No full-text available
To read the full-text of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the authors.
Development of concept-based physiology lessons for biomedical engineering undergraduate students
Abstract
Physiology is a core requirement in the undergraduate biomedical engineering curriculum. In one or two introductory physiology courses, engineering students must learn physiology sufficiently to support learning in their subsequent engineering courses and careers. As preparation for future learning, physiology instruction centered on concepts may help engineering students to further develop their physiology and biomedical engineering knowledge. Following the Backward Design instructional model, a series of seven concept-based lessons was developed for undergraduate engineering students. These online lessons were created as prerequisite physiology training to prepare students to engage in a collaborative engineering challenge activity. This work is presented as an example of how to convert standard, organ system-based physiology content into concept-based content lessons.
... The physiology subject is part of the teaching programs of undergraduate and graduate studies in different fields of biological sciences and other professional disciplines [1,11,19,20]. Physiology deals with issues of normal function of organisms. Besides, physiology requires students to integrate knowledge from physics, chemistry, biophysics, biochemistry, cellular and molecular biology to understand how molecular and cellular interaction can affect the organic systems and the whole organism [21]. ...
... Similarly, but to a lesser extent, there was an improvement in the answers to the questions that assessed lower order cognitive skills. In the last years, it has been shown that peer instruction increases the learning level of the contents of cardiovascular, respiratory, and renal physiology [11,16,17,19,[26][27][28], of exercise physiology [29], of acid-base physiology [19,30,31], of nervous system and hemato encephalic barrier physiology [11,20], excitability [32] and of a laboratory course of physiology [16,33,34]. ...
... ABET program outcomes for biomedical engineering programs require a knowledge of physiology [4], which can be gained through courses taught by either biology/physiology or biomedical engineering departments. A survey of ABET-accredited biomedical engineering programs showed that a majority of programs teach physiology within the department rather than outsourcing the course to their life science colleagues [5]. ...
The Covid-19 pandemic necessitated mainstream adoption of online and remote learning approaches which were highly advantageous yet challenging in many ways. The online modality, while teaching biomedical engineering-related topics in the areas of biomechanics, mechanobiology, and biomedical sciences, further added to the complexity faced by the faculty and students. Both the benefits and the challenges have not been explored systematically by juxtaposing experiences and reflections of both the faculty and students. Motivated by this need, we designed and conducted a systematic survey named BIORES-21, targeted towards the broader bioengineering community. Survey responses and our inferences from survey findings cumulatively offer insight into the role of employed teaching/learning technology and challenges associated with student engagement. While some alternatives to overcoming these challenges were also presented, the continuation of online learning techniques as in-person education resumes in many places was evident. Overall, the data presented summarizes the key benefits of online learning that emerged from the experiences during the pandemic.
Biofluids comprises a core topical domain for modern biomedical engineering education. Like other biomedical topic areas, biofluids education must address highly inter-disciplinary and applied topics. Concept/problem based active learning approaches can provide effective avenues to teach such diverse and applied topics. However, with the heterogeneity within biofluids topics across cellular, physiological, and/or extra-organismal scales, it is important to develop active learning content that enables students to explore concepts with appropriate context. This challenge is further complicated by the need to administer such content remotely (due to the Covid-19 pandemic). Here, we outline our design process and implementation experience for simulation-based active learning modules for a newly developed physiological biofluids course. We share the overall design approach, with two example cases of simulation based concept exploration: (a) arterial Windkessel effects and lumped parameter hemodynamic analysis; and (b) curvature induced helical flow in human aorta illustrated using 4D flow MRI. Evidence from student survey ratings, student comments and feedback, and monitoring student performance for course deliverables indicate positive student response towards these modules, and efficacy of the modules in enabling student learning. Based on our design and implementation experience, we argue that simulation-based approaches can enable active learning of biofluids through remote and online learning modalities.
