Using expert data to inform the use of research methods and representations to enhance biochemistry instruction and textbook design.

Biochemistry textbooks often provide a disconnected, highly mathematical, and decontextualized treatment of thermodynamic and kinetic principles, which renders topics like protein folding difficult to teach. This is concerning given that graduates entering careers, like the pharmaceutical industry, must be able to apply such knowledge and related research methods to solve biochemistry research problems. Thus, it is essential that instructors have strategies to incorporate research methods and representations to help students understand the source of such scientific knowledge.

Anticipated learning outcomes for a biochemistry course-based undergraduate research experience aimed at predicting protein function from structure: Implications for assessment design.

Several course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) have been published in the literature. However, only limited attempts have been made to rigorously identify the discovery-type research abilities that students actually develop during such experiences. Instead, there has been a greater focus on technical or procedural-type knowledge or general CURE skills that are too comprehensive to effectively assess.

How to Identify the Research Abilities That Instructors Anticipate Students Will Develop in a Biochemistry Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experience (CURE).

Course-based undergraduate research experiences (CUREs) have been described in a range of educational contexts. Although various anticipated learning outcomes (ALOs) have been proposed, processes for identifying them may not be rigorous or well documented, which can lead to inappropriate assessment and speculation about what students actually learn from CUREs. In this essay, we offer a user-friendly and rigorous approach based on evidence and an easy process to identify ALOs, namely, a five-step Process for Identifying Course-Based Undergraduate Research Abilities (PICURA), consisting of a content analysis, an open-ended survey, an interview, an alignment check, and a two-tiered Likert survey.

A Community-Building Framework for Collaborative Research Coordination across the Education and Biology Research Disciplines.

Since 2009, the U.S. National Science Foundation Directorate for Biological Sciences has funded Research Coordination Networks (RCN) aimed at collaborative efforts to improve participation, learning, and assessment in undergraduate biology education (UBE).

How Four Scientists Integrate Thermodynamic and Kinetic Theory, Context, Analogies, and Methods in Protein-Folding and Dynamics Research: Implications for Biochemistry Instruction.

To keep biochemistry instruction current and relevant, it is crucial to expose students to cutting-edge scientific research and how experts reason about processes governed by thermodynamics and kinetics such as protein folding and dynamics. This study focuses on how experts explain their research into this topic with the intention of informing instruction. Previous research has modeled how expert biologists incorporate research methods, social or biological context, and analogies when they talk about their research on mechanisms.

Exploring the MACH Model's Potential as a Metacognitive Tool to Help Undergraduate Students Monitor Their Explanations of Biological Mechanisms.

When undergraduate biology students learn to explain biological mechanisms, they face many challenges and may overestimate their understanding of living systems. Previously, we developed the MACH model of four components used by expert biologists to explain mechanisms: Methods, Analogies, Context, and How. This study explores the implementation of the model in an undergraduate biology classroom as an educational tool to address some of the known challenges.

An instructional design process based on expert knowledge for teaching students how mechanisms are explained.

In biology and physiology courses, students face many difficulties when learning to explain mechanisms, a topic that is demanding due to the immense complexity and abstract nature of molecular and cellular mechanisms. To overcome these difficulties, we asked the following question: how does an instructor transform their understanding of biological mechanisms and other difficult-to-learn topics so that students can comprehend them? To address this question, we first reviewed a model of the components used by biologists to explain molecular and cellular mechanisms: the MACH model, with the components of methods (M), analogies (A), context (C), and how (H). Next, instructional materials were developed and the teaching activities were piloted with a physical MACH model.

Development of the Neuron Assessment for Measuring Biology Students' Use of Experimental Design Concepts and Representations.

Researchers, instructors, and funding bodies in biology education are unanimous about the importance of developing students' competence in experimental design. Despite this, only limited measures are available for assessing such competence development, especially in the areas of molecular and cellular biology. Also, existing assessments do not measure how well students use standard symbolism to visualize biological experiments.

Development and Validation of a Rubric for Diagnosing Students' Experimental Design Knowledge and Difficulties.

It is essential to teach students about experimental design, as this facilitates their deeper understanding of how most biological knowledge was generated and gives them tools to perform their own investigations. Despite the importance of this area, surprisingly little is known about what students actually learn from designing biological experiments. In this paper, we describe a rubric for experimental design (RED) that can be used to measure knowledge of and diagnose difficulties with experimental design.

A model of how different biology experts explain molecular and cellular mechanisms.

