ten books are
The Questfor Mind (1973; second edition, 1981); The Shattered Mind (1975);
Developmental Psychology (1978; second edition, 1982); Art. Mind and Brain
(1982); Frames of Mind (1983); The Mind's New Science (1985); and, most
recently, To Open Minds: Chinese Clues to the Dilemma of American Education
(1989). At present, Howard Gardner serves as Professor of Education and Co
Director of Project Zero at the Harvard Graduate School of Education; Research
Psychologist at the Boston Veterans Administration Medical Center; and Adjunct
Professor of Neurology at the Boston University School of Medicine. In 1981 he
was awarded a MacArthur Prize Fellowship.
Bernard R. Gifford, chair of the National Commission on Testing and
Public Policy, is Chancellor's Professor of Education in the School of Education
at the University of California, Berkeley. He served there as Dean of the Graduate
viii
School of Education from 1983 through 1989. Now on leave from the
university, he is currently serving as Vice President, Education, Apple Computer
Inc. He received his Ph.D. in radiation biology and biophysics from the
University of Rochester. Gifford has published in a number of disciplinary
areas, ranging from applied physics to public policy. In recent years he has
devoted most of his efforts to writing about the process of educational change
and reform. His latest books are History in the Schools: What Shall We
Teacher? (Macmillan, 1988), Test Policy and the Politics of Opportunity
Allocation: The Workplace and the Law (Kluwer, 1989) and Testing Policy and
Test Perfonnance: Education. Language and Culture (Kluwer, 1989).
Kate McGilly is a post-doctoral student at the University of California,
Berkeley. Her research interests include children's strategy development and
mathematics learning. Dr. McGilly received her Ph.D. in Developmental
Psychology from Carnegie Mellon University in 1988.
Mary Catherine O'Connor is an Assistant Professor at Boston University,
with appointments in the Program in Literacy, Language and Cultural Studies,
and the Program in Applied Linguistics. She received her Ph.D. in linguistics
from the University of California at Berkeley in 1987. Funded by a Spencer
Postdoctoral Fellowship and by a grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
to the Literacies Institute, she is currently carrying out research on the ways that
discourse shapes mathematics learning in middle school. Her research interests
include discourse and narrative analysis, the development of school and
community-based languages and literacies, and the influences of language and
culture on standardized testing and alternative forms of assessment. She also
works on the grammar of Northern Porno, a native language of Northern
California, currently supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation.
James W. Pellegrino is a Frank W. Mayborn Professor of Cognitive
Studies at Peabody College of Vanderbilt University. Since 1990 he has been
co-director of the Learning Technology Center at Vanderbilt. Previously he was
Professor of Education and Psychology at the University of California, Santa
Barbara. He is widely published in the area of cognitive science research on
thinking and learning. Most recently, his research has focused on applications of
cognitive theory and computer technology to the assessment and training of
quantitative and visual-spatial abilities. His most recent work is being carried
out at the Cognition and Technology Group at the Learning Technology Center.
Recent publications include work on anchored instruction and its relationship to
situated learning, and the use of technology in the design of generative learning
environments.
ix
Daniel P. Resnick is Professor of History and Director of European Studies
at Carnegie Mellon University. His first scholarly work was in the field of
French history, and he has published articles, a monograph, and textbooks in the
field of European history and Western development. For more than a decade, his
research has dealt with the broad themes of literacy development, schooling, and
assessment in American and European settings. A study of public school testing
practices, undertaken with Lauren Resnick, was supported by the Carnegie
Corporation. He is currently at work on patterns of postsecondary assessment at
American colleges and universities, a study supported by the Carnegie
Foundation.
Lauren B. Resnick is Professor of Psychology and Education and Director of
the Learning Research and Development Center at the University of Pittsburgh.
Professor Resnick's primary interest is the cognitive psychology of instruction.
Her research focuses on the learning of mathematics and science. She is the
founder and editor of Cognition and Instruction, a major new journal in the field;
coeditor of the Instructional Psychology Series; and author of a recent, widely
circulated monograph commissioned by the National Academy of Sciences
(NAS) entitled Education and Learning to Think. She has also authored and
edited volumes on The Psychology of Mathematics for Instruction. The Nature
of Intelligence. and, most recently, Knowing. Learning, and Instruction. Dr.
Resnick serves on a number of national and international boards and
commissions and is active as a consultant to foundations and government
agencies. She is a member of the Commission on Behavioral and Social
Sciences and Education of the Mathematical Sciences Education Board of the
National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences, and has served on
various NAS committees. She is past president of the American Psychological
Association's Division of Educational Psychology, and a fellow in the
Association's divisions of Experimental Psychology, Developmental
Psychology, Educational Psychology, and the Experimental Analysis of
Behavior. She has also served as president of the American Educational Research
Association and vice president of their Division of Learning and Instruction. In
addition, Professor Resnick is a fellow of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science and a member of the National Academy of Education.
Lorrie A. Shepard is a Professor of Education at the University of Colorado,
Boulder. Her research in applied measurement has addressed issues of standard
setting and test bias. Her work in educational policy research has focused on the
use of tests for special school placements, e.g., identification of learning
disabilities, grade retention, and kindergarten screening. Her current work
addresses the effects of traditional testing on teaching and learning, and the
development of alternative assessments. Shepard has served as President of the
National Council on Measurement in Education, and as Vice-President for
x
Division D of the American Educational Research Association. She has been
editor of the Journal of Educational Measurement and the American Educational
Research Journal. She was Vice-Chair of the National Academy of Sciences
Panel on the General Aptitude Test Battery, and is currently a member of the
National Academy of Education's panel to evaluate the state-by-state version of
the National Assessment of Educational Progress.
Robert J. Sternberg is IBM Professor of Psychology and Education in the
Department of Psychology at Yale University. He received his B.A. summa cum
laude, Phi Betta Kappa from Yale in 1972 and his Ph.D. from Stanford in 1975.
Dr. Sternberg has won a number of awards, including the Mensa Education and
Research Foundation Award for Excellence (1989), designation in Who's Who in
American Education (1989-), the Outstanding Book Award and the Research
Review Award of the American Educational Research for Gifted Children (1985),
the Cattell Award of the Society of Multivariate Experimental Psychology
(1982), and the McCandless Young Scientist Award and the Distinguished Award
for an Early Career Contribution to Psychology of the American Psychological
Association (1982, 1981). Dr. Sternberg was a John Simon Guggenheim Fellow
in 1985-1986 and an NSF Graduate Fellow in 1972-1975. His main interests
are in understanding, measuring, and teaching intelligence and related thinking
skills.
Lynne S. Webber is a Visiting Assistant Professor in Education at the
University of Illinois at Chicago. She received her Ph.D. in Education from the
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1987. Her research interests
include listening comprehension and referential communication in young
children, and issues concerning assessment and instruction.