1CONCEPT MAP-BASED ASSESSMENT IN SCIENCE: TWO EXPLORATORY STUDIES1

The search for new “authentic ” science assessments of what students know and can do is well underway. As part of this search, educators and researchers are looking for more or less direct measures of students’ knowledge structures. Concept maps—structural representations of key concepts in a subject domain, constructed by individuals—have been dubbed a potential “find.” The rationale behind this claim is that knowledge has an organizational property that can be captured with structural representations (e.g.