EARTH SCIENCE STUDENT ASSESSMENTS

The test in this section contains items related to five of the K–4 standards in earth science from the NRC's National Science Education Standards (NSES); below are the standards as stated in the NSES. NOTE: These tests do not contain any items probing the astronomy component of the K–4 earth science standards.

K–4 Earth Science Standard 1:

"Earth materials are solid rocks and soils, water, and the gases of the atmosphere. The varied materials have different physical and chemical properties, which make them useful in different ways, for example, as building materials, as sources of fuel, or for growing the plants we use as food. Earth materials provide many of the resources that humans use."

K–4 Earth Science Standard 2:

"Soils have properties of color and texture, capacity to retain water, and ability to support the growth of many kinds of plants, including those in our food supply."

K–4 Earth Science Standard 3:

"Fossils provide evidence about the plants and animals that lived long ago and the nature of the environment at that time."

K–4 Earth Science Standard 4:

"The surface of the earth changes. Some changes are due to slow processes, such as erosion and weathering, and some changes are due to rapid processes, such as landslides, volcanic eruptions, and earthquakes."

K–4 Earth Science Standard 5:

"Weather changes from day to day and over the seasons. Weather can be described by measurable quantities, such as temperature, wind direction and speed, and precipitation."

Listed below are some student earth science misconceptions. The list is not intended to be exhaustive, but rather a summary of some of the more common prior ideas we identified from our analysis of the student response patterns to the items on the tests.

• All clouds are cold and therefore their presence makes the air cold.
• Cold causes hydrogen and oxygen to combine to form water.
• Heat causes water to break up into hydrogen and oxygen, i.e., water is destroyed when it evaporates.
• Air pressure increases with an increase in altitude.
• The atmosphere is mostly oxygen.
• Gases cannot dissolve in water.
• Soil is old, it has existed since Earth formed.
• Soil is a precursor of rock formation.
• Soils are always deposited by rivers.
• Sedimentary rocks are volcanic in origin because of the heat from the compression that formed them.
• Fossils provide evidence of past conditions to which individuals made adaptations and then passed on to their offspring.
• The hole in the ozone layer is the main cause of global warming. (Note that the ozone "hole" is often thought of by students as an actual hole or gap in the atmosphere, not as a region of relatively low ozone concentration.)

The following resources are useful for additional background information about students' science misconceptions:

Driver, R., Pupil as Scientist?, Philadelphia: Open University Press (1983).

Driver, R., et al., Making Sense of Secondary Science, Philadelphia: Open University Press (1994).

Hapkiewicz, A. "Naive Ideas in Earth Science" in the Michigan Science Teachers Association (MSTA) Journal, 44(2), pp. 26–30 (1999).

Philips, W.C. "Earth Science Misconceptions" in The Science Teacher, 58(2), pp. 21–23 (1991).

The test in this section contains items related to 12 of the grades 5–8 standards in earth science from the NRC's National Science Education Standards (NSES); below are the standards as stated in the NSES. NOTE: These tests do not contain any items probing the astronomy component of the grades 5–8 earth science standards.

5–8 Earth Science Standard 1:

"The solid earth is layered with a lithosphere; hot, convecting mantle; and dense, metallic core."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 2:

"Lithospheric plates on the scales of continents and oceans constantly move at rates of centimeters per year in response to movements in the mantle. Major geological events, such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and mountain building, result from these plate motions."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 3:

"Land forms are the result of a combination of constructive and destructive forces. Constructive forces include crustal deformation, volcanic eruption, and deposition of sediment, while destructive forces include weathering and erosion."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 4:

"Some changes in the solid earth can be described as the "rock cycle." Old rocks at the earth's surface weather, forming sediments that are buried, then compacted, heated, and often recrystallized into new rock. Eventually, those new rocks may be brought to the surface by the forces that drive plate motions, and the rock cycle continues."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 5:

"Soil consists of weathered rocks and decomposed organic material from dead plants, animals, and bacteria. Soils are often found in layers, with each having a different chemical composition and texture."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 6:

"Water, which covers the majority of the earth's surface, circulates through the crust, oceans, and atmosphere in what is known as the "water cycle." Water evaporates from the earth's surface, rises and cools as it moves to higher elevations, condenses as rain or snow, and falls to the surface where it collects in lakes, oceans, soil, and in rocks underground."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 7:

"Water is a solvent. As it passes through the water cycle it dissolves minerals and gases and carries them to the oceans."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 8:

"The atmosphere is a mixture of nitrogen, oxygen, and trace gases that include water vapor. The atmosphere has different properties at different elevations."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 9:

"Clouds, formed by the condensation of water vapor, affect weather and climate."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 10:

"Global patterns of atmospheric movement influence local weather. Oceans have a major effect on climate, because water in the oceans holds a large amount of heat."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 11:

"The earth processes we see today, including erosion, movement of lithospheric plates, and changes in atmospheric composition, are similar to those that occurred in the past. earth history is also influenced by occasional catastrophes, such as the impact of an asteroid or comet."

