Purpose

Online resources can be helpful for students and can augment the content presented in learning environments. A team consisting of four biologists, a graduate student, instructional designer and media developers collaborated on the design, development and evaluation of first-year biology online tutorials in a Canadian University. The tutorials were designed to address knowledge gaps resulting in low success rates and attrition of first-year students in biology. The decrease in the number of students in STEM has alarmed educators, prompting a call for efforts to increase STEM majors in universities. Large class sizes, such as first year biology with ∼900 registrants annually, with detail-oriented, content-heavy loads, can result in low success rates and attrition.

Design/methodology/approach

Active learning methods, including online formative assessments, which encourage student engagement in course material, can be effective in large introductory science classes, and thus, the authors provided engagement with tutorial online resources. The authors identified the tutorial topics by analyzing previous years' tests, student feedback and pedagogical research in undergraduate biology. The top five topics identified as common misconceptions or troublesome concepts within the course were selected. Standard instructional design processes were used to produce high-quality online tutorials. Tutorials included learning materials, videos, animations, self-assessments, reflective questions and badges to facilitate deep learning of the topics. Effectiveness of the tutorials was evaluated using quantitative methods and quasi-experimental design to compare the student learning results between the control year (without tutorials) and the year when tutorials were offered. Pre- and posttests measuring conceptual understanding were administered to assess gains in student learning. Additionally, student engagement was measured using the Classroom Survey of Student Engagement (CLASSE), and data from learning management system was collected.

Findings

Results of the study show that the tutorials were an effective means of providing supplementary assistance to students as well as fostering a gain in students' levels of engagement with the course. Data analysis indicates that there was a significant increased gain in learning of core concepts in biology. Specifically, using formative online assessments resulted in measurable learning gains in students who participated voluntarily, in comparison to students who chose not to engage in self-paced quiz testing.

Originality/value

As seen from the description earlier, the tutorials, and this project, provide suitable university-level complexity to address specific learning gaps in the first year course. They provide a valuable service to students in terms of representing content in an alternate format and motivating students as they engaged with videos and self-assessment most frequently. The project adds to the teaching and learning environment with respect to program design, mode of delivery and scheduling by providing self-paced tutorials that focus on specific concepts in biology. Students may review these resources whenever and as often as they feel necessary to better master the concepts. This makes the content applicable for the various preferences for approaches to learning and accommodation requirements found in students. Importantly, using formative online assessments resulted in measurable learning gains in students who participated voluntarily, in comparison to students who chose not to engage in self-paced quiz testing.

中文翻译：

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一年级大型生物课程交互式在线辅导的有效性

目的

在线资源可以对学生有所帮助，并且可以增加学习环境中呈现的内容。一个由四名生物学家、一名研究生、教学设计师和媒体开发人员组成的团队合作设计、开发和评估了加拿大大学一年级生物学在线教程。这些教程旨在解决知识差距导致的低成功率和生物学一年级学生的流失。STEM 学生人数的减少令教育工作者感到震惊，促使人们呼吁努力增加大学的 STEM 专业。大班级规模，例如每年约有 900 名注册学生的第一年生物学课程，以及注重细节、内容繁重的课程，可能会导致低成功率和人员流失。

设计/方法/途径

主动学习方法，包括鼓励学生参与课程材料的在线形成性评估，在大型导论性科学课程中是有效的，因此，作者提供了参与教程在线资源。作者通过分析往年的测试、学生反馈和本科生物学的教学研究来确定教程主题。选择了课程中被确定为常见误解或麻烦概念的前五个主题。标准的教学设计流程被用来制作高质量的在线教程。教程包括学习材料、视频、动画、自我评估、反思性问题和徽章，以促进对主题的深入学习。使用定量方法和准实验设计来评估辅导的有效性，以比较对照年（没有辅导）和提供辅导的年份之间的学生学习结果。测量概念理解的前测和后测用于评估学生学习的收获。此外，还使用学生参与课堂调查 (CLASSE) 衡量学生参与度，并收集来自学习管理系统的数据。

发现

研究结果表明，辅导课是向学生提供补充帮助以及提高学生参与课程水平的有效方式。数据分析表明，生物学核心概念的学习有了显着增加。具体来说，与选择不参加自定进度测验的学生相比，使用形成性在线评估可以使自愿参加的学生取得可衡量的学习成果。

原创性/价值

从前面的描述中可以看出，教程和这个项目提供了适合大学水平的复杂性，以解决第一年课程中的特定学习差距。他们在以替代格式呈现内容和激励学生最频繁地参与视频和自我评估方面为学生提供有价值的服务。该项目通过提供专注于生物学特定概念的自定进度教程，在程序设计、交付模式和日程安排方面增加了教学环境。学生可以在他们认为有必要时随时查看这些资源，以更好地掌握这些概念。这使得内容适用于学生对学习方法和住宿要求的各种偏好。重要的，