Student Learning Analysis

Courtney Jacobs
Introduction

During my time at Rochester High School, I have had the incredible opportunity to lead teach
students in Block Science as well as Chemistry. This analysis took place during the unit on
periodic table trends in my Chemistry class.

In the previous unit, students learned about the history of the atom, specifically, the different
models proposed by scientists (Dalton, Thomson, Rutherford, Bohr). This gave students the
foundation that they needed to look at the next unit, Periodic Table Trends. To launch this unit,
students watched a video showing the Alkali Metals reacting with water and were asked the
question, “Why does this happen?”. The end goal of the unit being that students will be able to
answer this question using the information about periodic table trends that they have learned.
The launch then lead to students learning about the periodic table trends including, atomic
radius, ionization energy, and electronegativity, and reactivity. To help students understand
reactivity, I wanted students to understand valence electrons and how they are represented in
the Bohr Model of the atom as well as Lewis Dot Structures. This was the stopping point of the
unit and will be a perfect transition into the next unit on bonding.

This Assessments Pre and Post test focuses on valence electrons and how to represent/draw
the Bohr Model of the atom and Lewis Dot Structures. Students were given a pre test, then they
learned the material, and then a post test was given.

Assessment Clearly Aligned with Specific Learning Goal

This entire unit, along with my assessment, was focused on the following Next Generation
Science Standard.
HS-PS1-1 Use the periodic table as a model to predict the relative properties of elements based
on the patterns of electrons in the outermost energy level of atoms.
Reactivity was one of the trends that I focused on having students understand. In order for them
to fully understand reactivity, they need to understand the importance of valence electrons.
Having students create visual representations of the atom via the Bohr Model and Lewis Dot
Structures allows them to see valence electrons and relate that back to an elements reactivity.
Specifically, how electrons are taken or removed from atoms, causing them to be more or less
reactive. By doing this, it also helped students to answer the anchoring phenomenon question of
why Alkali metals behave the way they do in water.
The main learning objectives I created for my students in this particular lesson are as follows.
 1. Students will be able to create Lewis Dot Structures for elements.
2. Students will be able to create Bohr Models for elements.
3. Students will understand the importance of valence electrons and how many each
element can have.

Data Used for Substantive Analysis of Student Understanding.

Here are pictures of the overview results, for the full analysis, use the links below.
Pre Test Results

Post Test Results

The following link is to a spreadsheet with the data I collected from my students pre and post
test.
Pre and Post Test Data

The following link is to examples of the actual Pre and Post tests completed by students
Student Examples

Analysis of Assessment- Student Thinking

Pre Test
Looking at all the data as a whole, no one question was answered correctly by all students. This
told me that if students did learn this material in the past, I still needed to review the material
thoroughly to ensure student understanding. The data also showed me that students were
familiar with the material. At least one student got each of the questions correct. According to
the data, my teaching efforts needed to be focused mostly on having students represent atoms
by Lewis Dot Structures. This can be seen in question one (33.33% correct) and question four
(11.11% correct). Specifically, I need to address how the electrons are placed around the
element symbol. This can be seen in question one, 4 of the 12 incorrect answers chosen by
students show the correct number of electrons, but the wrong placement. This can be seen in
the example pretest number one (written in the top right corner of paper). I also need to address
how students identify the amount of valence electrons an element has. In question one, 8 out of
the 12 incorrect answers chosen had an option with the incorrect number of electrons. This can
be seen in the example pretest number four (written in the top right corner of paper). Looking at
question four , students made several of the same mistakes. A majority of the mistakes were
seen when students did not including the number of protons and neutrons in the elements Bohr
Model. An example of this is shown in pretest number 4 and 11 (written in the top right corner of
paper).

Students did the best on question number 2. This question was about the maximum number of
valence electrons an element can have (14 out of 18 students got this question correct). This
was to be expected because prior to this pretest students learned how to write electron
configurations. By writing the electron configuration, students can easily find the number of
valence electrons a element has.

Looking at the Pretest data helped me to create a lesson to address their

misconceptions/misunderstandings while helping them to understand the material. The following
is a link to the presentation that I created to address them and help students understand the
material. After the presentation, students worked on practice problems as well as a handout.

Subsequent Instruction
Post Test
The post test I created addressed the same learning goals as the pre test, but did not ask the
same exact question. I did this to access the students actual understanding of the material. I
wanted to make sure students did not recall the answers on their pretest. I also made all the
questions short answer and took away the multiple choice options. This was done again to
ensure student understanding. I wanted their own thoughts, not them to pick any option if they
were unsure and just wanted to guess.
Looking at the post test results, you can see a clear improvement in students understanding.
Each question showed an improvement in understanding of the learning objectives. Specifically
questions 1,2,3 and 4 (Lewis Dot Structures). Question one specifically shows students
understanding of how to successfully create a Lewis Dot Structure, how to identify an element's
number of valence electrons, and how to place the electrons around the element’s symbol.
Question two addresses the concept of valence electrons and the maximum amount any
element can have. Question three addresses the idea that elements in the same family have the
same number of valence electrons. Question four asks them to draw out both a Bohr Model as
well as a Lewis Dot Structure.

No one question was answered correctly by all students. This shows me that there are still
areas that students need help in. Specifically, the Bohr model of the atom. In question four,
there are several students who answered this question incorrectly (9/18). Looking at the data, a
majority of them had the correct structure, but missed one part of the model. For example, 5 out
of the 9 students made the error in not including the correct number of protons and neutrons or
not including that information in their model which indicated the need for subsequent instruction.
Another example of an error that several students made was not putting the correct amount of
electrons on each energy level. This can be seen in the example post test number 10 (written in
the top right corner of paper). This result was surprising to me because in order to create the
Bohr model, I had students first write the electron configuration for the element. Using that
information, they create the model. This was surprising because on the actual post tests, not
many students actually wrote out electron configuration. This can be seen in the example post
test in the above link.

After looking at the data, students needed to complete a study guide for the upcoming test.
Using the data I was able to readdress some of the common misconceptions in the study guide.
Specifically, I had students do more examples of Lewis Dot Structures as well as Bohr Models.
With this I also created an answer key with the answers as well as important reminders, like be
sure to include the number of protons and neutrons in your Bohr Model. This key was made
available to all students. For future students, I made sure to create notes on my material to
ensure that when I teach this again, I address the misconceptions that students showed me in
the pretest.

Conclusion
Data analysis can be an extremely powerful tool for teachers in all subject areas. It can not only
help them gauge a students understanding of material, but it also allows teachers to evaluate
their instruction and see where there is room for improvement. By doing the pretest first, I was
able to specifically analyze my students needs and craft my lesson around the areas that
needed the most improvement. Specifically, I targeted how the electrons are placed around the
element symbol and how to identify the amount of valence electrons in an elements Lewis Dot
Structure. By targeting those areas in my instruction, students were able to better understand
that material and it shows in their post test results. This assessment gave me the opportunity to
reevaluate my instruction and come up with ways of improving for future students.