Development and validation of a text-based instrument measuring teachers’ professional vision of student thinking

Accurate teacher judgments of student thinking are key to adaptive teaching. Yet, making such judgments represents a particularly challenging task for teachers. Developing instruments that can elicit and capture teachers’ cognitive processes of noticing and interpreting is essential for assessing their skills. These instruments should be sensitive to the teachers’ cognitive processes and specific qualities of student thinking in the respective domain. In this article, we present an approach to develop and validate a text-based vignette test which meets these requirements. We used the example of teachers’ noticing and interpreting of cognitive aspects in learners’ attitudes on creation and evolution. We identified relevant components of student thinking in this domain and included these components systematically varied in written classroom vignettes. Experts confirmed a clear and salient representation of the components of student thinking that we intended to include.