Peer Review

BioSciEdNet: BEN Portal

Material Detail page

Reviewed:: Jul 13, 2003 by Teacher Education

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Ratings

Overall Rating:

Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

Ease of Use:

Overview:: The BEN Collaborative, spearheaded by the American Association for th
Advancement of Science (AAAS), is composed of professional societies that have a
focus on biology education. BEN provides federated searchable access to the
digital library collections of its Partners to provide users with peer reviewed
biology education resources. The materials are collected and maintained by
professional societies representing a broad spectrum of biological sciences:
AAAS - American Association for the Advancement of Science,
ABLE - Association for Biology Laboratory Education,
AIBS - American Institute for Biological Sciences,
APS - American Physiological Society Archive of Teaching Resources,
ASBMB - American Society for Biochemistry andMolecular Biology,
ASM - American Society for Microbiology MicrobeLibrary,
BCC - BioQUEST Curriculum Consortium,
ESA - Ecological Society of America EcoEdNet,
HAPS - Human Anatomy and Physiology Society,
NABT - National Association of Biology Teachers,
NBII - National Biological Information Infrastructure,
NHM-AE - National Health Museum-Access Excellence,
SOT - Society of Toxicology,
STKE - Science?s Signal Transduction Knowledge Environment, and
VIDA - Video and Image Data Access (VIDA) for Science Inquiry During Teacher
Preparation
Type of Material:: Collection of pedagogical resources. Some of the resources present
instructional approaches to new science content that does not yet appear in
college biology textbooks. For example, a search using the keyword "microarray"
reveals six items developed for teaching about microarrays by two different
scientific societies.
Recommended Uses:: Faculty Development: College biology instructors struggle with the balance
between teaching the history and core content of the discipline versus
innovative teaching of modern tools and discoveries. The BEN collection
provides scientifically accurate and pedagogically appropriate recommendations
for teaching content deemed to be important by professional biological science
research societies.
Technical Requirements:: Users must select a password to use BEN resources, and several partner
organizations require a second level of log-in and password selection. Depending
on the resource, plug-ins may be required. (Flash, Shockwave, Adobe Reader,
streaming video, audio, etc.)
Identify Major Learning Goals:: The intent is to foster the learning of the biological sciences by undergraduate
and graduate students with diverse interests and career aspirations.
Target Student Population:: The resources specifically target faculty who work to improve undergraduate and
graduate education in the biological sciences.
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: Navigation skills are needed.

Content Quality

Rating:
Strengths:: The BEN Collaborative is committed to acquiring and developing a wide range of
searchable resources to aid graduate and undergraduate level biology lectures,
classroom assignments, and hands-on labs. BEN introduces an important focus on
recognizing different learning styles and cultural perspectives plus access for
persons with disabilities. Resources on a variety of biological science topics
with sharing across traditional disciplines presents an important paradigm shift
for undergraduate and graduate biology education. Content and new instructional
resources should become a high priority as biology departments strive to teach
about new directions in the biological sciences. By highlighting resources such
as those from the Association for Biology Laboratory Education (ABLE), BEN helps
faculty recognize innovative models of teaching.

BEN harvests catalog information on the objects submitted by BEN partner
organizations, allowing users to rely on one search engine to access many
biology education resource collections simultaneously. The BEN cataloging
scheme is rich in useful detail. Currently, content can be recalled by browsing
from a limited list of subjects; by using an advanced search format to more
accurately limit the search; or by searching a resource type. The advanced
searching format allows the user to select the learning level of the target
audience.
Concerns:: Gaps and uneven content quality are occasional problems. Items currently in the
collection are mostly for science majors, labs, or high school investigations.
Large enrollment biology courses for non-majors are a major target audience that
should also be served. For example, a lecturer who might want to direct
students to the BEN Atlas of Macromolecules would find that the link did not
work during the time of this review. (Protein molecules grouped in categories
such as enzymes, structural proteins, lipid bilayers, proteins complexed to
nucleic acids, virus capsids, immune system and defense molecules, toxins,
carbohydrates, magnificent molecular machines, animated morphs of conformational
changes, and evolutionary conservation provide content covered in most general
education biology lecture courses.) The MERLOT Teacher Education Editorial
Board suggests that faculty recommend additional instructional materials
targeted to serve the needs of future teachers. Studies have consistently
failed to show any relationship between the number of college science courses
taken by an elementary teacher and the quality of elementary science teaching,
but BEN resources could improve how undergraduate courses teach biology in ways
that would be helpful to teachers who teach the citizens who will ultimately
make science research funding decisions. As the scale of BEN portal resources
increases, one might expect a decline in the frequency of null sets when
limiting a search by pedagogical use or target audience. BEN developers may
want to consider undergraduate students who are not science majors as a specific
target audience for the BEN catalog.