The field of immunology is rapidly evolving and has significant relevance to understanding human health, particularly in light of the threat from infectious diseases and the ability to harness the immune system to treat cancer, autoimmune diseases, and allergies. Providing opportunities to explore the field of immunology is relevant to undergraduate students interested in pursuing careers in health professions and biomedical research. There are calls for greater emphasis on interdisciplinary science education at the undergraduate level and the acquisition of transferrable competencies that will prepare undergraduates for success in a range of careers. The study of immunology provides an ideal platform to expose students to interdisciplinary science, both at the foundational and applied level. We describe the organization of an immunology curriculum, development of program learning objectives, selection and mapping of content objectives across courses, and programmatic assessment with the intent to meet calls for reform in undergraduate biology education.
The purpose of this study was to describe the experience of faculty in associate degree nursing programs who transitioned from traditional pedagogy to teaching in a concept-based curriculum. The transition experience of nurse educators is not well documented in the literature. Nineteen faculty from across the United States were interviewed. Five themes emerged during data analysis: recognizing fears, facing conflict, working out of one's comfort zone, seeing successes, and self-talk and questioning self. The results of this study can benefit programs that are contemplating or have already adopted a concept-based curriculum.
The Educate Utilizing CubeSat Experience (EdUCE) program was developed to cultivate practical hands-on K-20 Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) experiences via space systems engineering. Recently, the inclusion of the Arts (resulting in STEAM) has become a complementary effort to engage students in STEM activities and to motivate innovation in Systems Engineering curriculum and broaden the participation of K-20 students and educators worldwide. This paper discusses how the EdUCE program utilizes systematic approaches to implement its hands-on experiences to K-20 participants. These learning experiences were derived from a CubeSat project at the University of Florida. Original efforts to educate CubeSat concepts were through outreach activities such as designing and building a representative CubeSat class satellite with specific mission applications at engineering fairs and communication activities through the use of amateur radio equipment similar to tracking and commanding of satellites. In addition, this paper presents how the systems engineering processes are applied in the educational domain. Furthermore, the EdUCE experiences and derived content are delivered through a state-of-the-art digital platform.
Physiology faculty members at a wide range of institutions (2-yr colleges to medical schools) were surveyed to determine what core principles of physiology they want their students to understand. From the results of the first survey, 15 core principles were described. In a second survey, respondents were asked to rank order these 15 core principles and, independently, to identify the three most important for their students to understand. The five most important core principles were "cell membrane," "homeostasis," "cell-to-cell communications," "interdependence," and "flow down gradients." We then "unpacked" the flow down gradients core principle into the component ideas of which it is comprised. This unpacking was sent to respondents who were asked to identify the importance of each of the component ideas. Respondents strongly agreed with the importance of the component ideas we had identified. We will be using the responses to our surveys as we begin the development of a conceptual assessment of physiology instrument (i.e., a concept inventory).
Teachers often overrate the importance of their content and underrate their influence. However, students forget much of the content that they memorize. Thus, attempts to teach students all that they will need to know is futile. Rather, it is important that students develop an interest and love for lifelong learning. Inspiring and motivating students is critical because unless students are inspired and motivated our efforts are pointless. Once students are inspired and motivated, there are countless resources available to learn more about a subject. Thus, teachers must abandon the mistaken notion that unless they "cover the content" students will be unprepared for the future and they will have failed as teachers. Teachers must not worry about "losing" or "wasting" valuable lecture time for in-class discussion, collaborative problem-solving, and inquiry-based activities that take time away from covering content. Rather than worrying about covering content, teachers must design activities to focus student learning on how to use scientific knowledge to solve important questions. This is important because learning is not committing a set of facts to memory but the ability to use resources to find, evaluate, and use information. In fact, memorizing anything discourages deep thinking. Deep thinking is essential because understanding is the residue of thinking! To encourage thinking we must create a joy, an excitement, and a love for learning. We must make learning fun; because if we are successful, our students will be impatient to run home, study, and contemplate-to really learn.
