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Assessing and Enhancing the Introductory Science Course in Physics and
Biology: Peer Instruction, Classroom Demonstrations, and Genetics
Vocabulary
Adam P. Fagen
Ph.D. Thesis, Harvard University, 2003, 186 pages export citation
Most introductory college science courses in the United States are taught in
large lectures with students rarely having the opportunity to think critically
about the material being presented nor to participate actively. Further, many
classes focus on teaching rather than learning, that is, the transfer of
information as opposed to actual student understanding. This thesis focuses
on three studies about the assessment and enhancement of learning in
undergraduate science courses.
We describe the results of an international survey on the implementation of
Peer Instruction (PI), a collaborative learning pedagogy in which lectures are
interspersed with short conceptual questions designed to challenge students
to think about the material as it is being presented. We present a portrait of
the many instructors teaching with PI and the settings in which it is being
used as well as data on the effectiveness of PI in enhancing student learning
in diverse settings. The wide variety of implementations suggests that PI is a
highly adaptable strategy that can work successfully in almost any
environment. We also provide recommendations for those considering
adopting PI in their classes.
Classroom demonstrations are an important aspect of many introductory
science courses, but there is little evidence supporting their educational
effectiveness. We explore the effect of different modes of presentation on
enhancing student learning from demonstrations. Our results show that
students who actively engage with a demonstration by predicting the
outcome before it is conducted are better able to recall and explain the
scenario posed by that demonstration.
As preliminary work for the creation of an inventory of conceptual
understanding in introductory biology, we discuss results from a survey of
vocabulary familiarity and understanding in an undergraduate genetics
course. Students begin introductory classes with significant gaps in their
understanding, some of which are retained beyond instruction. Further, they
overstate their knowledge, and the degree to which they exhibit
overconfidence increases over the period of instruction.
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