Japan’s High School Science Class Evaluation:Policy,Strategy,and Enlightenment

China’s eighth curriculum reform in basic education puts forward the basic concept of developmental evaluation;under the new concept of developmental evaluation,academic evaluation is defined as: the process of learning and the results of learning.This definition inherently determines that academic evaluation must have two aspects,learning process and outcomes.Under the guidance of developmental evaluation,China’s high school academic evaluation has gone through a series of reforms,but there are still many problems that need to be resolved.This paper carries out a research on Japan’s high school science class evaluation,especially the academic evaluation under the guidance of "Learning Instruction Guidance" in 2010,and hopes to provide references and inspirations for the reform of high school academic evaluation in our country.Japan’s academic evaluation has gone through four periods,including absolute evaluation,relative evaluation and individual internal evaluation,achievement evaluation,and evaluation based on a goal.Now Japan’s academic evaluation has entered into the new era of “Real Evaluation”,and successfully transformed from the“New Academic Concept” under the concept of “Relaxing Education” to “Solid View of Studying”,which is the combination of “Mastery Learning and Research-based Learning”.The new academic evaluation helps students improve the skills of critical thinking,judgement,and performance,which are very important for the students to master knowledge and skills and apply them to solve problem,and focuses on evaluating the performance of students’ individual thinking process.Thus,the 2010 edition of “Learning Instruction Guidance” adjusted the contents and structures of academic evaluation piece of 2008 edition,and transformed “Performance” from“View " column – “Skills · Performance” part,which is divided by academic elements,to the original " Thinking · Judgement " part.Consequently,“Skills” and “Thinking ·Judgement · Performance" were formed,and associated contents and standards of academic evaluation,methods,and focus have undergone a corresponding change.First,in terms of the content,developing the evaluation criteria for each teaching unit and knowledge points should be based on the overall standards of the Guidance.Second,evaluation method is divided into two parts;one is evaluation based on the project response theory,and the other is problem-solving evaluation based on the content of the subject matter.The most common evaluation method in each region and school district is “one-piece of paper” evaluation method-thinking and judging process are shown on a piece of paper: evaluation process is clear and accurate under the premise of saving the maximum time and cost.This evaluation method focuses on performance;homework aims at making the thinking process during students’ study become more “explicit”;after combining with the form of pen-and-paper test,the process becomes easier and more convenient to implement.Third,in terms of the application of evaluation methods,the "Integrated Guidance and Evaluation" thinking came into effect,forming the circle of "PDCA(Plan Do Action Check)" circle;Fourth,as for the evaluation results,the new "Learning Instruction Guidance” has a clear explanation for the evaluation process and results,clarifies the ambiguous situation,performs personalized evaluation for evaluation results,applies the concept of developing evaluation to the evaluation result,and utilizes a modal reference to the comparison of the rating system,so that the result of the entire academic evaluation reflects the students’ learning ability and development potentials.Fifth,regarding the evaluating bodies,the authority,government,and schools jointly create evaluation subjects and plans,and ensure the problem-solving type of evaluation comes into effect steadily through administrative means.In addition,the social,school and student enrollment and employment are directly linked to the results of academic evaluation,increasing the understanding of academic evaluation within the education system.By analyzing official evaluation cases that focus on "evaluation based on various views towards guidance plan","evaluation based on the observation of experimental skills","evaluation of experimental operation records","evaluation of care,enthusiasm,and attitude","evaluation of thinking,judgment,and performance" "Evaluation of learning performance",analysis shows that Japan’s high school science classes evaluation complies with the following four principles: first,the pursuit of authenticity evaluation-evaluating of student’ most real academic level;second,the evaluation of the evaluating main bodies’ close participation and cooperation;third,the performance-expressing the learning process and results by using the method of their choices;fourth,self-evaluation-getting an understanding by the internalization and introspection of evaluation.Based on the evaluation concepts and practices of Japan’s high school science classes,this paper puts forward some suggestions on how to improve the evaluation of China’s high school science classes.First,improving the level and depth of the academic evaluation objectives by establishing high-level homework or examinations,applying the concept of integrated instruction and evaluation,and training and improving students’ learning abilities;second,in terms of the contents of academic evaluation,suggestions include perfecting evaluating contents by setting up instructing documentations,adding more performance based homework or examination,clearly stipulating division of labor among all the main parties in order to improve efficiency and decreasing teachers’ burden,forcing the connection between evaluation and college entrance examinations and employment through the improvement of students’ scientific thinking and critical thinking skills,and improving students’ core skills from the "college entrance examination baton";third,in terms of applying learning methods,combining Japan’s performance evaluation based on problem-solving evaluation and OPPA evaluation under the premise of saving costs,and comprehensively training students’ scientific thoughts and thinking process could effectively solve the problems currently existing within science research in our country: the research process is cumbersome and time-consuming,and teachers could not personalize their observation towards each student in terms of large amount of students in the class;fourth,the establishment of a new relationship among the academic evaluation main parties,including building the concept of participation and cooperation under the premise of clear division of labor-teacher are evaluators while students and parents are “evaluation participants”,maximizing the positive role of academic evaluation by taking advantage of related requirements and regulations related to division of labor,personalizing different evaluations for each student,and improving students’ development of abilities.