eleanor peirce and mario ricci school of medical sciences irene lee and john willison

First Year Students in the Ivory Tower

Life Impact The University of Adelaide

First Year Human Biology Students in the Ivory

Tower:Perspectives on research-skill-

building experiences in content-rich courses

Eleanor Peirce and Mario RicciSchool of Medical Sciences

Irene Lee and John WillisonCentre for Learning and Professional Development


Life Impact The University of Adelaide Slide 2

Context• Research experiences in uni courses topical

– Authentic research experiences– Work integrated learning, and of course …– Teaching-research nexus

• Benefits of such approaches well established in literature …but

• Difficult to incorporate for all students in large (first year) courses, and

• Academics frequently perceived as having blue-sky research agendas unconnected with real world that can:– Clash with, and impede quality of, teaching

• What happens when research skills are identified, fostered and assessed in a large first year science class?



Background • Human Biology IA/B

– Core level I course in BHlthSc Program– 80 students (2005) 220 students (2009)

• Challenges for Students:– Differences between university and

secondary education– Time management

• Challenges for Staff– Diverse student population– 200+ students– How to assess skills and attitudes, not just

course content



Background • Our Approach

– Find out what students can and can’t do (O-Week diagnostic)

– Gradually introduce students to research skills via Research Skill Development (RSD) tasks

• RSD Tasks– Literature, laboratory, and field-based– Build on skills introduced in earlier activities– Increasing autonomy over task directions

and outcomes as year progresses– Assessed via a RSD framework rubric



http://www.adelaide.edu.au/clpd/rsd/framework




RSD Tasks in Human Biology

I II IIIA

F

I II IIIA

F

I IIA

F

I II III IVA

F

I IIA

F

I IIA

F

Lit RSD 1O-Week RSD Lit RSD 3

Lab RSD 2Lab RSD 1 Individual Group Inquiry

Small Group InquiryLiterature Research Skill Stream

Laboratory Research Skill Stream

Field and Literature Research

Sem 1 Sem 2

I II III IVA

F



Analysis of RSD Approach• Quantitative

– Reported at HERDSA Conference, Darwin July 2009 (Willison Peirce & Ricci 2009)

• Qualitative– For staff:

• Objectives and assessment tasks clearer, more specific and focussed

• Better matching of teaching with course objectives and University graduate attributes

• Better quality and more timely feedback– For students?

• Interviews conducted to explore students’ understanding of benefits and downsides of explicitly developing research skills in Human Biology I



Student Interviews• Conducted 1 year after completion of Human Biology I so

that students had an opportunity to:– Apply skills developed– Retrospectively reflect on experience

• A 2006 student treated RSD tasks ‘... as a joke ‘cause it was sort of so straight forward’ but one year later reflected that ‘… it’s actually quite good ‘cause it got us thinking about what’s right and what’s wrong’ and part of a bigger-picture process to ‘develop these particular skills to enable you to be able to undertake the bigger research project at the end’.

• Greater appreciation of RSD approach• 2005, 2006 and 2007 cohorts interviewed• Compensated for time• Conducted by CLPD staff

– Semi-structured interview protocol• Independent analysis of results



Student Interviews• 2005 cohort (79 students)

– Interview invitations to 4 different groups of students:• Started well minimal improvement (G 1)• Started poor/medium most improvement (G 2)• Started weakest (based on O-Week diagnostic) average (G 3)• Started average low/no improvement or went backwards (G 4)

– 32 invitations sent; 9 accepted• Group 1: 0 students• Group 2: 6 students• Group 3: 2 students• Group 4: 1 student

• 2006 cohort (97 students)– More random sampling– 10 students accepted, but …– Similar student profile (mostly G 2)



Student Interviews• 2007 cohort (95 students)

– Only students whose improvement was less than average were selected

– 18 invitations sent; 13 accepted• In summary

– 32 student interviews in total over 3 consecutive years

– Broad selection of measured student research skill development

– All 2005 and 2006 students were still studying at university; two 2007 students had left university and were working



What did students say?• 2 key ideas emerged:

– In hindsight, students perceived the process as valuable in developing their research skills, but …

– Students did not appreciate that this development was happening at the time• Should have been explicitly

explained in advance



What did students say?2006 student comment:

’when I was doing the assignments I didn't really take into account that all these levels were increasing. I didn't honestly when I was actually doing them, but looking at them now and then thinking about what we were actually asked to do, it becomes a lot more obvious to me... but these levels didn't really occur to me at the time. But, yes, definitely I can see now though what they were getting at and trying to improve on... I think maybe it was a good idea doing it progressively and going into it, especially in first year that was a pretty good way to do it, like easing people into it.’

