SBIR Phase II: Collaborative game approach to support classroom instruction of difficult-to-teach science concepts

该项目将使学生能够使用协作游戏方法学习困难的科学概念，旨在显著提高学生的参与度和理解力。这款游戏是为了改善高中学生生命科学课程中必修的光合作用和细胞呼吸的教学。这些过程在很大程度上是看不见的，由一系列复杂而相互依赖的互动组成，很难教授。该计划旨在透过创造具教育意义的互动工具，让学生学习复杂的科学科目，提高中学生对STEM的参与和兴趣，并帮助他们建立核心科学知识和更高层次的思维技能，以应对21世纪的挑战。应用程序的内容和设计是基于有效的科学教学的循证教学方法。开发一种更加身临其境和切实可行的学习方法，坚持了美国国家科学基金会促进卓越科学教育的使命，并将有助于吸引和准备更多的学生从事stem相关的职业。这项工作将为教师提供一种教学工具，能够准确地传达基于化学的生物过程的细节，使他们能够在课堂上提供差异化的教学，并确保所有学生，无论其先前的知识和能力水平如何，都能够达到规定的国家和国家级生命科学标准。该项目建议开发和实现一个工作模拟器，为虚拟实验室学习环境提供科学准确的输出，学生可以通过试验和错误快速建立对科学方法的实际理解。这使得a)在学生学习中引入合法的代理，这样他们的选择就可以推动学习，b)生成有意义的（非通用的）教学提示，精确地响应每个人与游戏的互动方式，以及c)建立一个有价值的框架，基于他们与模拟器的多重真实互动来评估学生的学习。模拟器将使用数学模型来表示生物过程，以支持任意范围的假设。其他创新包括a)在课堂层面区分教学的自动化工具，以帮助教师解决学生从补习到高级的一系列熟练程度；b)利用协作评估和论证游戏扩展设备与设备之间的学生互动；c)应用程序管理工具，使教师能够组织、监控和评估个人学生在这些协作活动中的参与情况。d)将相关的地理历史气候数据整合到每个玩家的“奖励花园”中，以培养他们对定量分析活动的能力和兴趣。课堂测试将进行，以验证我们的方法和证明有效性。

This project will enable students to learn difficult science concepts using a collaborative gaming approach that aims to significantly increase student engagement and understanding. This game is being developed to improve the instruction of photosynthesis and cell respiration, which are required curriculum for high school students in life science courses. These processes are largely invisible, comprised of a complex and interdependent set of interactions, and difficult to teach. By creating educationally sound interactive tools to undertake complicated science subjects, the project aims to increase secondary student involvement and interest in STEM, and to help build the core scientific knowledge and higher-order thinking skills they will need to address the challenges of the 21st Century. The app content and design is based on evidence-based pedagogical approaches to effective science instruction. Developing a more immersive and practicable learning method upholds the NSF's mission to promote exceptional science education and will help attract and prepare more students for STEM-based careers. This work will provide teachers with an instructional tool that conveys accurate details of chemically-based biological processes, enable them to deliver differentiated instruction to their classes, and ensure that all their students, whatever their level of pre-existing knowledge and ability, are able to meet the prescribed national and state-level life science standards.The project proposes to develop and implement a working simulator that produces scientifically accurate output for a virtual lab learning environment, with which students can quickly build practical understanding of the scientific method through trial and error. This enables a) the introduction of legitimate agency into student learning so that their choices drive the learning, b) the generation of meaningful (non-generic) instructional prompts that respond precisely to how each individual interacts with the game, and c) the establishment of a valuable framework for assessing student learning based on their multiple authentic interactions with the simulator. The simulator will represent biological processes using a mathematical model in order to support an arbitrary range of hypotheses. Additional innovations include a) automated tools that differentiate instruction at the classroom level to help teachers address a range of student proficiencies, from remedial to advanced, b) expanded device-to-device student interactions that utilize collaborative assessments and argumentation games, c) app management tools that enable teachers to organize, monitor and assess individual student participation within these collaborative activities, and d) the integration of relevant geohistorical climate data into each player's "reward garden" in order to build aptitude and foster interest in quantitative analysis activities. Classroom testing will be conducted to validate our approach and demonstrate efficacy.