A Quantitative Evaluation Study On The Difficulty Of Geography Textbooks In Senior Middle Schools

Difficulty is an important yardstick for evaluating the quality of textbooks.The promulgation of the newly revised curriculum plan and curriculum standards in 2017 means that the reform of ordinary senior high school teaching has entered a new stage.The new edition of geography textbooks prepared with the guidance of this curriculum standard is gradually being promoted and implemented.How difficult is the new edition of geography textbooks?Can it reduce the heavy learning burden of high school students in China and better implement quality education?In this context,the difficulty of geography textbook is very necessary.This can not only make geography teaching workers better understand and use the textbook,and provide references for the writers of geography textbook to improve and perfect geography textbooks,but also enrich the difficulty evaluation system of geography textbooks.Based on the research results of domestic and foreign textbook difficulty,it is proposed that the evaluation of textbook difficulty should be a systematic evaluation that comprehensively considers textbooks,students,teachers and teaching processes.Due to the limited of research time and capabilities,this paper only considers the influence of the textbook on the difficulty of the textbook,that is,the static difficulty of the textbook,then uses the content analysis method and the statistical analysis method to construct the static difficulty evaluation model of the geography textbook,which is composed of the knowledge difficulty model and the inquiry difficulty model.Next,we take the geography 1 published by People's Education Press and the geography 1 published by Hunan Education Press published in 2019 as research cases to evaluate their difficulty.Combining the process and results of evaluation of the difficulty of textbooks,the author reflects on the model and puts forward suggestions for the compilation of the geography textbook.Finally,the research results are summarized and discussed,and further research directions are put forward.The main research results of this paper are as follows:(1)In terms of thinking,it is proposed that the evaluation of the difficulty of textbooks is a comprehensive system evaluation process,and the influence of textbooks,teachers,students,and teaching processes on the difficulty of the teaching materials should be considered comprehensively.(2)In terms of methods,a difficulty evaluation model for geography textbooks is proposed,including knowledge difficulty evaluation model and inquiry difficulty evaluation model.The difficulty of knowledge is determined by the breadth of knowledge(G)and the depth of knowledge(S).The relationship between the them and the difficulty(N)of the textbook is N=G×S.The calculation method of the difficulty of inquiry(N')is N'=?a5=1da.where da(a=1,2,3,4,5)represents the background,number of knowledge points,the level of inquiry,the process of inquiry,and the scenario problem respectively.(3)In practice,the difficulty evaluation is carried out with the samples of the geography 1 published by People's Education Press and the geography 1 published by Hunan Education Press.The results show that the difficulty of knowledge of the geography 1 published by People's Education Press is less than that of the geography 1 published by Hunan Education Press;the difficulty of exploring the two textbooks is close,and the geography 1 published by People's Education Press is slightly larger than that of the geography 1 published by Hunan Education Press.Combined with the process of difficulty evaluation,it is proposed that the compilation of geography textbook should design difficulty of textbooks scientifically,adopt flexible presentation mode,set up characteristic columns,strengthen the penetration of subject knowledge,create real situations,and reflect the process of problem solving.