Collaborative Project: Expanding the Use of Remote Electron Microscopy in the Classroom to Transform Undergraduate Geoscience Education

合作项目：扩大远程电子显微镜在课堂上的使用以改变本科地球科学教育

• 批准号: 1323354
• 负责人: James MacDonald
• 金额: $ 7.45万
• 依托单位: Florida Gulf Coast University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2013
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2013-09-01 至 2018-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1323354&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Project; Expanding; Use; Remote

This collaborative project is examining the remote operation of analytical instruments, specifically a scanning-electron microscope and electron microprobe analyzer housed at Florida International University (FIU), to facilitate inquiry-based approaches to learning in undergraduate geoscience courses. The effectiveness of remote instrument use is being assessed across different course levels and audiences at four diverse institutions: FIU, Valencia Community College, Florida Gulf Coast University, and the University of South Florida. Faculty at each institution are adapting instrument use to their courses and students, and using common methods to assess learning gains and changes in students' attitudes along a novice-to-expert trajectory. Instrument use and learning assessment at the four partnering institutions is being supplemented by national-level outreach to engage further partners, using hands-on workshops and follow-on individual training and consultation for faculty who commit to pilot use in their own courses.The intellectual merit of the project lies in its well-formulated plan to leverage fixed-location, high-end analytical instruments to enable authentic research and inquiry within the undergraduate curriculum at remote institutions. The embedded educational research addresses important questions of a) how much and what type(s) of remote instrument-aided inquiry enable targeted student-learning outcomes, b) what factors determine effectiveness as institution type, curricular level, and student audiences vary, and c) what challenges exist for widespread propagation of the approach and how might these be overcome. Broader impacts of the project include a) the production of insights and practices that promote remote use of research-grade analytical instrumentation at multiple levels of the undergraduate curriculum, providing a model that could be used at other research centers to enable heretofore inaccessible analytical capabilities at a wide range of undergraduate institutions, b) engagement of a diverse range of students (from seniors in majors' classes to first-year non-majors in introductory classes) and institutions (from research universities to community colleges) in authentic research, a high-impact practice for retaining students in STEM disciplines, and c) professional development for faculty at the partnering institutions and beyond, as well as for a postdoctoral scholar and graduate student engaged in discipline-based educational research.

这一合作项目正在研究分析仪器的远程操作，特别是设在佛罗里达国际大学的扫描电子显微镜和电子探针分析仪，以促进在本科地球科学课程中采用探究式学习方法。远程仪器使用的有效性正在四个不同机构的不同课程水平和受众中进行评估：金融情报室、瓦伦西亚社区学院、佛罗里达墨西哥湾沿岸大学和南佛罗里达大学。每个机构的教师都在调整工具的使用，以适应他们的课程和学生，并使用共同的方法来评估学习成果和学生态度的变化，沿着新手到专家的轨迹。四个伙伴机构的仪器使用和学习评估正在得到国家一级外联活动的补充，以吸引更多的伙伴，利用实践讲习班和后续个人培训，并为承诺在自己的课程中试用的教师提供咨询。高端分析仪器，使真实的研究和查询在远程机构的本科课程。嵌入式教育研究解决了以下重要问题：a）多少和什么类型的远程仪器辅助探究能够实现有针对性的学生学习成果，B）哪些因素决定了机构类型，课程水平和学生受众的有效性，以及c）广泛传播该方法存在哪些挑战以及如何克服这些挑战。该项目的更广泛的影响包括：a）在本科课程的多个层次上促进远程使用研究级分析仪器的见解和实践的产生，提供了一个可以在其他研究中心使用的模型，以使迄今为止无法访问的分析能力在广泛的本科院校，B）各种学生的参与（从专业课程的大四学生到入门课程的一年级非专业学生）和机构（从研究型大学到社区学院）在真实的研究，一个高影响力的做法，保留学生在干学科，以及c）为伙伴院校及其他院校的教师，以及从事学科为本教育研究的博士后学者和研究生提供专业发展。