5–8 Earth Science Standard 12:

"Fossils provide important evidence of how life and environmental conditions have changed."

Listed below are some student earth science misconceptions. The list is not intended to be exhaustive, but rather a summary of some of the more common prior ideas we identified from our analysis of the student response patterns to the items on the tests.

• Energy is not conserved.
• A change of state is a chemical change.
• A substance that undergoes combustion ceases to exist, having been converted into heat and energy (students may classify heat as a unique entity). (Note: Students with this belief do not recognize that when 100 pounds of gasoline are consumed, 100 pounds of gases are formed.)
• Heat causes water to break up into hydrogen and oxygen, i.e., water is destroyed when it evaporates.
• The atmosphere is mostly oxygen.
• Oxygen in the atmosphere comes from comets or the breakdown of water through evaporation, i.e., plants are not recognized as the source of free oxygen in the air.
• All mountains are either active, dormant or extinct volcanoes.
• Fossils provide evidence of past conditions to which individuals made adaptations and then passed on to their offspring.
• The hole in the ozone layer is the main cause of global warming. (Note that the ozone "hole" is often thought of by students as an actual hole or gap in the atmosphere, not as a region of relatively low ozone concentration.)

The following resources are useful for additional background information about students' science misconceptions:

Driver, R., Pupil as Scientist?, Philadelphia: Open University Press (1983).

Driver, R., et al., Making Sense of Secondary Science, Philadelphia: Open University Press (1994).

Hapkiewicz, A. "Naive Ideas in Earth Science" in the Michigan Science Teachers Association (MSTA) Journal, 44(2), pp. 26–30 (1999).

Philips, W.C. "Earth Science Misconceptions" in The Science Teacher, 58(2), pp. 21–23 (1991).

Wandersee, J.H., et al., “Research on Alternative Conceptions in Science,” in Gabel, D., (ed.) Handbook of Research on Science Teaching and Learning, New York: Macmillan, pp. 177–210 (1994).

The test in this section contains items related to 9 of the grades 9–12 standards in earth science from the NRC's National Science Education Standards (NSES); below are the standards as stated in the NSES.

NOTE: These tests do not contain any items probing the astronomy component of the grades 9–12 earth science standards.

9–12 Earth Science Standard 1:

"Earth systems have internal and external sources of energy, both of which create heat. The sun is the major external source of energy. Two primary sources of internal energy are the decay of radioactive isotopes and the gravitational energy from the earth's original formation."

9–12 Earth Science Standard 2:

"The outward transfer of earth's internal heat drives convection circulation in the mantle that propels the plates comprising earth's surface across the face of the globe."

9–12 Earth Science Standard 3:

"Heating of earth's surface and atmosphere by the sun drives convection within the atmosphere and oceans, producing winds and ocean currents."

9–12 Earth Science Standard 4:

"Global climate is determined by energy transfer from the sun at and near the earth's surface. This energy transfer is influenced by dynamic processes such as cloud cover and the earth's rotation, and static conditions such as the position of mountain ranges and oceans."

9–12 Earth Science Standard 5:

"The earth is a system containing essentially a fixed amount of each stable chemical atom or element. Each element can exist in several different chemical reservoirs. Each element on earth moves among reservoirs in the solid earth, oceans, atmosphere, and organisms as part of geochemical cycles."

9–12 Earth Science Standard 6:

"Movement of matter between reservoirs is driven by the earth's internal and external sources of energy. These movements are often accompanied by a change in the physical and chemical properties of the matter. Carbon, for example, occurs in carbonate rocks such as limestone, in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide gas, in water as dissolved carbon dioxide, and in all organisms as complex molecules that control the chemistry of life."

9–12 Earth Science Standard 7:

"Geologic time can be estimated by observing rock sequences and using fossils to correlate the sequences at various locations. Current methods include using the known decay rates of radioactive isotopes present in rocks to measure the time since the rock was formed."

9–12 Earth Science Standard 8:

"Interactions among the solid earth, the oceans, the atmosphere, and organisms have resulted in the ongoing evolution of the earth system. We can observe some changes such as earthquakes and volcanic eruptions on a human time scale, but many processes such as mountain building and plate movements take place over hundreds of millions of years."

9–12 Earth Science Standard 9:

"Evidence for one-celled forms of life--the bacteria--extends back more than 3.5 billion years. The evolution of life caused dramatic changes in the composition of the earth's atmosphere, which did not originally contain oxygen."

The items are identical on both test forms, but arranged in different sequences so that the forms can be used as a pretest/post-test pair (either form may be used as the pretest). Either form can be used by itself as a diagnostic test.

The 9–12 tests are intended for use primarily with high school earth science students. The tests can also be administered to any persons who possess at least a 9th grade reading level fluency in English.

NOTE: Administering the tests to anyone with less than the indicated minimum reading level may result in invalid test results due to the test performing more as a reading comprehension test rather than as a science test.