Grant program: Teaching and Learning Development Grant (TLDG)

Grant recipient: Nienke van Houten, Faculty of Health Sciences

Project team: Rebecca Lennox, research assistant, Nikia Aistov, workstudy student and Nicole Dawydiuk, volunteer

Timeframe: April 2018 to September 2019

Funding: $6000

Course addressed: HSCI 212 – Perspectives on Infectious and Immunological Diseases

Final report: View Nienke van Houten's final report (PDF)

Description: The aim of this project is to map student processes when they read primary literature, and identify reading practices that can be enhanced by an instructional intervention.

Questions addressed:

• What is the connection between a student’s reading process and evidence that a student selects to support the main point of the paper?
• How do student reading processes compare to published frameworks on reading and learning from informational text?
• What instructional interventions can help students overcome challenges that students face when reading?

Knowledge sharing:

• Local seminars
• Seminar at University of Groninen in June 2018
• Oral presentation to European Researchers in Didactics of Biology conference, July 2018 (ERIDOB2018 – July 2 - 6)
• Paper published as part of ERIDOB2018 conference proceedings
• Publish instructional intervention as a case study for submission to National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science (NCCSTS)

Hepburn, K., Leaman, E., Ogolo, G., Tamunoibim, S. and van Houten, N. (2018, July). Comparison of student primary literature reading approaches to a deep and surface learning model. Presentation at the 12th Conference of European Researchers in Didactics of Biology (ERIDOB), July 2-6, 2018, Universidad de Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain.

Keywords: Reading attitudes, primary scientific literature, critical thinking, reading approach