Tools for Assessment in Genetics aka TAG

遗传学是所有生物学专业的重要基础学科之一，也是学生学习难度最大的学科之一。对遗传学的深刻理解要求学生理解肉眼看不见的过程，掌握技术术语，并进行数学思考。最近的许多国家报告都向科学教育者提出了挑战，要求他们通过采用以证据为基础和以学生为中心的教学方法，而不是要求学生记忆孤立的事实，来开发促进对核心生物学概念更深层次理解的课程。随着遗传学课堂教学技术的变化，大学教师往往难以确定这些变化是否会提高学生的学习水平。这个项目完成后，将提供被称为概念清单（CI）的工具，教育工作者需要它来确定学生对几个核心遗传学概念的理解和误解程度，例如突变的本质和基因如何在生命系统中相互作用。教师可以使用这些工具来确定最适合学生需求的教学方法和课堂实践。该项目旨在改善大学生物科学的学习和教学方式，以满足国家的需求。美国需要更多受过更好教育的生物科学毕业生。虽然存在多种广谱遗传学概念测试，但本项目的智力优势在于开发了几个新的概念清单，重点关注一系列子主题。该项目将包括来自全国各地社区学院、R1、地区和小型私立学校的教师和学生。第一阶段将收集学生对开放性问题的回答，这些问题需要对突变、谱系、上位性、表观遗传学和多基因遗传有深刻的理解。第二阶段将是发展多项选择评估，包括学生的误解，这些误解被确定为开放式回答的可能答案。第三阶段将管理全国多个教室的概念清单，以确定概念清单是否符合规定的课程学习目标，在不同的环境中表现相似，并能够区分表现优异和表现不佳的学生。完成的概念清单将使教师能够更容易地制定和评估具体的教学策略，并准确地解决每个课堂中的误解。这个项目有可能对数百名教师如何教授遗传学产生积极影响，并在未来几年提高数千名学生对遗传学的理解。该项目由生物科学理事会分子和细胞生物科学部遗传机制项目和教育和人力资源理事会本科教育司共同资助，作为他们努力解决《本科生物学教育的愿景和变革：行动呼吁》（http://visionandchange.org/finalreport/）所提出的挑战的一部分。

Genetics is one of the key foundational subjects for all biology majors and also one of the most challenging for students to learn. A deep understanding of genetics requires students to understand processes that are invisible to the naked eye, master technical jargon, and think mathematically. Many recent national reports have challenged science educators to develop courses that promote a deeper understanding of core biological concepts by adopting teaching approaches that are evidence-based and student-centered instead of asking students to memorize isolated facts. As teaching techniques in genetics classrooms change, college instructors often struggle to determine if their changes lead to increased student learning. This project, when completed, will provide tools, called concept inventories (CI), needed for educators to determine the level of student understanding and misunderstanding of several core genetics concepts, such as the nature of mutations and how genes interact in a living system. These tools can be used by faculty to determine the teaching methods and classroom practices that best suit the needs of their students. This project aims to improve how biological sciences are learned and taught in college to meet the nation?s need for more and better educated graduates in the biological sciences.Although multiple broad-spectrum genetics concept tests exist, the intellectual merit of this project is to develop several new concept inventories focused on a range of sub-topics. The project will include faculty and students from community colleges, R1, regional, and small private schools across the country. The first stage will be to gather student responses to open ended questions that require deep understanding of mutations, pedigrees, epistasis, epigenetics, and polygenic inheritance. The second stage will be to develop multiple choice assessments that include student misconceptions that were identified as possible answers in the open-ended responses. The third stage will administer the concept inventories in multiple classrooms across the country to determine whether the concept inventories address the stated course learning objectives, perform similarly in different settings, and can distinguish between high and low performing students. The completed concept inventories will enable instructors to more easily develop and evaluate specific teaching strategies and precisely address misconceptions within each classroom. This project has the potential to positively affect how hundreds of instructors teach genetics and to improve the genetics understanding of thousands of students for years to come. This project is being jointly funded by the Genetic Mechanisms Program in the Directorate for Biological Sciences, Division of Molecular and Cellular Biosciences and the Directorate for Education and Human Resources, Division of Undergraduate Education as part of their efforts to address the challenges posed in Vision and Change in Undergraduate Biology Education: A Call to Action (http://visionandchange.org/finalreport/).