ITR: Atomic-Scale Models in Two Year Colleges: Bridging Science and Technology with Atomic-Scale Models

本项目探讨了如何在社区学院以有效和灵活的方式使用技术来教授科学。随着需要科学和数学的工作越来越多，新兴的生物技术只是一个例子，未来的工人将被要求快速学习新技能。nsf资助的分子工作台项目（REC 9980620），在其研究和测试的最后一年，已经开发了几个强大的原子水平模型。这些模型统称为“分子工作台”（Molecular Workbench），与一种与我们的模型“对话”的脚本语言以及伯克利大学（Berkeley）提供探究性科学在线项目的WISE项目相结合，可以阐明化学、生物学和物理学中一些最难教授的概念。社区大学不仅是职业培训的关键门户，对许多人来说，也是进入大学的关键门户。为科学课程注入强大的模型互动性，不仅可以让学生掌握科学知识，还可以促进他们向专业课程的过渡。该项目的总体目标是开发和评估在两年制大学技术课程中遇到的现实情况下复杂的交互式计算模型的使用。该项目将开发和评估灵活的原子尺度建模软件，以及支持利用该模型的教育材料的快速开发和部署的软件体系结构。分子工作台软件能够支持关键的物理和一些化学概念。它位于专业科学的严谨性和良好教学所需的简化之间。该项目建议开发建模软件的能力，以模拟化学键和光子相互作用，以及新的计算和可视化算法，以模拟较大生物分子的不同特征（例如活性位点的立体配体-受体相互作用）。与科学顾问和一组社区大学教育工作者一起工作，该项目不仅将增强分子工作台软件，还将使用这些模型开发课堂活动，并仔细评估它们的使用和功效。这项技术将在为期两年的大学课程中进行试点测试，提供一系列超模型或脚手架模型，这些模型使用原子尺度模型来说明典型技术专业背景下的关键科学主题。主要研究人员将确定一组关键的科学主题，这些主题通常在这个级别的生物、化学和物理课程中教授，并根据专业项目中使用的技术和过程为每个主题生成超模型。他们将利用加州大学伯克利分校（University of California, Berkeley）开发的一个现有的研究性科学项目平台。基于网络的探究科学环境（WISE）支持学生在探究项目上协同工作。使用WISE，超级模型将集成到完整的在线教学单元中，教师可以根据他们的需要进行调整，而无需对当前教学的组织或学习目标进行重大更改。然而，他们都将有一个一致的、原子尺度的方法，这可能是一个新的、跨学科的核心科学方法的基础。这些材料将与两年制学院的教师和课程专家合作开发，包括斯普林菲尔德（MA）技术社区学院（STCC）以及通过职业研究与发展中心（CORD）及其社区学院校长委员会招募的美国各地的其他学院。作为他们的开源教育技术库（OSLET）计划的一部分，pi将把所有获得赠款支持的代码作为开源提供。

This project addresses using technology to teach science in an effective and agile manner at the Community College level. As jobs requiring science and math increase in numbers, the burgeoning bio-technologies being only one example, future workers will be asked to learn new skills rapidly. The NSF-funded Molecular Workbench Project (REC 9980620), now in its final year of research and testing, has developed several powerful atomic-level models. These models, together called the Molecular Workbench, when combined with a scripting language that 'talks with" our model, and with Berkeley's WISE program that delivers on-line projects in inquiry science, can illuminate some of the hardest-to-teach concepts in chemistry, biology and physics.Community Colleges are a critical gateway not only to career training but also, for many, to college itself. Infusing science courses with the powerful interactivity of models will allow students not only to master science, but facilitate their transfer to specialty courses. The overall goal of this project is to develop and evaluate the use of complex, interactive computational models in the real-world situations encountered in two-year college technical programs. The project will develop and evaluate flexible atomic-scale modeling software as well as the software architecture that supports the rapid development and deployment of educational materials that utilize this model. The Molecular Workbench software is capable of underpinning key physics and some chemistry concepts. It is situated between the rigor of professional science and the simplifications required by good teaching. This project proposes to develop the modeling software's capacity to model chemical bonds, and photon interactions as well as new computational and visualization algorithms needed to model different features of larger biomolecules (e.g. steric ligand-receptor interactions at active sites). Working together with science advisors and a set of community college educators, this project will not only enhance the Molecular Workbench software, but will also develop classroom activities using the models, and carefully evaluate their use and efficacy. This technology will be pilot tested in two-year college courses by providing a range of hypermodels, or scaffolded models, that use atomic-scale models to illustrate key science topics in the context of typical technical specialties. The principle investigators will identify a set of key science topics typically taught in biology, chemistry, and physics courses at this level and generate hypermodels for each that are based on technologies and processes used in specialty programs. They will capitalize on an existing platform for inquiry science projects that has been developed at the University of California, Berkeley. The Web-based Inquiry Science Environment (WISE) supports students as they work collaboratively on inquiry projects. Using WISE, the hypermodels will be integrated into complete online instructional units that faculty can adapt to their needs without significant changes in the organization or learning objectives of current instruction. They will all, however, have a consistent, atomic-scale approach that could be the basis of a new, interdisciplinary approach to the core sciences. The materials will be developed in collaboration with faculty at two-year colleges and curriculum experts, including Springfield (MA) Technical Community College (STCC) and others throughout the US recruited through the Center for Occupational Research and Development (CORD) and their Community College Presidents Council. The PIs will make all grant-supported code available as open source as part of their Open Source Library of Educational Technology (OSLET) initiative.