The Comparative Research On Junior-high Students' Subject Competence Of Science In Integrated And Subject Science Curriculum

This study focuses on the comparative research on the Subject Competence in Science(SCS)among junior high school students in the Integrated and Subject Science curriculum.Based on the existing researches and large-scale international scientific literacy assessment project,the study constructed an assessment framework of junior high school students on SCS from three perspectives: the concept of SCS,scientific examination assessment,and students' basic Cognitive process.Following the assessment framework,the Item Response Theory(IRT)and "Four Cornerstones" framework were acted as methodological guidance,combined with Grade 7?9 students scientific knowledge to design the appropriate SCS assessment tools.After the prediction test,the assessment tools were optimized according to the result indicators analyzed by Rasch model.The formal tests were administered in two junior high schools where there was little difference in students pool,one was in the integrated science curriculum in City A,Zhejiang,the other was in the Subject science curriculum in City B,Jiangsu.In order to avoid differences in students' knowledge level affecting the comparison on two science curriculums,1380 effective samples were finally obtained after filtrating samples.Before discussing and analyzing data,the original data were pretreated to equalize Grade 7?9 to the same proficiency scale based on the linking items in the assessment tools.Statistical analysis of the assessment data was conducted by using Winsteps 3.72.0 and SPSS 23.0 software.The study carried out a vertical and horizontal comparison on the SCS of students in Grade 7?9 in the integrated and Subject science curriculum from a combination of quantitative and qualitative perspective,for purpose of exploring junior-high students' cognitive characteristics and expression rules of SCS,and to compare the differences in the SCS between students of different grades,genders and science curriculum.The following research results were obtained:(1)There were significant differences in SCS level of grade 7?9 students.With the grade increasing,the level of students' SCS would improve constantly;the students in grade 7 were mainly concentrated at the low SCS level;Grade-8 students showed obvious "M-mode" differentiation;Grade-9 students were concentrated at the high SCS level.(2)There was no significant difference in ability level of boys and girls in SCS.There was a degree of interaction between grade and gender variables in this study.(3)There were significant differences in SCS level of grade 7?9 students in the Integrated and Subject Science Curriculum.In Grade 7,the SCS level of students in the integrated science curriculum was better than that of students in the subject science curriculum.As the grade increased,the gap of students' SCS level between the two science curriculums was becoming narrow.Up to grade 9,the SCS level of students in subject science curriculum was superior to that in integrated science curriculum.Through analyzing cognitive characteristics and performance expression of juniorhigh student at different SCS levels,it's possible to propose targeted SCS breakthrough methods and improve students' SCS development.On top of this,analyzing the development difference of students' SCS in the Integrated and Subject science curriculum may be conducive to optimizing the further structure of science curriculum.