Abstract:

In 2014, the OECD team based on the results of their monitoring pointed out that regular assessment of pupils in Slovakia is not sufficiently formative and gave the strong recommendations for the introduction of "formative elements of assessment" into the Slovak education system.
Our study presents the results of empirical researches on the implementation of formative assessment classroom techniques (FACTs) in Slovakia. The paper describes an innovative applying of prediction cards as a tool of FACTs in chemistry education and presents the investigation results of the classroom implementation of prediction cards at seventh grades of primary school.
The prediction card is characterized as a tool that activates prior knowledge and at the same time creates a prediction of new information or concepts (Billmeyer, R., & Barton, M. L. , 1998). Using a prediction card as a formative assessment tool, teachers can compare pupils’ pre- and post-responses to note changes in attitude or content knowledge (Kozen, A., Murray, R. & Windell, I., 2006).
The goal of the research was to determine whether is there a difference between the predictions/decisions that pupils made in the prediction cards based on their previous knowledge and on the knowledge they gained through the lesson and whether is there a relationship between the pupils´ end-of-year evaluation and their overall results of predictions/decisions did in prediction cards.
We used a one-group time-series quasi-experiment method for the reaching of our research aims.
According to the results of the paired t-test (n = 15; t = 2.897; p-value = 0.006), there is a significant difference between the two means of the results we got from the pupils in prediction cards we used at the beginning and end of the lesson. The end-of-lesson score is higher. The results of analyzing the relationship between pupils' year-end grades and their point difference in prediction cards at the end and beginning of lessons, indicates the existence of medium effect (H = 0.515 at the beginning of the lesson), and small effect (H = 0.391 at the end of the lesson) by the factor, which was the year-end grades of the pupils.

References:
[1] Billmeyer, R., & Barton, M. L. . (1998). Teaching reading in the content areas: If not me, then who? . Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.
[2] Kozen, A., Murray, R. & Windell, I. (2006). Increasing all students’ chance to achieve: Using and adapting anticipation guides with middle school learners. Intervention in School and Clinic, 41(4), s. 195–200.
[3] Shewbridge, C., van Bruggen, J., Nusche, D., and Wright, P. P. (2014). OECD Reviews of Evaluation and Assessment in Education: Slovak Republic 2014. OECD Reviews of Evaluation and Assessment in Education. OECD Publishing, Paris. DOI=http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/9789264117044-en.

Keywords:

formative assessment, prediction card, chemistry learning, education.