Collaborative Research: Fluids for Life Science Students

参加基于代数的物理入门课程的大多数学生都是生命科学专业的学生。然而，生物学的基本物理主题，如流体，在这些课程中通常很少或不适合被覆盖。对流体的了解对于许多这些专业的实践是必不可少的，包括那些追求医学职业的人：生物体生活在流体环境中，体内的流体执行许多基本功能。我们目前对学生对流体的理解知之甚少，因此我们在这个主题上的教学方法相对来说是不了解的。基于研究的课程干预和评估问题使教学流体的方法更有见地。这一奖项的研究是通过访谈来考察学生对流体的知识现状，这些访谈阐明了学生对流体的先入为主的概念，以及学生对流体进行推理的资源(包括生产性和非生产性)。这些发现有助于设计指导性探究实验室、教程、量化问题以及形成性和总结性评估工具。本研究系统地考察了评估问题的有效性和可靠性，目的是构建流体概念清单，同时评估课程干预措施在提高学生理解能力方面的有效性。该奖项的广泛影响是显而易见的，因为这些交付成果使任何设有生命科学专业课程的机构的教师都可以提供经过测试的、基于研究的课程，内容涉及生命科学学生高度感兴趣的主题。

The majority of student enrolling in introductory algebra-based physics courses are life science majors. Yet essential physics topics for biology, such as fluids, often receive little or unsuitable coverage in these classes. An understanding of fluids is essential to the practice of many of these majors, including those who pursue careers in medicine: organisms live in fluid environments and fluids inside the body carry out many essential functions. Our current knowledge of student understanding of fluids is sparse and so our pedagogy on this topic is relatively uninformed.Research-based curricular interventions and assessment questions enable a more informed pedagogical approach to teaching fluids. The research of this award is examining students' current state of knowledge of fluids through interviews that elucidate student preconceptions about fluids and student resources (both productive and unproductive) for reasoning about fluids. These findings are then serving to help in the design of guided inquiry labs, tutorials, quantitative questions, as well as formative and summative assessment tools. The research systematically examines assessment questions for validity and reliability with the objective of constructing a fluids concept inventory, while also assessing the curricular interventions for effectiveness in improving student understanding. The broad impact of this award is apparent, as these deliverables enable instructors at any institution with a course for life science majors to offer a tested, research-based curriculum on fluids with topics of high interest to life science students.