Using Perceptual and Adaptive Learning to Advance Chemistry Education

描述（由申请人提供）：使用感知和适应性学习来推进化学教育本提案涉及广泛的挑战领域12）科学，技术，工程和数学教育和特定的挑战主题12-OD-101：教育方法对促进STEM能力的有效性。这项工作将完善和测试化学学习模块的有效性，这些模块结合了先进的感知学习和自适应学习技术，这两种技术都有很大的潜力，但在很大程度上尚未开发，以改善STEM学习。目标学习群体将是社区学院的学生参加基础化学课程。这一学生群体是一个庞大而重要的群体，代表了健康和科学相关职业的广泛人才库。该项目旨在解决限制学生学习的两个主要问题。一个是学生掌握和流畅处理关键结构和关系的能力。最近的研究表明，这个问题可以通过嵌入在学习技术中的感知学习原理来解决。第二个问题是，学习不适应个人学习者的需要。这些限制可以通过使用自适应学习技术来克服，在自适应学习技术中，学习事件基于学习者的准确性和速度进行排序。要测试的学习干预措施采取感知学习模块的形式。PLM通过简短的交互式试验，加快了学习者快速准确地处理复杂领域中关键结构和关系的能力。PLM是基于网络的;它们通过标准浏览器在互联网上提供学习和评估;它们可以很容易地扩大规模以获得更广泛的使用。该技术将结合最近获得专利的自适应学习算法，该算法使用连续的性能数据流来优化学习和记忆的原理，从而提高学习和评估的效率。该项目团队由认知科学、学习技术、课程开发和评估、化学和化学教育方面的专家组成，将完善两个以前开发的化学PLM，并使用现有的自适应学习软件开发一个新的PLM，从而对这些技术进行广泛的测试。实验室试点研究和社区学院化学课程的全面功效研究都将进行。有效性研究将包括受试者的随机化;将治疗组与使用常规材料花费相当时间的对照组进行比较;将包括测试感知/适应性学习特定成分有效性的条件。拟议的功效研究预计将产生强大的学习收益，表明感知学习产生模式识别和流畅性的潜力，以及适应性学习技术的潜力，以适应个人的学习需求，并产生掌握。研究结果将对其他STEM领域的化学教育和学习产生影响，特别是对那些与传统教学方法作斗争的学生。 公共卫生相关性：拟议的项目将测试网络交付的感知和自适应学习技术在社区大学生化学学习中的有效性，社区大学生是一个庞大而重要的群体，其中包括大部分就读于大学的学生，其中许多人属于传统上在STEM领域代表性不足的群体。在这个项目中获得的结果将为教育实践提供信息;成功的结果可能导致感知和自适应学习技术的广泛有效使用，以消除障碍，提高STEM课程中大量学生的学习效率，从而实现全方位的健康相关职业。

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Using Perceptual and Adaptive Learning to Advance Chemistry Education This proposal addresses broad Challenge Area 12) Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Education and specific Challenge Topic 12-OD-101: Efficacy of educational approaches toward promoting STEM competencies. The work will refine and test the efficacy of Chemistry learning modules that incorporate advanced perceptual learning and adaptive learning technologies, both of which have great, but largely untapped, potential to improve STEM learning. The target learning group will be community college students taking basic chemistry courses. This student population is a large and important group, representing a considerable pool of talent for a broad spectrum of health and science-related occupations. The project seeks to address two major problems that limit student learning. One involves students' abilities to grasp and process fluently crucial structures and relations. Recent work suggests that this problem can be addressed with dramatic success by perceptual learning principles embedded in learning technology. A second problem is that learning does not adapt to the needs of the individual learner. These limitations can be overcome by the use of adaptive learning technology in which learning events are sequenced based on learner accuracy and speed. The learning interventions to be tested take the form of Perceptual Learning Modules (PLMs). PLMs accelerate, through short, interactive trials, learners' abilities to quickly and accurately process key structures and relationships in complex domains. PLMs are web-based; they deliver learning and assessment via standard browsers over the Internet; and they can be easily scaled-up for broader use. The technology will incorporate recently patented adaptive learning algorithms that use a continuous stream of performance data to optimize principles of learning and memory, producing improved efficiency of learning and assessment. The project team, consisting of experts in cognitive science, learning technology, curriculum development and evaluation, chemistry and chemistry education, will refine two previously developed Chemistry PLMs and develop one new one using existing adaptive learning software, allowing a broad test of these technologies. Both laboratory pilot studies and full-scale efficacy studies in community college Chemistry courses will be carried out. Efficacy studies will include randomization by participant; treatment groups will be compared to control groups who spend comparable amounts of time using conventional materials; and conditions that test efficacy of specific components of perceptual/adaptive learning will be included. The proposed efficacy studies are expected to yield robust learning gains, indicating the potential of perceptual learning to produce pattern recognition and fluency, and the potential of adaptive learning technologies to fit individual learning needs and produce mastery. Results will have implications for Chemistry education and learning in other STEM fields, particularly for students who struggle with traditional instructional methods. Public Health Relevance: The proposed project will test the efficacy of web-delivered perceptual and adaptive learning technologies in Chemistry learning by community college students, a large and important group that includes a majority of all students enrolled in colleges, many of whom belong to groups traditionally under-represented in STEM fields. Results obtained in this project will inform educational practice; successful outcomes could lead to widespread effective use of perceptual and adaptive learning technologies to remove barriers and improve learning efficiency for large numbers of students in STEM curricula leading to a full-spectrum of health-related occupations.