TOWARDS IMPLEMENTATION OF THE ASSESSMENT OF 21 ST
CENTURY SKILLS
Faith Joko
Hillside Teachers’ College, Bulawayo, ZimbabweThe study set out to examine how sampled secondary schools
in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe assess the 21st century skills in science, mathematics and technology. It also explored
how pedagogies and learning environments impact on the assessment of the skills. Stratified random sampling
was used to obtain a population sample. The study was carried out using document analysis of assessment
items, questionnaires, semi-structured interviews. The study found out that there were different levels and
emphasis of assessment of the skills. Science placed a lot of emphasis on problem solving, project-based
assessment, inquiry based assessment, projects and design work. Mathematics mainly assessed critical thinking,
problem solving and knowledge application as evidenced by assessment documents. However, Information and
Communication Technology as well as interpersonal and intrapersonal skills were assessed to a limited extent.
Pedagogies employed in Science were by and large practical-based. STEM education is vital for the
development of a number of critical survival skills in diverse, interconnected, and innovation-oriented societies
of the 21st century. The 21st century or soft skills include cognitive skills such as critical thinking, knowledge
and application, interpersonal skills such as communication and collaboration as well as intrapersonal skills like
motivation and learning how to learn. These skills are developed through pedagogies and learning
environments which are commensurate with learner–centred teaching. The study recommended bridging the gap
between the current scenario and the ideal in assessment of the 21st century skills to enhance movement towards
the current trends of assessment.
Key words
21st century skills, pedagogy, problem-based and inquiry-based learning
INTRODUCTION
Science and Mathematics are the key drivers in technological advancement. Science is a mother of all
inventions. Mathematics plays an important role as a computational tool for data analysis. Development in
mathematics and science are a panacea to technological and economic development. Science and Mathematics
compliment each other and need to be correlated even during teaching and assessment. Knowledge and skills in
the subjects enhance problem solving even in the wider society. Societal problems and ills require the
application of mathematics and scientific literacy. Therein lies the contribution of the two subjects to human
development. A skills based curriculum is the linchpin of development. According to the 2001 report,
Zimbabwe’s Curriculum Content and Learning Strategies for the 21st century, focus includes the following
skills and competencies:



numeracy and literacy
science and technology
aesthetics and creativity
Therefore assessment of Science and Mathematics should focus on the afore-mentioned skills as well as
problem solving, design and Information and Technology.
The 20th century report on the Zimbabwe education revealed that education was examination driven. Generally,
assessment emphasis is more on cognitive summative terminal examinations rather than the continuous
1
formative assessment. Internationally education is changing. The environment, especially the economic
landscape, is also changing. The current assessment landscape focuses on measurement of core-content
knowledge of mathematics and science but comparatively lacks assessments of the 21st century skills. Ridgeway,
McCuster and Pead (2004) posit that outside observers in the U.S. school system claim that narrowly focused
high-stakes assessment systems produce only illusory student gains. This creates a gap between the knowledge
and skills students are acquiring in schools and the knowledge and skills essential for survival in the
increasingly global and technology infused 21st century workplace. The 21st century education purports to meet
the economic and social needs to compete effectively in the global arena . In order to meet today’s world
demands calls for a paradigm shift in assessment to the adoption of the 21st century skills in the schools .Both
formative and summative assessments should form a school’s overall assessment strategy of the 21st century
skills .
According to Darling –Hammond (2010) , a rigorous education system must refer to the mastery of both content
and skills. Students therefore need to acquire in-depth knowledge of facts and skills of their subjects. In
addition, students should be able to learn how to think, learn ,design, evaluate and manage their work. Students
need to learn how to communicate and collaborate. (Kay, 2010). The acquisition of science and mathematics
concepts in turn depends on the mastery of the process skills. Assessment should therefore be aligned to the
curriculum and methods. Learners must be engaged in interactive and manipulative activities which engender
the subject skills. According to Stiggins Chappauis,2006; Quellmalz and Kozma, 2003 , assessment should be
for learning not of learning. As learners are assessed, they should learn where they erred in the processing of
their science or mathematics answers. This makes assessment a learning process. Students’ assessment is the
cornerstone of effective teaching and learning. It is against this background that the Partnership for the 21 st
Century Skills ( a framework of 21 st century learning that describes the skills students need to thrive in
today’s global economy.
CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK
The study was premised on the teaching and assessment of some of the 21 st century skills. It focused on the
Partnership for Assessment of the 21 st Century skills and why the skills have to be assessed in this era. There is
a myriad of skills ,but this study dwelt on salient ones which science and mathematics students need to acquire
to survive in this digital era.
