Adolescent females' assessment of and learning gains from researcher developed mouse genetics multimedia simulation (MouseGen) : A mixed methods analysis

This thesis grew out of a personal interest in genetics and an admiration for the ground breaking research by Gregor Mendel in establishing the foundations of the Science of Genetics. As a high school science teacher I have been interested in how to best support adolescent students’ to learn the experimental methodologies and the hypothesis of monohybrid genetics, and how to improve their acquisition of the concepts and skills required for an understanding of fundamental Mendelian inheritance. Thirty years ago I collected a number of mouse mutants from pet shops and research institutions and set about ensuring that they were pure breeding for particular traits that students find appealing. Since this time I have used live mice in the teaching of high school genetics and have recorded students’ questions, answers and reflections. I have come to understand that for many students the study of high school genetics is not intuitive but conceptually and linguistically difficult. However, I have found that providing an experience of genetics using real mouse crosses to be an effective way to proceed in teaching this problematic science topic. This approach to teaching genetics has its constraints and for my thesis I used Microsoft PowerPoint to create a technology-based multimedia learning environment called “MouseGen”, which simulates cross breeding experiments with live mice. MouseGen contains video clips, photographs, animations, audio and annotated photographic diagrams (Multiple External Representations) and allows numerous students to access a learning experience that had previously been only provided for a single class at a time. I created coloured half disks (MER’s) to represent the different alleles of a gene to assist students learn the abstract concepts of genetics. I have taken seven years to develop and trial this multimedia program and have sought feedback from students and teachers throughout the process. The underlying pedagogical philosophy that I adopted when designing the MouseGen program was a constructivist framework of learning and multimedia development that places the learner at the centre of the process. I selected a pedagogical form of constructivism that encourages students to be set tasks that are appropriate to their cognitive and linguistic capacities, that requires them to be active participants in their own learning, to work together, and to reflect upon and talk about their learning (Morris & Adamson, 2010). The overarching research question for this thesis was whether a Microsoft PowerPoint resource, utilizing multiple external representations to product limits and designed according to constructivist principles, will significantly improve student conceptual development within an area of science that has been historically challenging for them. I developed a number of test instruments to assess students’ acquisition of genetic concepts and skills and to determine their perceptions of the usefulness of MouseGen in learning fundamental genetics. This research adopted a mixed methods approach with both qualitative and quantitative data collection. I am pleased to note that these assessments show that participants rated the MouseGen software very highly and their performance in the post test was significantly improved from the pre-test.