Differences in Students’ Perceptions of Learning Compulsory Foundation Biochemistry in the Health Sciences Professions

Abstract

Student approaches to learning vary from surface approaches to meaningful, deep learning practices. Differences in approach may be related to students' conceptions of the subject, perceptions of the learning environment, prior study experiences and performance on assessment. This study aims to explore entering students' conceptions of the unit they are about to study and how they intend to approach their studies. It involved a survey of 203 (of 250) first year students in a cross disciplinary unit in the Faculty of Health Sciences. They were asked to complete an open-ended response survey, including questions on what they thought they needed to do to learn biochemistry and what they thought the study of biochemistry was about. A phenomenographic methodology was used to identify categories of description for the questions. The paper will describe the categories in detail, the structural relationship between the categories and the distribution of responses within categories. The study reports a relationship between conception of the topic and approaches to learning. Students with more complex and coherent conceptions of the topic report that they were more likely to adopt deeper approaches to study than those with more fragmented conceptions. However, compared to previous studies, a surprisingly high proportion of students with more cohesive conceptions still intended to adopt more surface approaches. This may reflect the particular context of their learning, namely in a compulsory unit involving material for which most students have minimal background and difficulty seeing its relevance. Implications for teaching such foundation material are discussed.

A participatory learning approach to biochemistry using student authored and evaluated multiple‐choice questions

“…The students new to biochemistry also tend to use a ''surface approach,'' rather than a ''deep approach,'' to learning [1,2]. Consequently, we were eager to develop learning strategies that would help to motivate students new to biochemistry and promote a ''deep approach'' to learning.…”

Re-thinking microbiology/infection control education to enhance the practice-readiness of health professional students: More than just a curriculum issue

“…Becoming conversant with its specific terminology has been likened to learning a foreign language (Lumpkin Allen, 1997). A student's ability to learn and later apply microbiological and indeed scientific principles in general may be influenced by the perceived difficulty and relevance of the science subjects (Minasian-Batmanian, Lingard, & Prosser, 2005). They may also be influenced by their preconceptions of science.…”

On the Scholarship of Pedagogy in the Health Sciences

“…The first example of scholarly studies of teaching and learning in the health sciences addressing the ways in which students build on their prior understanding concerns a compulsory foundation biochemistry course for first-year undergraduates across the health sciences at an Australian university (Minasian-Batmanian, Lingard & Prosser 2005). The study took as starting point "a lack of literature on students' perceptions of learning topic areas that are both compulsory and only foundation studies in a focussed, professionally oriented curriculum, which is highly constrained by a graduate skills outcome" (p. 280), and an insight from existing literature that "students' prior orientations to study and their prior understandings of the subject matter and how it is conceived are related to their perceptions of the teaching and learning context" (p. 280).…”

“…From the outset, and even after having studied the course, there were still the same sorts of conceptions of the nature of the overall subject of study, in line with the notions of fragmented and coherent conceptions (Prosser & Trigwell 1999), and the percentages for each response are little changed. Source: Minasian-Batmanian et al (2005:285), (2006:1893 Research has shown that students who have a mainly fragmented prior knowledge are more likely to fail to grasp the goals of the course and to be overwhelmed by it and are then likely to take a surface -reproducing or fulfilling perceived course demands -rather than a deep approach with its meaning making intent (Prosser & Trigwell 1999). Also evident is that the surface approach is associated with students failing to grasp critical elements of content and tending to forget content rather fast -which is not to say that they fail their examinations but that they might not have adequate prior knowledge for future courses.…”

“…There are numerous conclusions and points for discussion that arise from these articles (see Minasian-Batmanian et al 2005, 2006. The point to make in this chapter is, however, that a scholarly study of entering students has been carried out to inform the academics involved in teaching of what pre-knowledge and learning practices their students come in with and what they glean, in terms of overall comprehension of the nature of the subject they are studying.…”