Concept Inventories Alone Don't Gauge “Good Teaching”

Some blog followers might be interested in a recent post “Concept Inventories Alone Don't Gauge ‘Good Teaching’ ” [Hake (2012a)]. The abstract reads:

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ABSTRACT: In response to my post “The Value of Student Evaluations of Teaching” [Hake (2012b)] at http://bit.ly/XX7OUX, Math-Learn’s Ed Wall stated that: (a) he used approximations to both “Student Evaluations of Teaching” (SET’s) and “Concept Inventories” (CI’s), but wondered what a “good” evaluation of “teaching? was; and (b) he’s reasonably okay with a statement such as “I know good teaching when I see it” versus a statement such as “I know good teaching when I see a CI score).”

Let alone a single CI score, in my opinion even the normalized pre-to-posttest GAIN on a Concept Inventory (CI) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concept_inventory, should not, by itself, be interpreted as a gauge of “good teaching.”

In the editor suppressed “Interactive-engagement methods in introductory mechanics courses” [Hake (1998b)] at http://bit.ly/aH2JQN I pointed out on p. 14 that among desirable outcomes of the introductory physics course that does not measure directly are students’: (a) satisfaction with and interest in physics; (b) understanding of the nature, methods, and limitations of science; (c) understanding of the processes of scientific inquiry such as experimental design, control of variables, dimensional analysis, order-of-magnitude estimation, thought experiments, hypothetical reasoning, graphing, and error analysis; (d) ability to articulate their knowledge and learning processes; (e) ability to collaborate and work in groups; (f) communication skills; (g) ability to solve real-world problems; (h) understanding of the history of science and the relationship of science to society and other disciplines; (i) understanding of, or at least appreciation for, "modern" physics; (j) ability to participate in authentic research.
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To access the complete 13 kB post please click on http://bit.ly/VeDTWI.

Richard Hake, Emeritus Professor of Physics, Indiana University
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“What we assess is what we value. We get what we assess, and
if we don't assess it,we won't get it.”
- Lauren Resnick [quoted by Grant Wiggins (1990)]


REFERENCES [URL shortened by http://bit.ly/ and accessed on 28 Nov 2012.]
Hake, R.R. 2012a. “Concept Inventories Alone Don't Gauge ‘Good Teaching’, ”online on the OPEN! AERA-L archives at http://bit.ly/VeDTWI. Post of 28 Nov 2012 13:24:52-0800 to AERA-L and Net-Gold. The abstract and link to the complete post are being transmitted to several discussion lists.

Hake, R.R. 2012b. "The Value of Student Evaluations of Teaching" online on the OPEN! AERA-L archives at http://bit.ly/XX7OUX. Post of 26 Nov 2012 13:35:35-0800 to AERA-L and Net-Gold. The abstract and link to the complete post are being transmitted to several discussion lists and are also on my blog "Hake'sEdStuff" at http://bit.ly/TqLDls with a provision for comments.

Wiggins, G. 1990. “The Truth May Make You Free, But the Test May Keep You Imprisoned: Toward Assessment Worthy of the Liberal Arts," AAHE Assessment Forum: 17-31; online at http://bit.ly/a7g09T.