New Perspectives in Science Education

In Korea, National Assessment of Educational Achievement (NAEA) is administered on a yearly basis. Its results are analyzed to examine the changes in students’ academic achievement, to ensure the quality of the national curriculum and to improve teaching and learning methods. 

In this study, a statistically significant sample of around 7,500 students was selected and analyzed in relation to the NAEA scores. This study focused on the answers students gave on the constructed response items related to digestion in the content area ‘life’ in middle school science. The students’ answers were classified, and the frequency distribution and percentage for each answer classification based on their test scores were provided. The frequency and percentage of students’ misconceptions regarding digestion were also calculated.

The study results showed the characteristics of the students’ academic achievement, which is difficult to be identified from the descriptive statistics data (the percentage of correct answers, the percentage distribution of partial scores and etc.). For example, while the students with high achievement level were able to understand digestion as a change in size at the molecular level and relate it to absorption, the students with low achievement level understood digestion only as a necessary process for absorption or didn’t understand digestion itself. In addition, the percentage for each classification of misconceptions varied according to their achievement level. The students with high achievement level were likely to misunderstand digestion as a way of obtaining nutrients or energy to support life or as something related to metabolism. On the other hand, the students with low achievement level had misconceptions that relate digestion to daily life; they had a tendency to misunderstand digestion as a means of preventing diseases or consuming more food.

This study is significant as the number of students’ answers to the constructed response items analyzed was great enough to estimate the characteristics of the whole student population. Thus, the results of this study have implications for improving the national science curriculum and supporting customized teaching and learning methods suitable for each achievement level.