Background
Process skills such as critical thinking and information processing are commonly stated outcomes for STEM undergraduate degree programs, but instructors often do not explicitly assess these skills in their courses. Students are more likely to develop these crucial skills if there is constructive alignment between an instructor’s intended learning outcomes, the tasks that the instructor and students perform, and the assessment tools that the instructor uses. Rubrics for each process skill can enhance this alignment by creating a shared understanding of process skills between instructors and students. Rubrics can also enable instructors to reflect on their teaching practices with regard to developing their students’ process skills and facilitating feedback to students to identify areas for improvement.

Results
Here, we provide rubrics that can be used to assess critical thinking and information processing in STEM undergraduate classrooms and to provide students with formative feedback. As part of the Enhancing Learning by Improving Process Skills in STEM (ELIPSS) Project, rubrics were developed to assess these two skills in STEM undergraduate students’ written work. The rubrics were implemented in multiple STEM disciplines, class sizes, course levels, and institution types to ensure they were practical for everyday classroom use. Instructors reported via surveys that the rubrics supported assessment of students’ written work in multiple STEM learning environments. Graduate teaching assistants also indicated that they could effectively use the rubrics to assess student work and that the rubrics clarified the instructor’s expectations for how they should assess students. Students reported that they understood the content of the rubrics and could use the feedback provided by the rubric to change their future performance.

Conclusion
The ELIPSS rubrics allowed instructors to explicitly assess the critical thinking and information processing skills that they wanted their students to develop in their courses. The instructors were able to clarify their expectations for both their teaching assistants and students and provide consistent feedback to students about their performance. Supporting the adoption of active-learning pedagogies should also include changes to assessment strategies to measure the skills that are developed as students engage in more meaningful learning experiences. Tools such as the ELIPSS rubrics provide a resource for instructors to better align assessments with intended learning outcomes.



中文翻译：

---

评估本科STEM课程中批判性思维和信息处理的专栏

背景
技术诸如批判性思维和信息处理之类的过程技能通常被认为是STEM本科学位课程的成果，但是讲师通常不会在其课程中明确评估这些技能。如果讲师的预期学习成果，讲师和学生执行的任务以及讲师使用的评估工具之间具有建设性的一致性，则学生更有可能发展这些关键技能。通过在讲师和学生之间建立对过程技能的共同理解，每种过程技能的专长可以增强这种一致性。专栏还可以使讲师反思自己的教学实践，以发展学生的处理技能，并促进对学生的反馈，以找出需要改进的地方。

结果
在这里，我们提供了可用于评估STEM本科教室中的批判性思维和信息处理以及为学生提供形成性反馈的指标。作为“通过提高STEM中的过程技能来提高学习水平（ELIPSS）”项目的一部分，开发了评估规则以评估STEM本科生的书面工作中的这两项技能。这些准则已在多个STEM学科，班级规模，课程级别和机构类型中实施，以确保它们适用于日常课堂使用。讲师通过调查报告称，这些原则支持在多个STEM学习环境中评估学生的书面作品。研究生助教还表示，他们可以有效地使用指标来评估学生的工作，并且该指标阐明了教师对他们应如何评估学生的期望。学生报告说，他们了解这些规则的内容，可以使用该规则提供的反馈来更改其未来的表现。

结论
ELIPSS评分标准使教师可以明确评估他们希望学生在课程中发展的批判性思维和信息处理技能。讲师能够阐明他们对助教和学生的期望，并就其表现向学生提供一致的反馈。支持采用主动学习法的方法还应包括改变评估策略，以评估随着学生参与更有意义的学习体验而发展的技能。ELIPSS专栏之类的工具为教师提供了一种资源，使他们可以更好地使评估与预期的学习成果保持一致。