Collaborative Research: Investigating How to Better Prepare Undergraduate Students for Physics Labs that Focus on Experimental Science

该项目旨在通过确定支持学生理解实验科学的策略来服务于国家利益。主要目标是确定教学策略，使本科生更好地为在物理实验室进行真正的科学实验做准备。传统的实验室练习训练学生将教学实验室视为进行死记硬背的程序的地方，这些程序会导致已知的结果。这个项目将探索如何帮助学生重新定义他们的期望，以便他们将物理实验室视为从事科学实验的地方。具体地说，这个项目旨在确定一些策略，帮助学生将物理实验室视为他们设计自己实验并从他们收集的数据中得出自己结论的地方。通过跨多个机构的合作，该项目将提供许多学生真实的科学实验室活动的例子，以及一个关于学生工作和参与的广泛数据库。后者将记录学生从不同背景带来的丰富多样的资源和经验，用于他们的科学实验室工作。这个项目旨在通过框架的理论镜头来理解学生在非传统科学实验室，特别是物理实验室的经历。一个人的框架在这里被定义为对正在发生的活动的一组稳定的(无论是局部的还是更全局的)期望。以前的文献表明，小事情会影响学生组织教学活动的方式，而这反过来又会对学生的学习产生很大影响。该研究项目的目的是(A)确定学生在不同的非传统实验室中安排活动的各种方式，(B)确定学生转移或改变他们安排实验活动的方式，以及(C)制定可测试的预测，以帮助学生为实验科学建立稳定、高效的框架。该项目得到了EHR核心研究计划的支持，该计划支持推进STEM学习和学习环境的基础研究、扩大对STEM的参与以及STEM劳动力发展的工作。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project aims to serve the national interest by identifying strategies to support students’ understanding of experimental science. The major goal is to identify instructional strategies that better prepare undergraduate students for doing authentic scientific experimentation in physics labs. Traditional laboratory exercises have trained students to view instructional laboratories as places to do rote procedures that lead to known results. This project will probe how to help students reframe their expectations so that they consider physics labs as places to engage in scientific experiementation. Specifically, this project intends to identify strategies that help students think of physics labs as places where they will design their own experiments and draw their own conclusions from the data they collect. By working across multiple institutions, the project will provide many examples of students’ authentic science laboratory activities, as well an extensive database of students' work and engagement. The latter will document the rich diversity of resources and experiences students bring from their diverse backgrounds to their science laboratory work. This project aims to understand student experiences in non-traditional science labs, specifically physics, through the theoretical lens of framing. A person's frame is defined here as a stable (either local or more global) set of expectations about the activity taking place. Prior literature suggests that small things can influence the ways students frame an instructional activity, which in turn can have a large impact on student learning. This research project is designed to (a) identify the various ways students frame activities in a diverse set of non-traditional labs, (b) identify ways students shift or change how they frame lab activities, and (c) formulate testable predictions for ways to help students develop stable, productive frames for experimental science. This project is supported by the EHR Core Research program, which supports work that advances fundamental research on STEM learning and learning environments, broadening participation in STEM, and STEM workforce development.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.