Life and
career
skills
Critical
thinking
skills
Proble
m
solving
skills
ICT and
media
skills
21 st century skills
Figure 1: 21 st century skills
In addition to the skills in Figure 1, there others such as health literacy, environmental literacy, interpersonal,
intrapersonal, communication and financial literacy skills. All these foster human development.The skills are
2
achieved through standardised assessments, conducive learning environments, sound curriculum and instruction
as well as improved professional development .
METHODS OF ASSESSING 21 ST CENTURY SKILLS
Assessment of the 21 st century skills is similar to assessing the scientific literacy skills such as: defining science
( Lemke et al 2004; Millar,2007) .Cognitive skills such as critical thinking have been measured using
instruments which were developed for that purpose. Instruments so developed underwent rigorous pilot testing
and retesting for validity and reliability. Mainly multiple choice items were used. Test of scientific literacy
skills(TOSLS) instruments have been used in some studies. Participants write the multiple choice tests and they
are marked .A mean score of 500 indicates the (students) achievement of the skills and lower scores indicate
non-achievement. Teacher participants are asked whether they teach and assess the 21st century skills. After
assessing students ,feedback is given to the teachers. Teachers then identify the skills which require follow up.
A number of instruments use software. The K to the 8 th Power Technology Literacy Assessment focuses on
global awareness, civic literacy, ICT literacy ,critical thinking ,problem solving and life skills. The Intel
Education Assessing Projects tool is database of assessments of hard to-measure 21 st century skills like critical
thinking and creativity. Another instrument is the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA).This
measures the 21 st century including critical thinking and problem solving skills. The mClass is a Math
diagnostic software which provides insight into students’ mathematical thinking. Mathematics knowledge and
critical process skills can also be assessed using TerraNova Performance Assessments. The vast number of
instruments were not directly used in this study. One particular instrument would not measure all the skills. The
researcher selected the crucial skills and investigated to what extent they were being taught and assessed. This
would give an idea about the extent of implementation by the educators.
The study sought to address the following research questions:
1.
2.
3.
4.
What science , mathematics and technology 21 st century skills are assessed?
How are the skills assessed?
What challenges are faced by the educators in assessing the skills?
How can the challenges be mitigated?
METHODOLOGY
The study was carried out following the qualitative design. The Researcher first sought permission from the
Bulawayo Provincial Education’ Directorate Office to carry out the study. A letter was generated to authorise
the researcher to take to schools. The school administration stamped the letter and authorised the researcher to
meet the science and mathematics teachers, The researcher also sought permission to carry out the study in
tertiary institutions, but the response is yet to come, Population sampling entailed stratified random sampling of
4 secondary schools . The population sample was composed of 10 participants drawn from Mathematics and
Science. The following instruments were used: questionnaires, semi- structured interview protocols and
classroom observation instruments and assessment documents such as mid-year examinations.
Questionnaires were distributed to participants and explained each page before the participants completed
them. The researcher waited for the participants to complete the questionnaire in order to have a100 % return
rate. She also held a focus group discussion with each group of participants, that is, science and mathematics.
The questionnaires required the participants to rate skills according to the extent to which they teach and assess
learners on them. If a participant was teaching and assessing the skill very well, the scale ticked would be 5. A
3
skill that was not taught and assessed was rated as 1 or 2 . Participants further explained why they rated certain
skills as 1 or 2. Participants then identified successes and challenges of implementing the 21 st century skills
assessment. Completion of questionnaires was followed by interviewing those participants who had peculiar
responses such as involving mathematics students in the Bridge Building Competition and Olympiads. This was
meant to clarify issues.
Document analysis of mid-year examination items was carried out to triangulate findings. The researcher
analysed each item to pick the 21 st century skills. Examinations were selected because they cover a wider range
of topics and skills than tests and exercises. The questionnaires responses were analysed using qualitative
statistics and SPSS.
FINDINGS OF THE STUDY
Findings from questionnaires
A significant number of participants demonstrated that they teach and assess 21st century skills such as problem
solving, science/ mathematics processes, creativity and ICT usage.
Table 1 : responses on ICT usage
Frequency
Percent
Valid Percent
Cumulative
Percent
Very poor
3
30.0
30.0
30.0
Poor
2
20.0
20.0
50.0
Average
4
40.0
40.0
90.0
Good
1
10.0
10.0
100.0
Total
10
100.0
100.0
Valid
Table 1 shows that 50% of the participants use ICT for teaching .However, the participants do not use the ICT
for assessment.
Fig
4
Figure 2 : Responses on assessment on problem-solving
70% of the participants responded that they teach and assess problem-solving skills while 20% are poor at doing
so.
