DEVISE: Interest in Science and Nature (Youth)

Background

This tool was developed by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology

A systematic process that critically examines a program's merit, worth or significance by collecting and analyzing information about a program’s activities, characteristics, and outcomes. The goal is to improve the program's effectiveness, and/or to inform programming decisions (Patton, 2001).

Research. The

A set of numbers or symbols used to represent characteristics of a variable in measurement (Vogt, 2005).

was developed with input from in-person

Combine both interviewing and participant observation. A focus group is not a discussion, problem-solving, or decision-making group. However, focus groups do capitalize on group dynamics to generate data and insights that would be unlikely to emerge otherwise (Frechtling, 2010).

and teacher feedback. Small groups of students ages 8-24 years also reviewed the scale. Young citizen scientists pilot tested the scale.

Format

This survey consists of 10 statements to which people respond to on a five-point scale, with 1 being “disagree strongly” , 2 being “disagree a little”, 3 being “unsure”, 4 being “agree a little” and 5 being “agree strongly”.

Audience

This scale is intended to be used with youth. It has mostly been used with elementary school-aged girls that participated in citizen science projects.

When and how to use the tool

This tool can be used for a one-time measure of interest in science and nature, or can be used to measure change in interest in science and nature through implementing the survey before and after a program.

How to analyze

The tool download (from the link provided above) will include detailed information on how to analyze this data. 

What to do next

Once you’ve administered your survey and analyzed the data, consider the following suggestions about what to do next: 

• If you used this scale once as a baseline measurement, you may want to consider those scores in designing programming. If participants scored low, you may want to find new ways to engage participants in activities. 
• Is there a particular item, out of the 10, that participants scored higher or lower in? This may be interesting to investigate when considering possible programmatic changes based on what participants are interested in. 
• If you used this scale to evaluate your program, do you see a change in scores between the pretest and posttest? You might want to follow-up with participants with

  A method of data collection that values interpersonal contact and assumes participant perspectives are meaningful, knowable, and can be made explicit (Frechtling, 2010).

  and find out what activities were most interesting and engaging to them.
• Invite program staff or other partners to look over the data. Consider questions together, like: 
• What do these results tell us about our programming, are participants engaged? Why do we think we got these results?
• What level of

  “Engagement refers to the degree of attention, curiosity, interest, optimism, and passion that [learners] show when they are learning or being taught, which extends to the level of motivation they have to learn and progress in their education” (Great Schools Partnership, 2016). Engagement can be with students, with the teaching, with learning, in research, with educators, and/or with the community (Groccia & Hunter, 2012).

  scores did we think we would get? And did these data support our goals?
• If our results did not support our goals, can we brainstorm on areas within the programming or delivery to increase

  An action towards something. Environmental educators are often interested in human behaviors that have direct or indirect impacts on the environment (Marcinkowski, 1993).

  scores?
• Who in our

  Can be geographically based (neighborhoods, towns, cities, etc.) or based on interest, identity, culture, belief, profession, etc. In environmental education community is often thought of as a system of systems including both natural, social, and economic systems (NAAEE, 2017).

  should we reach out to for collaboratively discussing program design?
• Who or what organizations can we share our learning with?

How to see if this tool would work with your program

To assess whether the tool is appropriate for your audience, please review the

A type of question or statement used as part of a survey or interview to understand a respondents' reactions or feelings. Each item measures a particular idea (Salazar et al., 2020).

carefully and

An initial trial of a program, instrument, or other activity intended to test out procedures and discover and correct potential problems before proceeding to full scale implementation. Pilot tests can be conducted either for a program (i.e., testing out the program with a small group of participants) or for an evaluation (i.e., testing out instruments and data collection procedures with a small group of people similar to program participants). When possible, a pilot test, or trial run, is conducted with a sample group that is representative of the target population. Based on the results of the pilot test, revisions and improvements can be made before wider implementation of the program, instrument, or activity (Zint, n.d.).

the tool with a small group that represents your

A group of persons (or other subjects of study) that one wants to describe in the evaluation process (Vogt, 2005).

. To pilot test, ask a small group of willing participants who are part of your target audience to talk to you as they complete the tool. What are they thinking when they read each item? What experiences come to mind when they respond? As long as this is what you expect and you will gain relevant information from your evaluation, you are on the right track! If the answers are different for each person, and they should be more similar given their experiences, you may need to look at other tools. If the problems are minor, and limited to changing a few words to make them simpler or more relevant, you could revise the language in the tool. For example, you could change “beach” to “pond” and “heron” to “squirrel” but you are likely to change the intent of the item if you change beach to landfill or heron to rat.

Tool tips

• Survey is suggested to be used in its entirety.
• Survey will take about 10 minutes to complete. Be sure to allow ample program time for participants to complete the survey.
• This survey can be used as a paper copy or can be formatted to be completed online by using Google Forms or Survey Monkey.