Ecology: the biology of interaction. Appendix V. Testing in the ecology course

Ukrainian language (latest version) / Russian language (updates stopped)

Appendix IV. Recommended Literature

D. Shabanov, M. Kravchenko. Ecology: The Biology of Interaction Appendices

Appendix VI. Personalities

{ "title": "Appendix IV. Recommended Literature", "summary": "", "body": "D. Shabanov, M. Kravchenko. Ecology: Biology of Interaction\nAppendices\n\nAppendix VI. Personalities\n\nAppendix V. Testing in the Course of General Ecology\nWhen teaching the course of general ecology at the Biological Faculty of V.N. Karazin Kharkiv National University, testing is used. A template has been developed to present and check tests, which includes a certain set of types of test tasks, adopted styles of notation, methods of filling and checking answer sheets. A template with a set of paragraph styles has been developed for creating and printing these tasks in Microsoft Word format, which simplifies the layout of tests.\nIt should be emphasized that a test is a whole work that solves a certain problem, a test task is a separate part of the test, a task in test form, and a question is an element of the task that provides for a separate choice of answer. When performing tests, students receive sheets with questions and answer sheets. Each question corresponds to a certain cell on the answer sheet. Students should not make any notes or marks on the sheets with questions, entering correct answers immediately into the answer blank.\nVariety of test tasks. According to their structure, test tasks can be combined into 4 types.\n[IMG_1]\nFig. IV.1. Sample ecology test. On the left - a sheet with tasks, on the right - an answer sheet (clickable)\n1. Choosing one correct answer (example - task 1 in Fig. IV.1). Answer options are denoted by numbers, a single cell is provided for the answer, where you need to write this number.\n2. Establishing correspondence (example - tasks 2, 3 and 4 in Fig. IV.1). Elements of the first list are denoted by lowercase letters in brackets, and the second list is numbered. In the answer sheet, each element of the first list corresponds to one cell, denoted by a lowercase letter. In each cell, you need to write the number of the corresponding answer from the second list (this number can be either one-digit or two-digit). If this is not specified otherwise, a complete correspondence of lists is not required: some elements of the numbered list can correspond to several elements of the list denoted by letters, and some - to none.\n3. Arranging objects in the required order (example - task 5 in Fig. IV.1). Objects denoted by numbers should be arranged in a certain order specified in the task. In the answer sheet, there is a row of cells without letter designations. One digit is written in each cell.\n4. Indicating correct and incorrect answers (example - tasks 6 and 7 in Fig. IV.1). Each statement is denoted by an uppercase letter. In the answer sheet, cells are denoted by the same uppercase letters. In each of these cells, you should write the digit 1 (true) or 0 (false). One digit is written in each cell.\nPlease note! In the answer sheet (except for the standard signature of the work), you should not write any explanations: only the digits written in the cells for answers are considered.\nIf a single cell is allocated for a test task in the answer sheet (type 1 task), you should write the digit that corresponds to the most correct of the proposed answer options.\nIf several cells are allocated for a test task in the answer sheet, denoted by lowercase (\"small\") letters (type 2 task), you should write the digits - numbers of the corresponding answers in these cells.\nFinally, if several consecutive cells are allocated for a test task in the answer sheet, which are not denoted by letters or numbers (type 3 task), you should write the digits corresponding to the correct sequence of answers in these cells in the required order.\nIf several cells are allocated for a test task in the answer sheet, denoted by uppercase (\"large\") letters (type 4 task), you should write the digits 1 or 0 in these cells.\nChecking tests and scoring. Checking test results can be done both manually and automatically. Here, we will consider only the manual option, for which a verification sheet with correct answers is necessary. During manual verification, the answer sheet is placed next to the verification sheet. Cells where the student's answers coincide with the sample are marked (in the example in Fig. IV.2 - \"ticks\" on the fields). Then, the number of marked cells (i.e., questions in the test that the student gave a correct answer) - the score is counted. For example, in the case shown in Fig. IV.2, the student scored 20 points out of 31 possible - 65%. Please note: incorrect answers (as in the case of task 1) and the absence of answers (as in the case of task 4) lead to the same result: loss of a point. In tasks to arrange objects in the correct order (as in task 5), only digits in the correct positions are counted.