Exploring Biological Evidence: Helping Students Understand the Richness and Complexity of Evidentiary Constructs in Biology

该提案是根据EHR核心研究（ECR）项目公告NSF 15-509提交的。STEM教育基础研究ECR项目为重要、广泛和持久的关键研究领域提供资金。EHR寻求有助于在以下重点领域综合、建立和/或扩大研究基础的提案：STEM学习、STEM学习环境、STEM劳动力发展和扩大STEM参与。ECR项目的特点是强调积累有力的证据，为以下方面的努力提供信息：(a)理解，(b)建立理论来解释，(c)提出干预（和创新）措施，以解决STEM兴趣、教育、学习和参与方面的持续挑战。本研究旨在探讨高中及本科学生在生物教与学背景下对证据理解的发展轨迹。许多科学学习者所经历的困难之一是他们不能完全理解支撑当代科学的证据基础。本研究将考察学生在生物学学习的背景下对证据的理解。这项研究将通过提供关于学生理解和使用证据的发展轨迹的信息，作为他们在中学和高中后学习生物学的核心部分，从而有助于了解STEM学习和STEM学习环境的基础知识。该项目还将提供有关教师和教学材料如何支持学生对证据的理解和推理的变化如何影响这一发展的信息。作为这个项目的一部分开发的教学资源（例如，适合年级的教师指南和支持作业和评估的范例）将对生物教育者具有直接价值。这项研究的结果将帮助教育工作者更好地为那些想要从事科学事业，包括研究事业的学生做好准备。此外，该项目开发的知识可以支持科学素养的发展和公民参与围绕科学问题的公共政策的循证决策。该项目将使用基于设计的研究方法来实现以下目标：a)对学科证据的各个方面进行概念分析，这些方面对生物学学习中的进化思维很重要；b)描述高中和本科生对进化生物学证据的理解和使用的学习轨迹；c)研究教学脚手架的变化与每个年级学生学习模式的关系；d)发展设计知识，促进高中和本科生物教学中学科证据脚手架的整合。首先，将收集学生在日常生物教学中对生物证据的了解和学习情况的数据。随后，该团队将整合教学框架，以培养对生物学证据更细致和多方面的理解。将考察两种变体：1)通用证据框架将提醒学生在科学中使用证据的不同方面(例如；“在构建解释时参考所有证据”)，但没有明确链接到每个方面的相关学科知识。2)学科证据支架将明确地提醒学生与证据的每个方面相关的关键学科知识。该项目将采用混合方法，将定性和定量认知科学技术相结合，从以下方面收集和分析数据：a)学生学习人工制品；b)生物内容知识的前后测试，以及他们对生物学证据的理解和使用；c)课堂教学录像；d)对教师和学生的访谈。这些方法将允许在两种教学条件下对小组表现进行定量比较，并以丰富的描述性数据补充这些比较，这些数据说明学生如何在不同的教学环境中学习。

This proposal was submitted in response to EHR Core Research (ECR) program announcement NSF 15-509. The ECR program of fundamental research in STEM education provides funding in critical research areas that are essential, broad and enduring. EHR seeks proposals that will help synthesize, build and/or expand research foundations in the following focal areas: STEM learning, STEM learning environments, STEM workforce development, and broadening participation in STEM. The ECR program is distinguished by its emphasis on the accumulation of robust evidence to inform efforts to (a) understand, (b) build theory to explain, and (c) suggest interventions (and innovations) to address persistent challenges in STEM interest, education, learning, and participation. The proposed study will explore trajectories of development in high school and undergraduate students' understanding of evidence in the context of biology teaching and learning. One of the difficulties experienced by many science learners is that they do not fully understand the evidence base that underpins contemporary science. This study will examine students' developing understanding of evidence in the context of biology learning. This research will contribute to fundamental knowledge on STEM learning and STEM learning environments by providing information on trajectories of development in students' understanding and use of evidence as a central part of their learning in biology through the secondary and post-secondary years. The project will also provide information on how variations in how teachers and instructional materials support students' understanding and reasoning about evidence influence this development. The instructional resources developed as part of this project (e.g., grade band appropriate teacher guides and exemplars of supported assignments and assessments) will be of direct value to biology educators. The outcomes of this study will help educators better prepare students who want to pursue careers in science, including research careers. Furthermore, knowledge developed by the project may support the development of scientific literacy and participation in evidence-based decision making around public policy on scientific issues among citizens.The project will use a design-based research approach to achieve the following objectives: a) Develop a conceptual analysis of varied facets of disciplinary evidence that are important to evolutionary thinking in biology learning; b) Describe trajectories of learning in high school and undergraduate students' understanding and use of biological evidence for evolution; c) Examine how variations in instructional scaffolding relate to patterns of student learning within each grade band; and d) Develop design knowledge to facilitate integration of disciplinary evidence scaffolding in high school and undergraduate biology instruction. First, data will be collected on what students know and learn about biological evidence in the context of routine biology instruction. Subsequently the team will integrate instructional scaffolds that foster more nuanced and multifaceted understandings of biological evidence. Two variations will be examined: 1) Generic evidence scaffolds will remind students of different aspects of using evidence in science (e.g. "refer to all the evidence when constructing an explanation"), but without explicit links to relevant disciplinary knowledge for each aspect. 2) disciplinary evidence scaffolds will explicitly remind students of key disciplinary knowledge related to each aspect of evidence. The project will use a mixed method approach, combining qualitative and quantitative cognitive science techniques to collect and analyze data from a) student learning artifacts, b) pre and posttests of biology content knowledge, and their understanding and use of evidence in biology, c) videotaped classroom lessons, and d) interviews with teachers and students. These methods will allow for quantitative comparisons of group performance across the two instructional conditions and supplement these comparisons with rich descriptive data about how students learn in varied instructional contexts.