CAREER: Characterizing the Development of Metacognitive Skills in Life Science Undergraduates and How They Use Metacognition to Learn Independently and Collaboratively

元认知指的是意识和控制自己的思维。以前的研究表明，支持学生发展和使用他们的元认知技能可以提高他们在STEM课程中的成功。例如，通过使用他们的元认知技能，当他们学习新的想法，学生可以更好地识别他们不理解的概念。这些知识使他们能够选择，实施，反思和调整他们的学习策略，随着时间的推移建立更好的理解。在小组合作的同时，学生们还可以提出问题并发表声明，以刺激彼此的元认知。培养出强大元认知技能的STEM学生能够更有效地学习并坚持自己的专业。因此，我们需要更好地了解生命科学学生在大学生涯中获得元认知技能时发生的变化，如何设计小组工作来增强社会元认知，以及学生的元认知能力对生命科学中学习，推理和解决问题的影响。这些知识将告知如何设计生命科学学习环境，以支持本科生在课堂内外发展和使用元认知。p 本项目将通过以下特征来推进知识：（1）生命科学本科生在整个大学生涯中的元认知发展（无干预）;（2）学生如何在彼此中促进元认知思维（社会元认知）以及这种促进如何影响他们在小组问题解决过程中的推理;以及（3）个人和社会元认知之间的关系。元认知发展的特点是通过在格鲁吉亚大学（博士生大学），北格鲁吉亚大学（硕士生大学），南格鲁吉亚州立学院（大专/学士学位学院）的生命科学专业的纵向案例研究的发展。调查将集中在学生何时以及如何使用他们的元认知技能，以及学生的个人认识论和自我效能感如何影响元认知。每个学生的年度档案将根据半结构化访谈，思考大声协议，而解决问题的分析，以及对已公布的库存的反应。社会元认知将通过分析在上层细胞生物学教室的小团体工作的录像进行调查。随后的学生群体将被引导在使用有效类型的社会元认知，而在小组工作。最终，该项目将应用研究结果，以创建和评估生物学研讨会课程的元认知为一年级生命科学学生在格鲁吉亚大学的生物学导论课程。本课程将与支持有才华的农村和第一代大学生的大学课程相结合。该项目还将通过国家教育网络的在线研讨会系列更广泛地影响科学教师的发展。p 教师早期职业发展（CAREER）计划是美国国家科学基金会（NSF）范围内的一项活动，旨在支持那些有潜力在研究和教育领域成为学术榜样的早期职业教师。这个职业生涯项目得到了NSF教育人力资源理事会核心研究（ECR）计划及其改进本科STEM教育（IUSE）计划的支持。p p该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。/ p

pMetacognition refers to awareness and control of one's own thinking. Previous research shows that supporting students' development and use of their metacognitive skills can enhance their success in STEM courses. For example, by using their metacognitive skills as they learn about new ideas, students can better identify concepts they do not understand. This knowledge allows them to select, implement, reflect upon, and adjust their learning strategies to build better understanding over time. While collaborating in small groups, students can also ask questions and make statements to stimulate metacognition in one another. STEM students who develop strong metacognitive skills are positioned to learn more effectively and persist in their majors. Thus, we need to better understand the changes that occur as life science students acquire metacognitive skills across their college careers, how small group work can be designed to enhance social metacognition, and the effects of students' metacognitive abilities on learning, reasoning, and problem-solving in the life sciences. This knowledge will inform how life sciences learning environments can be designed to support undergraduate students' development and use of metacognition in and out of the classroom./p pThis project will advance knowledge by characterizing: (1) the development of metacognition in undergraduate life science students throughout their college careers (without intervention); (2) how students prompt metacognitive thinking in one another (social metacognition) and how this prompting influences their reasoning during small group problem solving; and (3) the relationships between individual and social metacognition. Metacognitive development will be characterized via development of longitudinal case studies of life sciences majors at University of Georgia (a doctoral university), University of North Georgia (a master's university), and South Georgia State College (an associate's/baccalaureate college). The investigations will focus on when and how students use their metacognitive skills, and how students' personal epistemologies and self-efficacy may affect metacognition. Yearly profiles of each student will be constructed based on analyses of semi-structured interviews, think-aloud protocols while problem-solving, as well as responses to published inventories. Social metacognition will be investigated through analysis of video recordings of small-group work in an upper-level Cell Biology classroom. Later cohorts of students will then be guided in the use of effective types of social metacognition while working in small groups. Ultimately, the project will apply the research findings to create and evaluate a Metacognition in Biology seminar course for first-year life science students taking the Introductory Biology course at the University of Georgia. This course will be integrated with university programs that support talented rural and first-generation college students. The project will also impact science faculty development more broadly via an online workshop series of a national education network./p pThe Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Program is a National Science Foundation (NSF)-wide activity that supports early-career faculty who have the potential to serve as academic role models in research and education. This CAREER project is supported by NSF's Education & Human Resources Directorate Core Research (ECR) Program and its Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (IUSE) Program./p pThis award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria./p