Die kognitive Validität von Ordered Multiple Choice Aufgaben zur Erfassung des Verständnisses von Materie

One important goal of science education is to foster students’ understanding of scientific concepts. To diagnose students’ states of understanding Ordered Multiple Choice (OMC) items have been suggested by Briggs et al. (Briggs, Alonzo, Schwab und Wilson 2006). In OMC items, each of the possible response options corresponds to a specific level of an underlying learning progression. In order to provide more diagnostic information than typical multiple choice items, students’ response behavior must reflect their understanding of the construct measured. That is, evidence about the cognitive validity of OMC items is required. In this paper, we present the findings from a think-aloud-study with 11 students from grade 6 (n = 3), grade 9 (n = 4), and grade 12 (n = 4). We investigated the cognitive validity of 8 OMC items that covered aspects of students’ understanding of the matter concept. Our findings suggest that 9th and 12th grade students’ choice of response option was mainly based on cognitive processes related to their understanding of the matter concept, whereas 6th graders’ choices were mainly based on other, non-matter-related cognitive processes.