Merle S. Bruno - US grants

Biological Sciences (61)
This project addresses the need to engage introductory biology students in critical thinking and problem solving and to make topics in biology more exciting and relevant for all students. The products from this project include 1) the Human Biology Case Library, an undergraduate interface to a powerful suite of medical school case studies and 2) a set of inquiry-based curricular materials based on the use of the cases. These products foster active learning experiences, promote collaborative learning and increase the inquiry-orientation of science education. We aim to make accessible a tremendous variety and quantity of cases that have been collected at Harvard Medical School and adapted for undergraduate education. The Human Biology Case Library brings the advanced computational infrastructure to any student with a web browser and provides a suite of interactive tools based on a number of human biology cases. This access to a multiplicity of human cases, source documents and analysis tools provides a rich environment for promoting student inquiry. Introductory biology classes serve a great number of college students, including non-majors
and many future teachers. Medical school cases in non-electronic form have been adapted for undergraduate classes for six years at Hampshire College. The software being developed will support inquiry activities in the original classroom and is being tested in additional classrooms. Three cases are being implemented as a proof of concept, and their effectiveness is being tested in a variety of post-secondary institutions (e.g., a community college and large university) and within a variety of teaching styles (e.g., traditional large lecture-based and small case-based classes). We are examining the difficulties of comparing student performance across institutions. Close communication with faculty is facilitating the use of the modules and testing their effectiveness through student and faculty outcome studies, interviews and evaluation of changes in attitude and content learning. Rigorous methodologies are being used among well-defined populations to analyze outcomes. This material will be submitted to and reviewed by BioQUEST.

This project addresses the need to engage introductory biology students and future teachers in critical thinking and problem solving. The work fosters active learning and provides inquiry-oriented biology materials that make learning biology exciting and relevant for all students. The products include 1) The Human Biology Case CyberLibrary, a powerful suite of medical case studies for undergraduates; and 2) a set of software tools to support student inquiry. Medical cases are adapted from cases developed for medical education, including some from Harvard Medical School. Based on prior funding from the CCLI program and the Department of Education we developed infrastructure software, inquiry tools and one human biology case. The current project is developing several additional cases and testing the effectiveness of the product and tools on student learning. We are examining how well the material supports inquiry learning and evaluating usability and changes in student attitudes towards scientific reasoning. This material is being tagged for the National Science Digital Library (NSDL) and submitted to and reviewed by BioQUEST. Intellectual merit: The work pushes the state of the art in the use of artificial intelligence, interactive multimedia, and web-based technology in biology education. Broader impact: The results have the potential to impact publishers, universities, for-profit companies, and individual authors who develop non-print educational materials.