Potential Effectiveness as a Teaching Tool

Rating:
Strengths:: BEN is a searching tool that provides access to a wide variety of teaching
resources. Its potential as a tool for college faculty is substantial given the
caliber of the partner organizations. In addition to the prestige of the
partner organizations, the emphasis on selection and peer review of all
resources to appear on BEN make this a search engine that holds tremendous
promise as an effective tool for locating exemplary teaching materials. For
example, when retrieving an item made available by the ASM, a peer review shows
the quality and potential use for the item provided through a link. Users are
thus informed by experts in the field about the resources they might consider
using. An option to Post a Comment and View Comments on some resource records
should facilitate networking among faculty who share instructional materials.
Concerns:: The main concern is to populate BEN with showcase instructional materials that
can be located using BEN search functions. Currently, the selection of
resources is limited. Some category classifications should be revised (Example:
classification of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory as Animation, Audio, Image,
Photograph, and Video seems inappropriate.) Given the substantial potential to
allow cross-pollenization of ideas and methodologies across disciplines, it is
recommended that users participate and provide feedback as the BEN collection
develops.

Ease of Use for Both Students and Faculty

Rating:
Strengths:: The clear and consistent organization and navigation structure of BEN and the
fact that users can Nominate a Resource for Inclusion in the BEN Catalog show
that this collection can be expected to grow. Users are told what information
is required to submit new recommended resources:
the title
subject
version
date of creation or publication
author name, institution, and department
copyright and cost information (most users prefer no cost)
pedagogical use and recommendations
general description and keywords
Before any resource appears in the BEN catalog, the resource and the catalog
description are reviewed by AAAS staff and forwarded to the appropriate partner
from the list of associations for peer review and selection of those items most
appropriate for the BEN collection. Each search displays a recalled set of the
selected items clearly with the searching track displaye d for reference. Each
resource is briefly described and the association responsible for peer review is
listed. The display is clear and the navigation to the resource is easily
visible. Usage directions are provided by each partner site so that before
access to each resource is provided, users must agree to only authorized use of
materials. Examples of the specific acknowledgements and clear copyright
contact directions are provided by some of the partner associations.
Concerns:: When selecting Download/View Resource after a search, it is not always clear
that the link opens a new window from the professional society. One concern is
that the window that appears often has no relationship to the item selected. In
some cases, logging in through the professional society link opens another
record for the item (APS), but in other cases logging in takes one directly to
the item with no access to the detailed resource record (ESA). From the APS
Archive, it is not possible to return to BEN using the BACK button on the
browser. Consequently the BEN search list is lost when one resource is viewed.
Such navigational dead ends mean that to return to BEN, the user must use the
browser back button, but navigation within an association website may result in
a return to its main search page rather than to BEN.

The distinction between resource types (Learning resource type) such as
Illustration, Image, Photograph, and 35 mm Slide is not clear. A glossary would
help the user distinguish among these options.

The Pedagogy keywords (Assess, Learn, Plan, Research, and Teach) seem vague and
of limited use.

One suggestion to improve the site is to provide a feedback button for users to
report problems that cause frustration. Soliciting feedback would promote the
community networking goals of BEN.

Other Issues and Comments:: Many of the BEN resources are free for educational uses, however there are also
for-fee resources. It would be useful to allow a user the option of narrowing
their search to exclude for-fee resources.

The tremendous step taken by AAAS to associate organizations that represent most
major realms of biological knowledge is to be applauded. No doubt this
initiative will improve over time. Users should contact BEN and provide
feedback so that the BEN collection of materials continues to develop in
directions that meet urgent needs of biology educators.
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