Proposal Title

A new assessment of graph construction competency for undergraduate biology students

Session Type

Workshop

Room

Somerville House, room 3315

Start Date

12-7-2023 11:00 AM

End Date

12-7-2023 11:50 AM

Keywords

graphing assessment quantitative skills performance-based

Primary Threads

Evaluation of Learning

Abstract

With an increasing emphasis on teaching the skills and processes of science in the undergraduate biology classroom, working with and interpreting data has become an important part of the curriculum. Visual representations are a key tool when examining data, especially graphs. Undergraduate biology students notoriously have trouble both making good graphs and interpreting graphs. Yet, although there is an extensive literature on graph interpretation challenges amongst students, there has been much less work on the confusions students exhibit when constructing graphs.

On the path to creating tools to help teach graphing to biology students, we have been building a new performance-based assessment of graph construction competence. The assessment presents students a research question and asks them to make graphs to test a hypothesis drawn from that question. The graphs are auto-scored for a number of practices associated with making good graphs. The digital nature and auto-scoring has allowed us to provide this assessment and analyze results at larger scales than previous assessments, gathering data that will help focus teaching tools on the areas of highest need.

In this workshop, each participant will take one version of the graphing assessment themselves (about 20–30 minutes) and then we will discuss the experience. After talking about how well the assessment lines up to the graphing practices you look for in your students, the presenter will show data on where we find biology students struggle, drawn from students in a diverse set of classes and institutions. Bring your laptop (Mac or Windows only).

Note: the creative commons license below is for the abstract and talk only, not the software.

Elements of Engagement

Will have them work through, individually, our new assessment on their own computer, then discuss. A laptop (Mac or Windows) is required to try the graphing assessment.

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

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Jul 12th, 11:00 AM Jul 12th, 11:50 AM

A new assessment of graph construction competency for undergraduate biology students

Somerville House, room 3315

With an increasing emphasis on teaching the skills and processes of science in the undergraduate biology classroom, working with and interpreting data has become an important part of the curriculum. Visual representations are a key tool when examining data, especially graphs. Undergraduate biology students notoriously have trouble both making good graphs and interpreting graphs. Yet, although there is an extensive literature on graph interpretation challenges amongst students, there has been much less work on the confusions students exhibit when constructing graphs.

On the path to creating tools to help teach graphing to biology students, we have been building a new performance-based assessment of graph construction competence. The assessment presents students a research question and asks them to make graphs to test a hypothesis drawn from that question. The graphs are auto-scored for a number of practices associated with making good graphs. The digital nature and auto-scoring has allowed us to provide this assessment and analyze results at larger scales than previous assessments, gathering data that will help focus teaching tools on the areas of highest need.

In this workshop, each participant will take one version of the graphing assessment themselves (about 20–30 minutes) and then we will discuss the experience. After talking about how well the assessment lines up to the graphing practices you look for in your students, the presenter will show data on where we find biology students struggle, drawn from students in a diverse set of classes and institutions. Bring your laptop (Mac or Windows only).

Note: the creative commons license below is for the abstract and talk only, not the software.