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Student experiences learning chemistry have been well studied in chemistry courses but less so in biology courses. Chemistry concepts are foundational to introductory biology courses, and student experiences learning chemistry concepts may impact their overall course experiences and subsequent student outcomes. In this study, we asked undergraduate students enrolled in introductory biology courses at a public R1 institution an open-response question asking how their experiences learning chemistry topics affected their identities as biologists. We used thematic analysis to identify common ideas in their responses. We found that while almost half of student respondents cited learning chemistry as having positive impacts on their experiences learning biology, students who struggled with chemistry topics were significantly more likely to have negative experiences learning biology. We also found significant relationships between prior chemistry preparation, student background, and the likelihood of students struggling with chemistry and negative experiences learning biology. These findings emphasize the impact of learning specific content on student psychosocial metrics and suggest areas for biology educators to focus on to support learning and alleviate student stress in introductory biology.
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“Big Ideas” of Introductory Chemistry and Biology Courses and the Connections between Them
Introductory courses are often designed to cover a range of topics with the intent to offer students exposure to the given discipline as preparation to further their study in the same or related disciplines. Unfortunately, students in these courses are often presented with an overwhelming amount of information that may not support their formation of a usable coherent network of knowledge. In this study we conducted a mixed-method sequential exploratory study with students co-enrolled in General Chemistry II and Introductory Biology I to better understand what students perceived to be the “take-home” messages of these courses (i.e., core ideas) and the connections between these courses. We found that students identified a range of ideas from both courses; further analysis of students’ explanations and reasoning revealed that, when students talked about their chemistry ideas, they were more likely to talk about them as having predictive and explanatory power in comparison with reasons provided for their biology big ideas. Furthermore, students identified a number of overlapping ideas between their chemistry and biology courses, such as interactions, reactions, and structures, which have the potential to be used as a starting place to support students building a more coherent network of knowledge.
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- PAR ID:
- 10349999
- Editor(s):
- Loertscher, Jennifer
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- CBE—Life Sciences Education
- Volume:
- 21
- Issue:
- 2
- ISSN:
- 1931-7913
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript1.0
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.21-10-0301
