Effects of participation in formative assessment on critical thinking skills in a science classroom

Abstract

Critical thinking is a skill that students struggle to master. This skill is useful not only in academics but also in becoming a discerning consumer of information. I wanted to see if student participation in formative assessment with frequent feedback would improve their critical thinking skills as well as their confidence in those skills. The experimental group was given additional questions on each formative assessment that assessed their critical thinking skills. The comparison group was given formative assessments without the added critical thinking questions. Both groups of students were given the same pre- and post-assessments to measure growth in critical thinking skills. Both groups were also given a pre-, mid-, and post-survey to measure confidence. The results of this study showed that participation in formative assessment does not improve student performance of critical thinking skills and did not increase student confidence in those skills. Further study is needed in this area.