Constructing explanations is an essential skill for all science learners. The goal of this project was to model the key components of expert explanation of molecular and cellular mechanisms. As such, we asked: What is an appropriate model of the components of explanation used by biology experts to explain molecular and cellular mechanisms? Do explanations made by experts from different biology subdisciplines at a university support the validity of this model? Guided by the modeling framework of R.

Bridging the educational research-teaching practice gap: curriculum development, part 2: becoming an agent of change.

Many faculty members in science departments are experiencing pressure to improve their courses, particularly with respect to the ways in which students are taught and assessed. The purpose of this article is to provide some insights and practical ideas on how curriculum change can be brought about-how motivated individuals can become agents of change. Change almost always elicits opposing and supporting forces, examples of which are given.

Bridging the educational research-teaching practice gap: Foundations for assessing and developing biochemistry students' visual literacy.

External representations (ERs), such as diagrams, animations, and dynamic models are vital tools for communicating and constructing knowledge in biochemistry. To build a meaningful understanding of structure, function, and process, it is essential that students become visually literate by mastering key cognitive skills that are essential for interpreting and visualizing ERs. In this article, first we describe a model of seven factors influencing students' ability to learn from ERs.

Bridging the educational research-teaching practice gap. Curriculum development, Part 1: Components of the curriculum and influences on the process of curriculum design.

This article summarizes the major components of curriculum design: vision, operationalization of the vision, design, and evaluation. It stresses that the relationship between these components is dynamic, and that the process of curriculum design does not proceed via a linear application of these components. The article then summarizes some of the major influences on curriculum design: policy, local context, societal expectations, research trends, and technology.

Bridging the educational research-teaching practice gap: Tools for evaluating the quality of assessment instruments.

Student assessment is central to the educational process and can be used for multiple purposes including, to promote student learning, to grade student performance and to evaluate the educational quality of qualifications. It is, therefore, of utmost importance that assessment instruments are of a high quality. In this article, we present various tools that instructors could use, both to improve instrument design and validity before presentation to students and, to evaluate the reliability and quality of the assessment after students have answered the questions.

Bridging the educational research-teaching practice gap: Conceptual understanding, part 2: Assessing and developing student knowledge.

The first paper [1] in this two-part miniseries on conceptual understanding discussed expert and novice conceptual knowledge, the multifaceted nature of conceptual understanding, and the cognitive skills essential for constructing it. This second article presents examples of instruments for the assessment and development of five facets of conceptual understanding that require competence in the cognitive skills of mindful memorization, integration, transfer, analogical reasoning, and system thinking. We also argue for the importance of explicitly assessing these facets of conceptual understanding as part of all biochemistry and molecular biology curricula so as to develop expert knowledge in our students.

Bridging the educational research-teaching practice gap: Conceptual understanding, part 1: The multifaceted nature of expert knowledge.

The term "conceptual understanding" has been used rather loosely over the years in educational practice, with a tendency to focus on a few aspects of an extremely complex phenomenon. In this first article of a two-part miniseries on conceptual understanding, we describe the nature of expert (versus novice) knowledge and show how the conceptual understanding of experts is multifaceted in nature requiring competence in a wide range of cognitive skills. We then discuss five such facets of conceptual understanding that require competence in the cognitive skills of memorization, integration, transfer, analogical reasoning, and system thinking.

Bridging the educational research-teaching practice gap: The power of assessment.

Student assessment, in all its forms, is central to the educational process. In this paper in the series, "Bridging the Gap", I describe how assessment can be used as a powerful instrument for influencing how and what students learn and how and what instructors teach in a manner that is conducive to educationally sound curriculum change and improvement. In this way assessment is seen as a useful strategy for colleagues interested in bridging the gap between educational research and its application in teaching practice.

Bridging the educational research-teaching practice gap: The importance of bridging the gap between science education research and its application in biochemistry teaching and learning: Barriers and strategies.

There is a large body of educational research results available in the science education literature that could be usefully applied for the improvement of teaching practice in biochemistry and molecular biology. Unfortunately, for a great variety of reasons, such applications are relatively limited in our discipline. In this first paper in the series, "Bridging the Gap", I describe some of the barriers that are hampering the bridging of this gap and suggest some possible strategies that colleagues might wish to try in order to promote the wider use of this excellent educational resource.

The importance of visual literacy in the education of biochemists*.

Visualization is an essential skill for all students and biochemists studying and researching the molecular and cellular biosciences. In this study, we discuss the nature and importance of visualization in biochemistry education and argue that students should be explicitly taught visual literacy and the skills for using visualization tools as essential components of all biochemistry curricula. We suggest that, at present, very little pedagogical attention has been given to this vital component of biochemistry education, although a large diversity of static, dynamic, and multimedia visual displays continues to flood modern educational resources at an exponential rate.