Avaliando a aprendizagem do conceito de energia no ensino médio usando a TRI

Abstract

This work presents the development, application, calibration and analysis of items about the concept of energy for the three years of high school. It discusses the importance of evaluation in the teaching-learning process and presents a justification of the need for achieving the identification of conceptual gaps of students. Important concepts for the development of items, such as descriptors and distractors, are presented and discussed in the text. The principal aim of this work consists in building a sequential assessment, for the three years of high school, to monitor the learning development of the concept of Energy. The items have been drawn up in accordance with the recommendations of the Ministry of Education and Culture (MEC), using as basis the Curriculum of Physics of the State of Minas Gerais, and involve the application of the concept of Energy in mechanics, thermodynamics and electromagnetism. Some itens were used in different tests in order to check whether the students maintain skills acquired in previous years. The tests were applied to students of private and public schools in the cities of Formiga, Lavras and Três Corações, sampling 676 students from four schools. The result of the application of the tests in these schools were analyzed using the classical theory of testing and Item response theory. As educational product, it was developed a Bank of items, consisting of the catalog of 45 calibrated and tested items, containing some descriptive and pedagogical informations. Our results demonstrate the great difficulty of students in the learning of concepts related to Energy. In particular, students present great difficulty in linking concepts learned in different stages of the learning process, or in different topics.