Connecting Concepts

1. Connecting Concepts On-line Tutorials for Introductory Biology

2. Overview Why we created the tutorials How we created the tutorials Demonstrations An assessment

3. Introduction Introductory Biology 151-152 Majors course 1,000 students Mostly sophomores Team-taught 30 faculty 5 lecture sections The tutorials were designed for our Intro Bio courseThe tutorials were designed for our Intro Bio course

4. The Need Growth in class size Students vary in learning styles foundations in biology Students tend to focus on facts rather than on concepts have misconceptions compartmentalize Growth: decreased student-instructor interaction Inadequate interactive engagement with learning materials means that students make little progress toward understanding science as a dynamic process or learning to think critically about that process Students tend to compartmentalize ideas and fail to see connections across subdisciplines within biology Growth: decreased student-instructor interaction Inadequate interactive engagement with learning materials means that students make little progress toward understanding science as a dynamic process or learning to think critically about that process Students tend to compartmentalize ideas and fail to see connections across subdisciplines within biology

5. The Goals Stimulate higher-order learning apply concepts covered in lecture solve problems think critically Correct misconceptions Connect concepts to get the �big picture� Reduce need for TAs to clarify material covered in lecture

6. The Outcome 9 tutorials: 2 Cell biology 2 Evolution 2 Animal physiology 1 Genetics 1 Plant biology 1 Ecology

7. Creation Wealth of experience about central concepts, specific, misconceptions held by students, unanimous goals to have students think more holistically and integrate concepts--connecting concepts idea Access to top-notch instructional designers who taught us to apply principles from cognitive psychology to our learning objectives Marriage of instructional design and teaching expertise that led to the success of these materials, along with a lot of creativity and research into the literature of each subject Wealth of experience about central concepts, specific, misconceptions held by students, unanimous goals to have students think more holistically and integrate concepts--connecting concepts idea Access to top-notch instructional designers who taught us to apply principles from cognitive psychology to our learning objectives Marriage of instructional design and teaching expertise that led to the success of these materials, along with a lot of creativity and research into the literature of each subject

8. Demonstration Homeostasis (most frequently accessed from MERLOT) Natural selection Water relations Speciation (effectiveness data relate to this one)

9. 1. Homeostasis Connect concepts Mechanisms of endocrine vs nervous systems Systems work together Learning goal: Systemic thinking Instructional design: Advance organizer Structure for linking new info and prior knowledge Models a good way to organize new info Demo (link) Advance organizer (Ausubel�s subsumption theory) textbook design Systemic thinking--a person, their internal and external environments and how organ systems work together A preview of information that give learners a structure for tying together new information they�ll receive and their prior knowledge Also gives them a �warning� of a good way to organize the information they�ll receive--in this case a person experiencing envrionmental and internal challenges and systems working together to restore balance, not isolated systems that operate independentlyAdvance organizer (Ausubel�s subsumption theory) textbook design Systemic thinking--a person, their internal and external environments and how organ systems work together A preview of information that give learners a structure for tying together new information they�ll receive and their prior knowledge Also gives them a �warning� of a good way to organize the information they�ll receive--in this case a person experiencing envrionmental and internal challenges and systems working together to restore balance, not isolated systems that operate independently

10. 2. Natural Selection Connect concepts: Genetic variation Relationship between genotype and phenotype Meaning of fitness Learning goal: Correct misconceptions Instructional design: Game Situated context �Foil� expectations Cycles of cognitive disequilibrium/resolution Demo (link) Natural selection topic you hear about over and over again as source of misconceptions-a big one is the idea that an individual can undergo a mutation in order to adapt to its environment--to improve its fitness and that is mostly not correct, especially in multicellular organisms Wanted a way to have students confront their conflicting ideas head-on Games are good at providing a situated context--here we wanted to give students several different organisms and environment, a genotype and its corresponding phenotype, Games �foil� expectations by creating cognitive disequilibrium and giving players means to resolve it Rapidly, often and with feedbackNatural selection topic you hear about over and over again as source of misconceptions-a big one is the idea that an individual can undergo a mutation in order to adapt to its environment--to improve its fitness and that is mostly not correct, especially in multicellular organisms Wanted a way to have students confront their conflicting ideas head-on Games are good at providing a situated context--here we wanted to give students several different organisms and environment, a genotype and its corresponding phenotype, Games �foil� expectations by creating cognitive disequilibrium and giving players means to resolve it Rapidly, often and with feedback

