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During ICTs, just over a quarter of high school seniors could both select and explain their correct
answers about heating and cooling. Double that amount54 percentin the eighth grade group could
support correct conclusions with evidence, but only 15 percent of fourth grade students could do the
same in their experiment.
The computer tasks eliminated limits of geography and time, so students could virtually see, for
example, how a plant given a certain amount of sunlight would grow without waiting days or weeks to
see the actual process.
Though the tests raised significant questions about students abilities to apply scientific knowledge to
the real world, they at least seemed to enjoy taking them, according to Peggy Carr, associate
commissioner at the National Center for Education Statistics.
Carr usually observes students losing interest in the traditional NAEP tests. Not so with these
assessments, Carr said.
In the hands-on tasks, female students in every grade outdid their male counterparts by 2 to 4
percentage points, on average. Girls also scored slightly better than male students in grades eight and
12 on interactive computer tasks.
This gender gap shows a reversal from the traditional NAEP tests in which eighth-grade boys scored at
least four points higher on average than their female peers in 2009 and 2011
White and Asian-Pacific Islander students outperformed black and Hispanic students in the hands on
tasks, and Asian/Pacific Islander students achieved higher scores on average than other students in all
grades computerized assessments.
The lowest scoring group in both assessments was 12th grade black students. They answered 19 percent
of computerized questions correctly, whereas their Asian-Pacific Islander counterparts passed 33
percent.
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Copyright 2011