BRAID 2.0: Bringing Relationships Alive through Interdisciplinary Discourse

Braid 2.0项目是：(I)创建密集的新生本科生科学和技术课程群；(Ii)对学生和教职员工的态度和理解随着时间的推移而发生的变化进行纵向研究。在四年的时间里，该项目形成了五套多学科的辫子，明确地将数学、化学和科学史等三门学科课程的重叠主题内容与每周一次的小规模研讨会课程联系在一起，强调学生和所有三名教师之间的跨学科讨论。在研究中，该项目采用了一项纵向研究，跟踪通过辫子课程的学生(以及控制课程的学生，即没有参与的学生)在继续他们的高级课程并在毕业前取得进展时的表现。我们期望参与的学生在后续的高级课程中表现出更好的跨学科思维能力和更好的表现，这些课程的主题变得非常跨学科。正在通过专家访谈、调查和课程表演来检验在编织经验期间和随后几年跟踪期间的这些收获。此外，我们还在研究教员专业知识和态度随着时间的推移而发生的变化。在这个项目中，我们正在收集数据，从战略上为本科生学习科学的研究做出贡献。这些结果对改进本科理工科教育实习具有直接的应用价值。它们将影响我们对这一经历如何催化学生态度和理解的改变，以及参与其中的教师的态度和理解的理解。

The BRAID 2.0 project is: (i) creating intensely BRAIDed clusters of freshman undergraduate science and technology courses and (ii) pursuing a longitudinal research study of both the change in attitudes and understanding of students and faculty over time. Over four years the project is generating five sets of multiple curricular BRAIDs, that explicitly tie the overlapping topic content of three disciplinary courses, e.g. Math, Chemistry and History of Science, with a small additional weekly seminar class that emphasizes interdisciplinary discussions between students and all three faculty. In research, this project employs a longitudinal study tracking the performance of students who pass through the BRAID curriculum (and controls, i.e. students who do not participate) as they continue in their upper-level courses and progress to graduation. We expect the participating students to show improved interdisciplinary thinking skills and improved performance in subsequent upper-level courses where topics become quite interdisciplinary. These gains during the BRAID experience and following in the tracking years are being examined via expert interviews, surveys and course performances. In addition we are also studying change in faculty expertise and attitudes over time. In this project we are gathering data to strategically contribute to research on undergraduate learning of science. These results have direct applications for improving educational practice in undergraduate science and technology courses. They will impact our understanding of how this experience catalyzes change in students' attitudes and understanding, as well as in that for participating faculty.