Participatory Evaluation for Organizational Learning on Enacting Chemistry Laboratory Inquiry

• Main Authors: Hui-Jung Chen, 陳慧蓉
• Other Authors: Mei-Hung Chiu
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2009
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/87493500758324273701

博士 === 國立臺灣師範大學 === 科學教育研究所 === 97 === The influence of evaluation on organizational learning in enacting chemistry laboratory inquiry in a senior high school in Taiwan is investigated. The investigation focuses on the understanding of the mechanism underlying the links between activities and consequences in practical participatory evaluation in a school setting. Referring to social constructivism and knowledge utilization theories, this study proposes that the evaluation is a knowledge co-construction process of both evaluators and stakeholders (teachers) through reflections, dialogues, and evaluation activities. During the course of the study, we collected data by means of interviews, questionnaires, classroom observations, and video recording to investigate how students performed inquiry skills in the chemistry laboratory as consequences of how teachers structured the inquiry activities in the context of evaluation environments. The results indicate that both teachers and evaluators have considerable instrumental, conceptual and symbolic influence on the evaluation findings. For teachers, instrumental influence occurred as they adjusted course plans from community assistance, reflective interviews and using the data from evaluators. On the other hand, the influence of the evaluation on the evaluators was shown on the adjustment of technical evaluative skills, rethinking of the knowledge of evaluation theories and practices, and improvement in communication frequency and quality with teachers. From the empirical results, it is suggested that the mechanism of PEOL evaluation should be considered as a process of knowledge co-construction in the whole evaluation process, not only in the particular steps of data analysis but also interpretation by evaluators and stakeholders. It is not a linear progressing process of evaluation. The feedbacks and chain reactions among knowledge co-construction are transformed into actionable knowledge, eventually leading to actions. It effectively facilitated the evaluation influence of evaluation findings.