Trends of Assessment Research in Science Education

Abstract

This study seeks educational implication by analyzing research papers dealing with science assessment in the most recent 30 years in Korea. The main purpose of the study is to analyze the trends in published papers on science assessment, their purpose, methodology, and key words, especially concentrating on the cognitive and affective domains. We selected 273 research articles and categorized them by research object, subject, methodology, and contents. To examine the factors that affect the research trend, we also tried to contextualize papers’ theme in terms of changes in national curriculum and assessment system during the contemporary period. As a result, an overall research trend reflects changes in science curriculum and assessment events such as implementation of college scholastic ability test or performance assessment. There is an unequal distribution in various aspects of the researches, showing a superiority in cognitive domains than the affective ones. By using standardized data obtained through the national and international assessment of educational achievement in science, quantitative researches were superior to qualitative ones. Studies on cognitive domain use variously written- and performance-based tests, whereas most studies of the affective ones prefer written tests. Applied research and evaluation research are predominant comparing to basic ones, which most of the research methodology is based on statistics. Lastly, we found out that key words and subjects tend to be subdivided and detailed rather than general and comprehensive, as time goes on. Such trend will be helpful to elaborate and refine assessment tools that have been regarded as a problem.