Quality of 8th-grade science books: a systematic analysis of end-of-chapters-tasks in 8th-grade science books using Revised Bloom Taxonomy

Background Although textbooks continue to be the primary resources for teaching and learning to attain educational goals, it is important to address the content of these resources to promote students’ learning and critical thinking skills. Moreover, science books should incorporate practical real-world tasks to trigger students’ interest and help them apply scientific knowledge in their daily life. Designing high-quality tasks, particularly those that demand critical thinking and analytical skills can, enhance both the learning experience and the quality of the science education.Purpose This study aims to analyze the end-of-chapter tasks in science books of the 8th-grade students in the Kosovo education system and their alignment with the revised Bloom’s Taxonomy (RBT).Design and methods A total of 2074 end-of-chapter tasks from four science books and their accompanying workbooks (chemistry, biology, and physics) currently in use by the Kosovo educational system served as the source of data for analysis. The study implied quantitative research through content analysis. The RBT framework, which considers the knowledge dimension, type of question, and cognitive domain, was used to classify the end-of-chapter task.Results The results indicate that open-ended tasks largely dominate in science books. These questions cover mainly lower cognitive levels of RBT, promoting mainly factual and conceptual type of knowledge, while tasks that encourage creativity, critical thinking, and metacognition leave much to be desired.Conclusions Textbooks that emphasise factual knowledge and primarily target lower cognitive levels are ineffective at supporting students for scientific literacy and critical thinking in the twenty-first century. Consequently, to meet the demands of students with the scientific competence of the twenty-first century, there is a critical need to adjust the content of science books and related tasks.