Does the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?

As biology education is being redesigned toward an interdisciplinary focus and as pedagogical trends move toward active-learning strategies and investigative experiences, a restructuring of the course content for the Introductory Biology course is necessary. The introductory course in biology has ty...

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Autor principal:	Maryanne C. Simurda
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	American Society for Microbiology 2012
Materias:	Special aspects of education LC8-6691 Biology (General) QH301-705.5
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/90262c13547d4af7a082052e8d3192cc
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:90262c13547d4af7a082052e8d3192cc2021-11-15T15:20:09ZDoes the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?10.1128/jmbe.v13i1.3401935-78851935-7877https://doaj.org/article/90262c13547d4af7a082052e8d3192cc2012-01-01T00:00:00Zhttps://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/jmbe.v13i1.340https://doaj.org/toc/1935-7877https://doaj.org/toc/1935-7885As biology education is being redesigned toward an interdisciplinary focus and as pedagogical trends move toward active-learning strategies and investigative experiences, a restructuring of the course content for the Introductory Biology course is necessary. The introductory course in biology has typically been a survey of all the biosciences. If the total number of topics covered is reduced, is the students’ overall knowledge of biology also reduced? Our introductory course has been substantially modified away from surveying the biological sciences and toward providing a deep understanding of a particular biological topic, as well as focusing on developing students’ analytical and communication skills. Because of this shift to a topic-driven approach for the introductory course, we were interested in assessing our graduating students’ overall knowledge of the various biological disciplines. Using the Major Field Test - Biology (Educational Testing Service (ETS), Princeton, NJ), we compared the test performance of graduating students who had a traditional lecture-based introductory course to those who had a topic-driven active-learning introductory course. Our results suggest that eliminating the traditional survey of biology and, instead, focusing on quantitative and writing skills at the introductory level do not affect our graduating students’ overall breadth of knowledge of the various biosciences.Maryanne C. SimurdaAmerican Society for MicrobiologyarticleSpecial aspects of educationLC8-6691Biology (General)QH301-705.5ENJournal of Microbiology & Biology Education, Vol 13, Iss 1, Pp 17-20 (2012)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	Special aspects of education LC8-6691 Biology (General) QH301-705.5
spellingShingle	Special aspects of education LC8-6691 Biology (General) QH301-705.5 Maryanne C. Simurda Does the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?
description	As biology education is being redesigned toward an interdisciplinary focus and as pedagogical trends move toward active-learning strategies and investigative experiences, a restructuring of the course content for the Introductory Biology course is necessary. The introductory course in biology has typically been a survey of all the biosciences. If the total number of topics covered is reduced, is the students’ overall knowledge of biology also reduced? Our introductory course has been substantially modified away from surveying the biological sciences and toward providing a deep understanding of a particular biological topic, as well as focusing on developing students’ analytical and communication skills. Because of this shift to a topic-driven approach for the introductory course, we were interested in assessing our graduating students’ overall knowledge of the various biological disciplines. Using the Major Field Test - Biology (Educational Testing Service (ETS), Princeton, NJ), we compared the test performance of graduating students who had a traditional lecture-based introductory course to those who had a topic-driven active-learning introductory course. Our results suggest that eliminating the traditional survey of biology and, instead, focusing on quantitative and writing skills at the introductory level do not affect our graduating students’ overall breadth of knowledge of the various biosciences.
format	article
author	Maryanne C. Simurda
author_facet	Maryanne C. Simurda
author_sort	Maryanne C. Simurda
title	Does the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?
title_short	Does the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?
title_full	Does the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?
title_fullStr	Does the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?
title_full_unstemmed	Does the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?
title_sort	does the transition to an active-learning environment for the introductory course reduce students’ overall knowledge of the various disciplines in biology?
publisher	American Society for Microbiology
publishDate	2012
url	https://doaj.org/article/90262c13547d4af7a082052e8d3192cc
work_keys_str_mv	AT maryannecsimurda doesthetransitiontoanactivelearningenvironmentfortheintroductorycoursereducestudentsoverallknowledgeofthevariousdisciplinesinbiology
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Does the Transition to an Active-Learning Environment for the Introductory Course Reduce Students’ Overall Knowledge of the Various Disciplines in Biology?

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