• Outcome: for 2007 cohort, process of research skill development was made more explicit for students



What did students say? 2007 Group

• RSD useful for current university studies– ‘It definitely allows you to get out there and

compare all different experiments and investigations and analyse materials and make up your own mind based upon them. I think it is a very important part for university, even if your course … isn’t real research-based.’

• Comments consistent with other studies that have found longer term academic benefits for student engagement in research process



What did students say?

• RSD also useful outside of university– Further studies– Employment– Keeping skills up-to-date (life-long

learning)– Critical thinking

“...whether it’s academic things like doing assignments and papers and writing whatever on academic stuff, or whether it’s just even simple things like that are in your job... there’s still stuff you have to research.”



What did students say? • RSD universally useful

“I think uni research in every aspect when you’re in uni, because you need to learn and with learning you need to research, so I guess it’s pretty broad, research, and it applies to every course you do. Everything you do, actually. Even if you need to learn how to assemble the TV, you need to research that as well.”



Conclusions• Research skill development (RSD) at university

perceived as useful for subsequent study as well as employment in non-academic environments

• Students not necessarily aware of RSD process at the time. – It wasn’t that I didn’t understand the

assignment, it was that I sort of missed the point at the time which seems silly now; it makes sense now.

– Process & context is now more explicit, even clearer

• 2009 cohort shown student quotes from interviews



Ivory tower?Maybe for those who thought RSD only useful for university but …

NOT for most students



Correlations between RSD and pre-RSD tasks 2003-2007 (Willison, Peirce & Ricci 2009)

2003(pre-RSD)

2004(pre-RSD)

2005(mid RSD)

2006 2007

Lit RSD 3 vs Open Inquiry

0.20

n= 104

Power 0.77

p < 0.1

0.40

n=117

Power 0.99 p< 0.01

0.48

n=79

Power>0.98

p<0.01

0.55

n=97 power>0.99

p<0.01

0.57

n=95 power>0.99

p<0.01

Lit RSD-Diagnostic vs Lit RSD-Summary

Lit RSD-Summary vs

Lit RSD-Referencing

Lit RSD-Summary vs

RSD-Population

Analysis

Lit RSD-Referencing

vs RSD-Population

Analysis

Lit RSD-Referencing

vs Exam Sem 2

RSD-Population Analysis vs Exam Sem 2

0.01

(n=138)

0.30

(n=121)

Power = 0.95 p=0.05

0.38

(n=95)

Power = 0.96 p=0.05

0.57

(n=95)

Power >0.995 p<0.01

0.36

(n=94)

0.39

(n=94)

Correlations between lit-RSD tasks, field task and end of year exam 2007



Research Skill Increase Over Year vs Research Skill at 'O W eek' (n=75)

-4

-2

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

STUDENT SCORE (O Week)

Incr

ease

= Fi

nal R

esea

rch

Ski

ll S

core

- O

Wee

k S

core

Movement fromAssessment 1 toAssessment 3

Great Improvers

Slow Starters Fast Starters

Minimal Improvers


Life Impact The University of Adelaide

References for RSDWillison, J., & O’Regan, K (2006) Research Skill Development Framework. [Online] available at http://www.adelaide.edu.au/clpd/rsd/frameworkWillison, J. & O’Regan, K. (2007) Commonly known, commonly not known, totally unknown: a framework for students becoming researchers. Higher Education Research and Development, 26(4), 393-409.Willison, J. Peirce, E, & Ricci, M. (2009) Towards student autonomy in literature and field research. Proceedings from the Higher Education Research and Development Conference, 7-9 July, 2009, Darwin.

Slide 20


eleanor peirce and mario ricci school of medical sciences irene lee and john willison

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