Home
People
Tutor Units
Participating Schools
Pilot the Tutor
Downloads for Participants
Home
Genetics is one of the fundamental unifying themes of biology. The Human Genome Project and advances
in genetics and biodiversity will revolutionize biology, medicine and industry. However, genetics can be an intimidating challenge for students across the full range of post-secondary institutions and the growing demand for genetics education outstrips the supply of qualified teachers.
We are developing an innovative GENETICS COGNITIVE TUTOR to support student problem solving and to make genetics accessible to all students.
The Genetics Cognitive Tutor:
- poses rich problem-solving tasks
- follows the student’s individual solution path
- provides feedback on problem-solving actions
- provides focused, multi-level advice upon request at any point during the student’s problem-solving
Cognitive Tutors are based on an understanding of both the domain knowledge and strategies that students use in problem solving. This problem solving knowledge is represented as a “cognitive model” within the tutor, an embedded program that can solve the problems in the many ways that students do. As a student works, the cognitive model is used to follow the student’s problem solving and to provide help as needed.
We are developing 16 Cognitive Tutor units for topics in Mendelian Transmission, Pedigree Analysis, Recombination and Gene Mapping, Gene Regulation and Population Genetics. Additional Gene Regulation and Population Genetics units are under development. These lessons are being used and evaluated in biology courses at several college and university pilot sites that represent a cross-section of higher education.
Cognitive Genetics Tutor problem solving activities draw on a wide range of quantitative reasoning skills involving algebraic modeling and symbol manipulation, probability and combinatorics, and proportional reasoning. Students also engage in scientific reasoning, inferring causal processes from observed effects and designing experiments to aid this reasoning process.
Sponsors
Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
