Design and assessment of an assignment-based curriculum to teach scientific writing and scientific peer review

Abstract

A writing-intensive, upper-level undergraduate course which integrates content, context, collaboration, and communication in a unique fashion, is described. The topic of the seminar is "Scientific Writing in Chemistry" and an assignment-based curriculum was developed to instruct students on best practices in all aspects of science communication and to educate students about the scientific publication process and peer review. To effectively teach students how to understand science, both the content and the process must be included. Peer review is an integral and essential part of the process of science and the peer review tasks in the course described in this paper evolve from rubric-based peer assessments to free-format peer review. The curriculum was developed for a semester-long, three-hour seminar with limited enrolment. The curriculum was taught in the Spring semesters of 2010-2014 and enrolment data and results of evaluations collected over four years are presented to demonstrate the success of the implementations.

Doing peer review and receiving feedback: impact on scientific literacy and writing skills

“…Including peer review as part of a blended pedagogical approach to learning is consistent with a number of previous studies (2,18,21,30,39,40,45,49,53). Incorporating different forms of peer review (single blind and open as well as individual and group) along with writing assignments is a practice consistent with the admonitions of Hanauer and Bauerle (22) to include a range of assessment tools and both formative and summative assessments in undergraduate science courses and the charge to academics from Fellenz (14) to design meaningful assessment activities that support higher level learning.…”

“…An experiential, writing-based approach to learning (i.e., doing peer review in addition to hearing and/or reading about it) is consistent with two of four recommendations of Jones (25) to science academics to ensure that "undergraduate science curricula are founded upon teaching approaches that foster active learning." Students' identification of peer review as the most helpful learning activity in increasing their knowledge and understanding of science and as one of the most helpful learning activities in improving their scientific writing skills is consistent with the merit accorded peer review by others who have done research on using peer review as a teaching-learning tool in the undergraduate sciences (12,18,21,30,40). 4.…”

“…1. The general flow of information followed a fairly regular sequence or "rhythm" (18), with the introduction of a topic via a short PowerPoint presentation with examples from the primary literature, a small-group activity modeled after the process-oriented guided inquiry learning (POGIL) approach (50), one or more writing assignments (in small groups, drafts, and nongraded and graded), and a peer review. Students were presented with selected research articles in their entirety; however, each writing assignment and peer review focused on only one component or section of a scientific paper to build students' knowledge, skills, and confidence incrementally throughout the semester.…”

The Benefits of Peer Review and a Multisemester Capstone Writing Series on Inquiry and Analysis Skills in an Undergraduate Thesis

“…To achieve these benefits, however, students must be taught the characteristics of effective science writing and how to read effectively for offering useful feedback (Morgan et al , 2011). Lu and Law (2012) and Bird and Yucel (2013) stress the importance of instructing students to see how effective peer review goes beyond the ability to recognize substandard work and instead helps writers advance higher-order aspects of their writing such as logic, coherence, and evidence selection (Glaser, 2014). By thinking beyond “error” as peer reviewers, students are able to gain insight on their own science reasoning and analysis (Morgan et al ., 2011; Glaser, 2014).…”

“…To this end, practitioners and scholars highlight the need for science writing rubrics in classes that integrate writing (Reynolds and Thompson, 2011; Bird and Yucel, 2013; Mynlieff et al , 2014; Dowd et al , 2015b). Science writing rubrics articulate for instructors and students the aspects of a writing project most salient to science reasoning—clear research focus, well-reasoned data analysis, logically drawn implications for future research, and so on—while deprioritizing surface-level errors (Morgan et al , 2011; Glaser, 2014). Rubrics also help instructors work effectively and efficiently with student writers (Hafner and Hafner, 2003; Reynolds and Thompson, 2011; Bird and Yucel, 2013; Dowd et al , 2015b).…”