Newman Dina L, Spector Hannah, Neuenschwander Anna, Miller Anna J, Trumpore Lauren, Wright L Kate
Thomas H. Gosnell School of Life Sciences, Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, New York, USA.
J Microbiol Biol Educ. 2023 Jan 31;24(1). doi: 10.1128/jmbe.00198-22. eCollection 2023 Apr.
Visual literacy, which is the ability to effectively identify, interpret, evaluate, use, and create images and visual media, is an important aspect of science literacy. As molecular processes are not directly observable, researchers and educators rely on visual representations (e.g., drawings) to communicate ideas in biology. How learners interpret and organize those numerous diagrams is related to their underlying knowledge about biology and their skills in visual literacy. Furthermore, it is not always obvious how and why learners interpret diagrams in the way they do (especially if their interpretations are unexpected), as it is not possible to "see" inside the minds of learners and directly observe the inner workings of their brains. Hence, tools that allow for the investigation of visual literacy are needed. Here, we present a novel card-sorting task based on visual literacy skills to investigate how learners interpret and think about DNA-based concepts. We quantified differences in performance between groups of varying expertise and in pre- and postcourse settings using percentages of expected card pairings and edit distance to a perfect sort. Overall, we found that biology experts organized the visual representations based on deep conceptual features, while biology learners (novices) more often organized based on surface features, such as color and style. We also found that students performed better on the task after a course in which molecular biology concepts were taught, suggesting the activity is a useful and valid tool for measuring knowledge. We have provided the cards to the community for use as a classroom activity, as an assessment instrument, and/or as a useful research tool to probe student ideas about molecular biology.
视觉素养是指有效识别、解释、评估、运用和创造图像及视觉媒体的能力，它是科学素养的一个重要方面。由于分子过程无法直接观察到，研究人员和教育工作者依靠视觉表征（如绘图）来传达生物学观点。学习者如何解读和组织这些众多的图表与他们对生物学的基础知识以及视觉素养技能有关。此外，学习者以何种方式以及为何以这种方式解读图表（尤其是当他们的解读出乎意料时）并不总是显而易见的，因为不可能“看透”学习者的头脑并直接观察他们大脑的内部运作。因此，需要能够研究视觉素养的工具。在此，我们提出了一项基于视觉素养技能的新颖卡片分类任务，以研究学习者如何解读和思考基于DNA的概念。我们使用预期卡片配对的百分比以及与完美排序的编辑距离，对不同专业水平的组以及课程前后的表现差异进行了量化。总体而言，我们发现生物学专家基于深层概念特征来组织视觉表征，而生物学学习者（新手）则更常基于表面特征（如颜色和风格）来组织。我们还发现，学生在修完一门讲授分子生物学概念的课程后，在这项任务上表现得更好，这表明该活动是一种用于衡量知识的有用且有效的工具。我们已将这些卡片提供给学界，用作课堂活动、评估工具和/或用于探究学生关于分子生物学观点的有用研究工具。