Figure 3: responses on assessment of project and design work
60% of the participants assess pupils’ projects and design work while the remainder indicated that they are poor
at doing so. Mathematics and science lend themselves to this type of assessment so as to develop the process
skills.
Figure 4 :responses on teaching and assessing science / mathematics process skills
Approximately 80% of the participants professed to be teaching and assessing science / mathematics process
skills. 10% of the participants were average in this regard.
5
Figure 5 responses on assessment of creativity skills
70 % the participants responded that they assess creativity skills well.
Responses on portfolio assessment
All the participants sampled had no idea of this type of assessment, hence rated themselves as poor or very poor
in this kind of assessment. When explained to, they still said they never tried it.
Responses about involving pupils in science/ mathematics Olympiads
50% of the participants professed that they involve pupils in the Olympiads while the other 50% was not aware
of them. This was worsened by the fact that this year , the Olympiads were cancelled.
Responses on participation in scholastic presentations
%0% of the participants took pupils to scholastic while 50% were unaware of the scholastic events
Figure 7: responses to science/ mathematics exhibitions
90% of the participants responded that they assess pupils’ science exhibitions and 10% said they were not
involved. The participants even referred to the recent District and Provincial Exhibitions as well as the coming
National exhibition in which some pupils would be participating. A few pupils who talked to the researcher
showed enthusiasm about the exhibitions.
DISCUSSION OF FINDINGS
6
There were some dissenting voices on the limited use of ICT resources as in some institutions they remained to
be the preserve of Computer Studies. In addition, very few were aware of subject software. The few participants
who professed the use of subject software mainly used it for power point presentations but not for assessment.
The software animations and simulations were done by the teacher because pupils could not be trusted with the
ICT machines. Such scenarios were aggravated by the fact that the computers or laptops used belonged to the
teachers and not the school, hence pupils could not touch them. This is contrary to the fact that many young
children are already familiar with current technologies like iPads or iPhones on which most them play games.
These children belong to the Net Generation which has close contact with digital devices in their daily life, The
generation prefers digital resources to access information, communicate and solve problems .(Oblinger and
Oblinger ,2005). Participants who had software never bothered to staff develop department members on how
and when to use the subject software. assessment of pupils ‘ICT skills could not be done.
None referred to portfolio assessment. This sounded very strange to the majority of the participants. Reasons
for not assessing learners on creativity and portfolios ranged from ignorance to shortage of resources.
Assessment of skills related to science exhibition , running of science and mathematics clubs as well as
mathematics. Olympiads were fairly well assessed. However , this year (2015), Olympiads were cancelled.
Presentations at scholastica and science ,engineering and technology expos were not assessed by most of the
educators . The participants explained that there was poor dissemination of information about the organisation
of these events. Consequently their institutions could not participate albeit the valuable contributions to
performance in the subjects.
Successes registered by the teaching and assessment of the 21st century skills included improved performance in
both mathematics and science, attitudinal change from negative to positive, increased enthusiasm for the
subjects and good application of mathematical concepts like change of subject in the formula relating current,
voltage and resistance (V= IR).There was also improved creativity. The Mathematics Bridge building
competition went a long way in demystifying the difficult concepts. These findings are in line with what other
studies found out.
The participants faced challenges on implementing the assessment of the 21 st century skills. One major
challenge was the inadequacy of computers in some institutions which in turn impinged on access. Furthermore,
some participants professed ignorance on using computers and related accessories. Participants therefore could
not assign and assess computer-based tasks yet these are the in-things in this cyberspace revolution era. Some
participants could not assess learners’ application of science to the real world because they had claimed that they
had no instruments to measure the applicability. Even without instruments, relating science and mathematics to
everyday life is very crucial for ethno-science and mathematics. Learners must relate the mathematics and
science to the real world in order to apply these.
Participants suggested that institutions beef up resources ,especially computers. Alternatively, learners should be
allowed to bring their laptops and tablets for computer-based learning and assessment. Cell phones could not be
recommended as pupils would concentrate more on social media, such as Whatsup and Facebook. At the
moment , pupils are not allowed to bring cell phones to school. Other proposed interventions included the
conduction of science and mathematics workshops on the 21st century skills assessment as well as the use of
computers in both teaching and assessment. In addition, participants proposed that there be training on
designing 21 st century assessment tools. Further to that, participants proposed that assessment items should
include those relating to everyday life.
