Assessing Science Inquiry and Reasoning Using Dynamic Visualizations and Interactive Simulations

How can we leverage dynamic visualizations and interactive simulations to assess complex science learning? Science systems involve many dynamic processes, and visualizations of these processes are central components of scientific thinking and communication. Although multiple-choice items may effectively measure declarative knowledge such as scientific facts or definitions, they fail to capture evidence of science inquiry practices such as making observations, collecting data, or modeling dynamic systems. As computers become more widely accessible, interactive, simulation-based assessments have the promise of capturing information about students’ ability to apply these more complex science practice skills. Tasks using dynamic visualizations and simulations are likely to provide more valid measures of the scientific proficiencies called for internationally by science educators, such as those reflected in the United States’ National Assessment of Educational Progress and the Next Generation Science Standards. In this chapter, we describe the range of science content knowledge and practice skills we seek to measure, outline research-based assessment design principles, and review a test creation process that mitigates the potential limitations of dynamic assessments. Next, we provide examples of how the stimulus and response affordances of dynamic visualizations allow us to assess scientific inquiry and reasoning skills. Finally, we provide findings from an efficacy study that support the claim that dynamic and interactive assessments provide better measures of student proficiency with complex scientific inquiry and reasoning. Throughout the chapter, we give concrete examples of the principles and processes in the context of two science assessment platforms, SimScientists and ChemVLab+.