An official website of the United States government
Abstract BackgroundSTEM instructors who leverage student thinking can positively influence student outcomes and build their own teaching expertise. Leveraging student thinking involves using the substance of student thinking to inform instruction. The ways in which instructors leverage student thinking in undergraduate STEM contexts, and what enables them to do so effectively, remains largely unexplored. We investigated how undergraduate STEM faculty leverage student thinking in their teaching, focusing on faculty who engage students in work during class. ResultsFrom analyzing interviews and video of a class lesson for eight undergraduate STEM instructors, we identified a group of instructors who exhibited high levels of leveraging student thinking (high-leveragers) and a group of instructors who exhibited low levels of leveraging student thinking (low-leveragers). High-leveragers behaved as if student thinking was central to their instruction. We saw this in how they accessed student thinking, worked to interpret it, and responded in the moment and after class. High-leveragers spent about twice as much class time getting access to detailed information about student thinking compared to low-leveragers. High-leveragers then altered instructional plans from lesson to lesson and during a lesson based on their interpretation of student thinking. Critically, high-leveragers also drew on much more extensive knowledge of student thinking, a component of pedagogical content knowledge, than did low-leveragers. High-leveragers used knowledge of student thinking to create access to more substantive student thinking, shape real-time interpretations, and inform how and when to respond. In contrast, low-leveragers accessed student thinking less frequently, interpreted student thinking superficially or not at all, and never discussed adjusting the content or problems for the following lesson. ConclusionsThis study revealed that not all undergraduate STEM instructors who actively engage students in work during class are also leveraging student thinking. In other words, not all student-centered instruction is student-thinking-centered instruction. We discuss possible explanations for why some STEM instructors are leveraging student thinking and others are not. In order to realize the benefits of student-centered instruction for undergraduates, we may need to support undergraduate STEM instructors in learning how to learn from their teaching experiences by leveraging student thinking.
more »
« less
Do details bug you? Effects of perceptual richness in learning about biological change
Summary People often have difficulty in understanding processes of biological change, and they typically reject drastic life cycle changes such as metamorphosis, except for animals with which they are familiar. Even after a lesson about metamorphosis, people often do not generalize to animals not seen during the lesson. This might be partially due to the perceptual richness of the diagrams typically used during lessons on metamorphosis, which serves to emphasize the individual animal rather than a class of animals. In two studies, we examined whether the perceptual richness of a diagram influences adults' learning and transfer of knowledge about metamorphosis. One study was conducted in a laboratory setting, and the other was online. In both studies, adults who saw the bland diagram during the lesson accurately transferred more than adults who saw the rich diagram during the lesson.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 1760940
- PAR ID:
- 10456213
- Publisher / Repository:
- Wiley Blackwell (John Wiley & Sons)
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Applied Cognitive Psychology
- Volume:
- 34
- Issue:
- 5
- ISSN:
- 0888-4080
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- p. 1101-1117
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
Abstract One way to bring greater awareness to the fact that language can be, and often is, studied scientifically is to show people the scientific tools that linguists use to study it, such as the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). This project investigated how doing a common IPA activity might influence people’s perceptions of language science and linguists. Adult visitors to a science museum (N = 117) participated in an activity in which they saw their name transcribed into the IPA and were guided to notice how it differed from the standard spelling, informed about some basic articulatory phonetics connected to the sounds in their names, and encouraged to think about the differences between sounds and letters more generally. Participants were then surveyed about what they had learned and their attitudes about language science. The results showed that most participants learned at least some of the core content material. More notably, the participants were more likely to believe that aspects of language such as poetry and dialects could be studied experimentally by scientists than a control group of adults who had not participated. These results demonstrate that even a brief intervention, if thoughtfully conducted, can shift attitudes towards the belief that language can be studied scientifically.more » « less
-
Do children use objects to infer the people and actions that created them? We ask how children judge whether designs were socially transmitted (copied), asking if children use a simple perceptual heuristic (more similar = more likely copied), or make a rational, flexible inference (Bayesian inverse planning). We found evidence that children use inverse planning to reason about artifacts’ designs: When children saw two identical designs, they did not always infer copying occurred. Instead, similarity was weaker evidence of copying when an alternative explanation ‘explained away’ the similarity. Thus, children inferred copying had occurred less often when designs were efficient (Exp1, age 7-9; N=52), and when there was a constraint that limited the number of possible designs (Exp2, age 4-5; N=160). When thinking about artifacts, young children go beyond perceptual features and use a process like inverse planning to reason about the generative processes involved in design.more » « less
-
The shape and relative size of an ocular lens affect the focal length of the eye, with consequences for visual acuity and sensitivity. Lenses are typically spherical in aquatic animals with camera-type eyes and axially flattened in terrestrial species to facilitate vision in optical media with different refractive indices. Frogs and toads (Amphibia: Anura) are ecologically diverse, with many species shifting from aquatic to terrestrial ecologies during metamorphosis. We quantified lens shape and relative size using 179 micro X-ray computed tomography scans of 126 biphasic anuran species and tested for correlations with life stage, environmental transitions, adult habits and adult activity patterns. Across broad phylogenetic diversity, tadpole lenses are more spherical than those of adults. Biphasic species with aquatic larvae and terrestrial adults typically undergo ontogenetic changes in lens shape, whereas species that remain aquatic as adults tend to retain more spherical lenses after metamorphosis. Further, adult lens shape is influenced by adult habit; notably, fossorial adults tend to retain spherical lenses following metamorphosis. Finally, lens size relative to eye size is smaller in aquatic and semiaquatic species than other adult ecologies. Our study demonstrates how ecology shapes visual systems, and the power of non-invasive imaging of museum specimens for studying sensory evolution.more » « less
-
Abstract With age, people increasingly emphasize intent when judging transgressions. However, people often lack information about intent in everyday settings; further, they may wonder about reasons underlying pro‐social acts. Three studies investigated 4‐to‐6‐year‐olds', 7‐to‐9‐year‐olds', and adults' (data collected 2020–2022 in the northeastern United States, totaln = 669, ~50% female, predominantly White) desire for information about why behaviors occurred. In Study 1, older children and adults exhibited more curiosity about transgressions versus pro‐social behaviors (ds = 0.52–0.63). Younger children showed weaker preferences to learn about transgressions versus pro‐social behaviors than did older participants (d = 0.12). Older children's emphasis on intent, but not expectation violations, drove age‐related differences (Studies 2–3). Older children may target intent‐related judgments specifically toward transgressions, and doing so may underlie curiosity about wrongdoing.more » « less
