ASSESSMENT OF THE SUB-COMPETENCES OF ENTREPRENEURIAL COMPETENCE IN THE BASIC SCHOOL

Abstract

Age-appropriate entrepreneurial competence increases the well-being of the individual and society because diverse abilities and competences must be applied in entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is defined through the entrepreneurial process, which begins with the recognition and action of an entrepreneurial opportunity and ends with the implementation of a new idea. In the development of entrepreneurship competence, the assessment of the development of cognitive and social skills is difficult and novel in the field due to the abundance of entrepreneurship sub-competences and their different starting points. The purpose of the study is to create and validate a test to assess the knowledge and attitudes of basic school students about entrepreneurship. 19 Estonian basic schools of different locations and sizes participated in the test. The test was taken by 616 students who were divided into 3rd grade (N=326) and 6th grade (N=290) students. The test contains special types of tasks, e.g., multiple-choice tasks, each answer of which provides information about the learner's knowledge or attitude about at least one entrepreneurial sub-competency. There were three tasks in the test to measure each sub-competency. The tasks (N=34) were divided into multiple-choice situational tasks and self-directed tasks. The entrepreneurial sub-competences were: (1) self-efficacy, (2) motivation and risk-taking, (3) economic and financial literacy, (4) planning and management skills, (5) sustainable thinking, (6) community initiative, (7) environmental awareness and ethical thinking, (8) teamwork, (9) valuing ideas and opportunities, (10) vision and creativity. As a result, the tasks measuring sub-competences were divided into three categories: ideas and opportunities, resources and into action. As the main results of the study, the responses of the 3rd and 6th grade students differed, and it was found that the 3rd grade students achieved the best results on the tasks categorized according to the self-efficacy dimension and the lowest results in tasks measuring economic mindset competences. In contrast, 6th graders achieved the best results in tasks assessing ideas and opportunities and the worst results resources mobilization in tasks. As a result of the study, a test was prepared and validated, which enables the evaluation of sub-competences in entrepreneurship. As a result of the purposeful assessment of the sub-competences of entrepreneurial competence, there is an opportunity to develop entrepreneurial competence in the 3rd and 6th grades.