Diagnostic Question Clusters: Development and Testing in Introductory Geology and Biology

诊断性评估是教学改进的基础。它提醒教师注意学生在学习特定概念方面的困难。此外，真正的诊断性评估提供了关于学生为什么会有困难的信息，找出了学生遇到的常见概念障碍。这些信息可以用来指导教师对他们的教学做出改变。这个项目正在努力实现两个主要目标。一个是开发一个通用的系统，用于在本科学科中创建和使用诊断评估。二是在地质学和生物学中实施这一系统。为了实现第一个目标，我们正在试行一种程序，以开发可在任何领域使用的诊断问题，开发在线同行审查和发布诊断问题的协议。此外，我们正在规划LON CAPA网络，以支持在线同行审查和发布诊断问题，并输出关于学生对问题的回答的数据。(Lon CAPA是具有计算机辅助个性化协助的在线学习网络。这是密歇根州立大学开发的一个系统，用于提供在线教学材料，其他机构可以免费获得。)最后，我们正在让其他机构的教师参与开发工作，使他们意识到诊断问题群，并帮助他们学习如何将诊断问题整合到他们的教学中。这个项目通过产生涉及地质学和生物学主题的诊断问题群来回应地质学和生物学中诊断问题的匮乏。这些集群涵盖了地质学中的三个主题：系统、全球碳循环和水循环。在生物学中，它们涵盖了两个大的主题，氮循环和碳循环。这两个问题分别涉及三个不同的层面：全球层面、宏观层面和微观层面。我们正在与生物和地质系合作，教他们使用诊断问题作为他们教学的一部分，以便了解他们的学生遇到的概念障碍，并根据这些信息修改他们的教学。我们的最终目标是让所有领域的教师使用这一程序来开发诊断问题并添加到库中。那些使用LON-CAPA的人将得到新的数据导出功能的帮助。LON-CAPA诊断问题库是一个永久的地方，用于存储STEM教师可以使用的同行评议问题。

Diagnostic assessment is the foundation for instructional improvement. It alerts instructors to student difficulties in learning particular concepts. In addition, truly diagnostic assessment yields information as to why students have difficulties, identifying common conceptual barriers students encounter. This information can be used to guide instructors in making changes to their teaching. This project is working to achieve two major goals. One is the development of a generalized system for creating and using diagnostic assessment in an undergraduate discipline. The other is to implement this system in geology and biology. Towards the first goal we are piloting a procedure for developing diagnostic questions that can be used in any field, developing protocols for online peer review and publication of diagnostic questions. Further, we are programming the LON CAPA network to support the online peer review and publication of diagnostic questions and the export of data on students' responses to questions. (LON CAPA is the Learning Online Network with Computer Assisted Personalized Assistance. It is a system developed at Michigan State University for delivery of on-line instructional materials that is freely available to other institutions.) Finally, we are engaging faculty in other institutions in development work that will make them aware of the diagnostic question clusters and help them learn how to integrate diagnostic questions into their teaching.This project is responding to the dearth of diagnostic questions in geology and biology by producing clusters of diagnostic questions addressing topics in geology and biology. These clusters cover three topics in geology: systems, the global carbon cycle, and the water cycle. In biology they cover two large topics, nitrogen cycling and carbon cycling. Each of these two are being covered at three different levels: global, macro, and micro. We are working with biology and geology faculty, teaching them to use the diagnostic questions as part of their instruction in order to learn about the conceptual barriers encountered by their students and modify their instruction in light of this information. Our ultimate goal is to have faculty in all fields using this procedure for developing diagnostic questions and adding to the pool. Those who use LON-CAPA will be aided by the new data export features. The LON-CAPA library of diagnostic questions is a permanent place for storing peer-reviewed questions available to STEM teaching faculty.