11. 3. Water Relations Connect concepts Movement of water and gases in photosynthesis Physiology of plant cells and whole plant Water relations equation Learning goal: Problem solving in context Instructional design: Scaffolding Worked examples, completion problems Leading questions Just in-time information Demo (link) Scaffolding--hear about this a lot in online instruction Structured guidance for completing complex task Holistic vision of the whole task gradually embellished Scaffolding--provides learning support as you complete the task with: Workded examples, completion problems--gradually diminish the support Leading questions Just in time information Scaffolding--hear about this a lot in online instruction Structured guidance for completing complex task Holistic vision of the whole task gradually embellished Scaffolding--provides learning support as you complete the task with: Workded examples, completion problems--gradually diminish the support Leading questions Just in time information

12. 4. Speciation Connect concepts Species definitions Incompleteness of evidence Relative weight of evidence Learning goal: Critical thinking Instructional design: Scaffolding Case study Metacognitive procedures built into interface Demo (link) critical thinking-- evaluating individual lines of evidence then, then weighting it relative to other evidence, determining which hypothesis the evidence supports Scaffolding to reduce cognitive load Metacognitive procedures: Is this evidence for or against? How strong is it? What conclusion does all the evidence add up to? critical thinking-- evaluating individual lines of evidence then, then weighting it relative to other evidence, determining which hypothesis the evidence supports Scaffolding to reduce cognitive load Metacognitive procedures: Is this evidence for or against? How strong is it? What conclusion does all the evidence add up to?

13. Are they effective?

14. Pre-test: a week before the lecture on speciation Post-test: a week after the lecturePre-test: a week before the lecture on speciation Post-test: a week after the lecture

15. Tutorial, or one of two other non-interactive homework exercises, assigned as controls, came after the post-test. Its effect was test on the 3rd (final) exam.Tutorial, or one of two other non-interactive homework exercises, assigned as controls, came after the post-test. Its effect was test on the 3rd (final) exam.

16. 3 treatment groups: Interactive (n = 51) --completed speciation tutorial on-line 2. Non-interactive 1 (n = 42) --assigned tutorial info as PDF Non-interactive 2 (n = 53) --assigned a general homework question on speciation --read only 1 of the 2 case studies as PDF One lecture section (N = 283 students) Random assignment of students into 3 groupsOne lecture section (N = 283 students) Random assignment of students into 3 groups

17. Treatment subgroups: A. Average on previous two exams >80% B. Average on previous two exams <80% Subgroups approximately equal in size.Subgroups approximately equal in size.

18. Result 1: Effect of lecture Pre- vs. post-test, i.e. before and after lectures, but both before tutorial; so, these test effectiveness of the lecture. --All 3 groups did signif better on post-test than on pre- --but only in Grp 1 did the <80% subgroup do better. Pre- vs. post-test, i.e. before and after lectures, but both before tutorial; so, these test effectiveness of the lecture. --All 3 groups did signif better on post-test than on pre- --but only in Grp 1 did the <80% subgroup do better.

19. Final exam vs. mean score on the two prior exams: --Only <80% subgroup of Grp 1, and Grp 1 overall, did better on exam 3 than on the other two; --the <80% subgroup, with an increase of more than 10 percentage points, drove the score of the whole group to a significant increase This occurred even though the final exam had only 1/3 on speciation 80% of Group 1 went on to do the NS tutorial voluntarily, while only about 10% of the other two groups did so � Thus, the group that did the speciation tutorial recognized its value. Final exam vs. mean score on the two prior exams: --Only <80% subgroup of Grp 1, and Grp 1 overall, did better on exam 3 than on the other two; --the <80% subgroup, with an increase of more than 10 percentage points, drove the score of the whole group to a significant increase This occurred even though the final exam had only 1/3 on speciation 80% of Group 1 went on to do the NS tutorial voluntarily, while only about 10% of the other two groups did so � Thus, the group that did the speciation tutorial recognized its value.

20. Result 3: Effect of tutorial Total final exam scores were compared to the scores students would have received for the evolution questions alone. Evolution questions (including questions on speciation) made up 41% of the final exam. No group did better on the evolution questions than on other questions; no significant differences But the <80% subgroup of Group 1 did better than other groups, not only on the evolution questions (mean = 81.0%), but on the final exam as a whole (mean = 83.2%). Total final exam scores were compared to the scores students would have received for the evolution questions alone. Evolution questions (including questions on speciation) made up 41% of the final exam. No group did better on the evolution questions than on other questions; no significant differences But the <80% subgroup of Group 1 did better than other groups, not only on the evolution questions (mean = 81.0%), but on the final exam as a whole (mean = 83.2%).

21. Conclusions Lecture most effective for the >80% subgroup Tutorial most effective for the <80% subgroup Tutorial seemed to enhance learning of material not directly related to speciation We conclude that it�s the interactivity of the tutorials that provided the learning gain to the <80% subgroup.We conclude that it�s the interactivity of the tutorials that provided the learning gain to the <80% subgroup.

22. Wish-list: Existing tutorials update information enable edits enable customization Possible new tutorials in genetics cell ecology Nevertheless