Four themes of science literacy have been defined by The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS); these are systems, models, constancy and change, and scale. Previous research has shown that scale literacy is a better predictor for success than traditional measures in a general chemistry course. Scale has been integrated as a theme in the undergraduate general chemistry curriculum along with targeted scale instruction and has led to increases in student learning measured by final exam performance. The goal is to be able to generalize this research across STEAM disciplines with Anatomy and Physiology I as the next course being studied. Due to the cross-disciplinary nature of scale the expectation is that measuring, and the eventual integration of scale into Anatomy and Physiology I, will produce similar results to those found in introductory chemistry. The tools developed for the introductory chemistry class had to be adjusted in order to fit the needs of the undergraduate biology course. Three assessments, the Scale Literacy Skills Test (SLST), Scale Concept Inventory (SCI), and laboratory survey, have been integrated into Anatomy and Physiology I at a university in the Midwest. The preliminary results of the control semesters as well as a model for determining how student success will be measured for this course will be discussed.

Investigation of scale in an introductory anatomy and physiology course

254th National Meeting (2017)

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