The questionnaire items were followed up by the use of semi-structured interview items to probe further by
illuminating responses from the questionnaire. The randomly sampled participants expressed sentiments that
they were really interested in the assessment of the 21 st century skills. However, some of the participants were
holders of non-teaching diplomas and degrees which militated against implementation of the 21 st century skills
assessment. Other participants were employing the assessment methods without attaching the title ‘21 st century
skills assessment’. The current trends of assessment place great emphasis on this very one. Oblinger and
Oblinger , 2005 advocate for adaptation of the teaching and learning (T& L) strategies to match the students’
needs.
7
Document analysis of assessment items revealed that participants generally copied and pasted past examination
papers from ‘O’ Level to ‘A’ Level. As already alluded to, the education system is so examination driven that
internal examiners in institutions merely adopt without adapting the items. Most , if not all Mathematics
examination items, assess problem solving skills and critical thinking. Some items relate to the real world, for
example, a problem on selling airtime and calculating profit. Another problem entailed the determination of the
number of units on the telephone bill, calculating cost per unit and the total cost. Such items make mathematics
more relevant than calculations which have little bearing on the real world. One item in the ‘O’ level paper
required candidates to describe energy changes in a solar panel. Recommendations were that the participants
adapt and adopt the examination items to suit the context by making the items more ethno and learner centric.
These findings reveal that pedagogies and learning environments influence the assessment of the 21 st century
skills. Where ICTs are not being used for learning and research , computer -based assessments minimally or not
used at all. Problem-based learning (PBL) also goes hand in hand with the assessment method. If project-based
learning does not take place, then assessment of project of that nature is not done. Inquiry based learning (IBL)
calls for assessment of the learners’ ability to carry out investigations. Hence the teaching and learning strategies
(T &L) must be in tandem with inquiry. Institutions with limited or no computers are crippled in using
computer-based assessments like online portfolio assessment. Where computers and other ICT technologies are
there i in the institutions, failure to implement the 21 st century pedagogy and effective technology integration is
attributed to educators being unprepared for the changes demanded by and formed by technology infusion.(
Charp,2000; Rakes and Casey,2002).
CONCLUSION
The study found out that efforts are being made to implement assessment of some of the 21 st century skills.
These skills include problem solving, critical thinking, project and design, science and mathematics process
skills. The subjects lend themselves to these skills. It is imperative that teachers teach the skills and assess them
as they enhance survival in the 21 st century. The study recommended that science and mathematics educators
be staff developed on the 21 st century pedagogies including ICT based ones as well as on the assessment of the
skill. A significant number of participants had a vague picture about the 21 st century skill. Another
recommendation was that institutions consider improving ICT learning platforms and access for the Net
Generation students. The study also recommended the design and implementation of local instruments and
rubrics for measuring the 21 st century skills. In the meantime, it may be prudent to adapt and adopt the existing
instruments and to participate in the International competitions on the 21 st century skills.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The author acknowledges the secondary school science and mathematics teachers who participated in the study.
She is also greatly indebted to colleagues in her college for the constructive criticism on the research
instruments.
REFERENCES
Darling-Hammond, L. (2010).New policies for the 21 st century demands. In: In: J. Bellancha &R. Brandt
(Eds.),21st century skills: Rethinking how students learn. Bloomington: Solution Tree Press, pp: 33-49
Kay, K.(2010) 21st century skills: why they matter, what they are, and how we get there .In: J. Bellancha &R.
Brandt (Eds.),21st century skills: Rethinking how students learn. Bloomington: Solution Tree Press, pp: xiiixxxi.
Lemke,M., Sen, A, Pahlke, E.,Partelow,L.,Miller. D., Williams,T., Kstberg, Dand Jocelyn, l. International
Outcome of Learning in Mathematics Literacy and problem-solving: PISA Results from U.S .Perspective.
Wshington D.C.: Centre for Education Statistics; 2004
8
Miller, J.D. The impact of college science courses for non-science majors on adult science literacy. Paper
presented at the Critical Role of College Courses for Non- Majors. San Francisco, C.A, February 18 .2007
Oblinger, D.G. & Oblinger , J.L.,(2005) Is it age or IT: First step towards understanding the net generation. In
D.G. Oblinger & J.L. Oblinger (Eds.), Educating the net generation. (pp; 2.1-2.20).Retrieved from
www.educause.edu./educatingthenetgen/.
Quellmalz,E.S.,& Kozma, R.(2003) Designing assessment of learning with technology, Assessment in
Education 10(3),389-407
Ridgeway, J. MCCuster, S. & Pead, D.(2004).Literature review on e-assessment. United Kingdom: Nesta
Futurelab series. Report 10
Stiggins, R . & Chappuis, J. (2006)( What a difference a word makes: Assessment FOR learning rather
assessment OF learning helps students to succeed. Journal of Staff Development, 27 (1), 10-14
9