Feder, Martin E. Aims of undergraduate physiology education: a view from the University of Chicago. Adv Physiol Educ 29: 3 - 10, 2005; doi: 10.1152/ advan. 00028.2004. - Physiology may play an important, if not essential role, in a liberal arts education because it provides a context for integrating information and concepts from diverse biological and extra-biological disciplines. Instructors of physiology may aid in fulfilling this role by clarifying the core concepts that physiological details exemplify. As an example, presented here are the core principles that are the basis for an undergraduate physiology course taught at the University of Chicago. The first of these is: Evolution has resulted in organisms comprising mechanisms for maintenance, growth, and reproduction, despite perturbations of the internal and external environment. Such principles necessitate a coupling of physiology to diverse disciplines (i.e., "sciomics") and provide a basis for integrating discoveries in other disciplines.
A synthesis of the literature on knowledge dissemination and use in education, notably in science and mathematics, is presented. Perspectives have changed in the ways in which knowledge and products are seen to reach potential users. From the top-down, linear models, we have come closer to bottom-up approaches and to the crucial role of linking agents. At present, the most influential approach is a constructivist one, whereby research and other kinds of specialized knowledge is exchanged between researchers and professionals in a mutually constructed social context. While there is still debate over the best predictors of successful knowledge use, the scope of the field has been considerably enlarged by including users' perspectives. To some extent then, specialists in this field are now working in a new paradigm.
Physiology is recognized as a core topic for biomedical engineering but the physiology courses taught to bioengineering students vary widely in scope and depth from institution to institution. As part of the NSF-sponsored VaNTH Engineering Research Center in Bioengineering Educational Technologies curriculum project, a group of bioengineering, physiology, and learning science faculty have been developing a physiology taxonomy that could guide curriculum development. The initial efforts focused on a systems-based taxonomy but we have now changed to a concepts-based taxonomy that will be cross-referenced with topics taught in system physiology courses. The final product will include resources for developing a learner-centered bioengineering physiology curriculum.
The explosion of knowledge in all of the biological sciences, and specifically in physiology, has created a growing problem for educators. There is more to know than students can possibly learn. Thus, difficult choices have to be made about what we expect students to master. One approach to making the needed decisions is to consider those "core principles" that provide the thinking tools for understanding all biological phenomena. We identified a list of "core principles" that appear to apply to all aspects of physiology and unpacked them into their constituent component ideas. While such a list does not define the content for a physiology course, it does provide a guideline for selecting the topics on which to focus student attention. This list of "core principles" also offers a starting point for developing an assessment instrument to be used in determining if students have mastered the important unifying ideas of physiology.
Students generally approach topics in physiology as a series of unrelated phenomena that share few underlying principles. In many students' view, the Fick equation for cardiac output is fundamentally different from a renal clearance equation. If, however, students recognize that these apparently different situations can be viewed as examples of the same general conceptual model (e.g., conservation of mass), they may gain a more unified understanding of physiological systems. An understanding of as few as seven general models can provide students with an initial conceptual framework for analyzing most physiological systems. The general models deal with control systems, conservation of mass, mass and heat flow, elastic properties of tissues, transport across membranes, cell-to-cell communication, and molecular interaction.
Physiology may play an important, if not essential role, in a liberal arts education because it provides a context for integrating information and concepts from diverse biological and extra-biological disciplines. Instructors of physiology may aid in fulfilling this role by clarifying the core concepts that physiological details exemplify. As an example, presented here are the core principles that are the basis for an undergraduate physiology course taught at the University of Chicago. The first of these is: Evolution has resulted in organisms comprising mechanisms for maintenance, growth, and reproduction, despite perturbations of the internal and external environment. Such principles necessitate a coupling of physiology to diverse disciplines (i.e., "sciomics") and provide a basis for integrating discoveries in other disciplines.