\n[IMG_2]\nFig. IV.2. Example of a completed answer sheet (corresponds to the task in Fig. IV.1) and the result of its verification when compared with a verification sheet containing correct answers\nOn the applicability of tests in the course of general ecology. Testology (the science of tests) divides tests into two groups: achievement tests and ability tests. The former check the assimilation of a certain amount of knowledge, the latter - the expediency of further education. In this course, achievement tests are used, and they are used for their intended purpose: to control the assimilation of material. This testing in the course of general ecology is favorably different from the state independent testing in the version that is used in Ukraine at the time of writing this manual. During independent testing, not only the measurement of the quality of school education is carried out, but also the selection of graduates for higher education. These two tasks impose different requirements on test tasks, which are not currently taken into account when compiling them.\nAs can be seen from the example given, in the used version of testing, the \"price\" in points of each question (corresponding to a cell on the answer sheet) is the same. For effective separation of strong and weak students, it is necessary to use tasks of different complexity in each test. When performing such a test, a stronger student will answer a larger share of questions than a weak one and will receive a higher final score.\nAn example of analyzing the performance of a test task. Statistical analysis of answers to tests allows us to assess the complexity of test tasks, recheck their correctness, and select those tasks that allow us to effectively differentiate students by their level of knowledge.\nAn example of analyzing the results of a test task shown in Fig. IV.1 under number 4 is given in Fig. IV.3. A student who has mastered the educational material should understand that if two species reach the same number during joint residence as they do alone, this indicates the absence of competition between them. The absence of competition is associated with the difference in ecological niches (at least in their resource part). Achieving a reduced number by both species is possible with the division of niches. One species consumes one part of the total resource, and the other - another. This is possible if the niches intersect partially. Finally, competitive displacement occurs when the displacing species overlaps the niche of the displaced one.\n[IMG_3]\nFig. IV.3. The higher the score for the test as a whole, the better students answered task 4 (Fig. IV.1.)\nCan students who do not understand the essence of the problem (who are not familiar with the concept of a niche; who cannot interpret graphs; who do not establish a connection between niche parameters, competition, and species abundance) accidentally arrange the necessary digits in the necessary cells? They can. But they will receive the correct result less often than well-prepared students, and therefore the performance of this test task will make a contribution to the differentiation of students by their knowledge.\nThe figure IV.3 shows how students answered this task in the spring of 2011. All 75 students who performed this task were divided into 5 groups according to the overall score they received during testing. For each group, the average result of answers to the task in question and the error of this average are indicated.\nAs can be seen, weak students answer questions of this task mainly randomly, but with the growth of their \"strength\", the frequency of correct answers also increases. Since the frequency of correct answers and the level of preparation of students are strongly related, answers to this task can be used to judge the \"strength\" of students. For this task, the difference in the number of correct answers between the strongest and weakest students (more than 5 times) is higher than for the entire set of tasks used as a whole. This means that the analyzed task has a high differentiating ability. Since even among strong students, many did not answer this task completely, it can be considered complex.\nA certain drawback of the analysis carried out in Fig. IV.3 is that the \"strength\" (level of preparation) of students, which was compared with the success of performing a separate test task, was also determined using testing (on a wider set of tasks). It would be better to use the result of some other, non-related to testing, assessment of the level of preparation of test subjects. According to the data available at the time of writing this manual, the assessment of students by tests corresponds well to their expert assessment, which they receive when evaluating by other methods.\nAppendix IV. Recommended Literature\n\nD. Shabanov, M. Kravchenko. Ecology: Biology of Interaction\nAppendices\n\nAppendix VI. Personalities" }

Appendix IV. Recommended Literature

D. Shabanov, M. Kravchenko. Ecology: The Biology of Interaction Appendices

Appendix VI. Personalities