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NEXUS Overview Papers

Page history last edited by Joe Redish 5 years, 2 months ago

BERG > Project NEXUS UMCP  > Papers and Presentations

 

NEXUS/Physics is an Introductory Physics for Life Scientists (IPLS) class that is designed to 

  • Focus on the development of general scientific competencies;
  • Fit effectively into a standard curriculum for biologists and pre-health care students;
  • Be perceived by life-science students as biologically authentic – i.e., as helping them understand important results they are learning in their biology and chemistry classes.

 

NEXUS/Physics is being developed through extensive negotiations among stakeholders followed by cycles of education research and development: careful observations of student learning, attitudes, and behavior, followed by curriculum development, assessment, and new observations. 

 

The course is positioned as a mid-level class in the biology curriculum. It is designed to build on introductory biology and chemistry classes and to prepare students for upper-division classes in those subjects. As a result:

  • Introductory biology, chemistry, and calculus are pre-requisites for the class.
  • The class treats multiple scales including organismal, cellular, and molecular.
  • There is a more extended treatment of fluids and phenomena within fluids than is traditional.
  • The topics of random motion, diffusion, entropy, chemical energy, and Gibbs free energy are treated to help students develop a strong conceptual and mechanistic understand of these critical concepts.

 

The NEXUS/Physics team and their collaborators have published many papers discussing the research, motivation, and approach to these issues. The set below provides a useful overview.

 

The full collection of NEXUS/Physics papers and presentations (slides) are available at

 

Phase 0: Background and Motivational Papers

 

A. An overview of the project that created the competency development tools on which NEXUS/Physics is built:

 

B. A paper making the case for the importance of understanding random motion for biology students:

 

C. This paper explores the concept of biological authenticity in physics as perceived by biology students.

 

D. A paper making the case for the importance of a multi-disciplinary approach (including physics) for discussing chemical bonding.

 

E. A look at the use of physics in a biology class on organismal diversity.

 

Phase 1: Lessons Learned

 

1. An brief overview of the issues involved in created a physics course for biology majors -- written for an audience of physicists.

 

2. An in-depth exploration of the different approaches taken to instruction by biologists and physicists -- written for an audience of biologists.

 

3.  A paper on the way biology students perceive the relationship between the scientific disciplines.

 

4. Case studies of bio students coming to understand how physics might play a role in her thinking of biology.

 

 

Phase 2: Thinking about Designing a Course

 

5. An overview of the full NEXUS project, including the materials developed for chemistry, math-in-bio, and capstone multi-disciplinary case-based lessons.

 

6. These papers explore student views of the relationships between the disciplines and the implications for designing activities that tie them together effectively.

 

7. This is the overview paper that summarizes the motivation for NEXUS/Physics, the decisions made in designing it, and the changes made from traditional approaches.

 

8. This paper summarizes the NEXUS/Physics laboratories. These labs are Scientific Community Labs, emphasizing helping students learn experimental design, sense-making with labs, and working effectively in groups. The labs are data rich, use modern technology, and have students develop their own protocols.

 

Phase 3: Understanding Particular Curricular Issues

 

9. Overview of Common Thermodynamics papers.

 

10. Papers discussing the treatment of chemical energy in NEXUS/Physics

 

11. Papers discussing the treatment of entropy and free energy in NEXUS/Physics.

 

12. Papers discussing the use of math and equations in biology and NEXUS/Physics classes.

 

 

 

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