Enhancing Science Learning and Collaboration through Social Metacognition is a research project investigating how students use social metacognition in different STEM learning contexts and how social metacognition is perceived by students. The goal of this research is to 1) characterize social metacognition’s relationship with successful collaboration in different science contexts and 2) determine students’ perceptions of naturally-occurring social metacognition. To meet this goal, the research team is collecting two forms of data from students in introductory biology labs and case-based biochemistry courses. First, students will be recorded in class while working collaboratively with their peers. Second, the research team will interview students individually by showing them video clips from their recorded group work sessions (known as a stimulated recall interview). This study is funded by a National Science Foundation BCSER Award grant to Dr. Stephanie M. Halmo. Stephanie is the PI on this project and is currently seeking interested undergraduate researchers to collaborate with on this research. If you are an LSAMP student at UGA interested in this project, please contact Dr. Halmo at [email protected]. Check out a foundational paper on social metacognition from the Stanton Lab here.

The College Learning Study is a longitudinal research study investigating the development of metacognitive regulation skills and beliefs about learning in life science undergraduates. The goal of this research is to learn how undergraduate life science students use metacognition to learn and how their metacognitive skills develop during college. To meet this goal, the research team is following a cohort of students from three differing institution types from their first year of college through the duration of their college career. Each year of the study, we interview students individually by asking them questions about how they approach learning in their science courses and we also ask them to solve two biology problems out loud (known as a think aloud interview). This study is funded by a National Science Foundation CAREER Award grant to Dr. Julie Stanton. Stephanie is currently leading and managing this project as a part of her postdoctoral research associate position. Check out a recent preprint from year 1 of this project here.

BioSTEPS was a longitudinal research study investigating the development of problem solving skills in life science undergraduates. The goal of this research was to learn how undergraduate life science students solve problems in biochemistry and how their problem solving skills develop during college. To meet this goal, the research team followed a large cohort of students through the duration of their college career and asked them to solve a suite of biochemistry problems centered on the foundational concepts of protein structure and function and metabolism as they progressed through their science curriculum in college. This study was funded by a National Science Foundation CAREER Award grant to Dr. Paula Lemons. Stephanie was a graduate student in Dr. Lemons’ research group for her split-dissertation PhD and as a part of this project, she explored student difficulties with structure-function problems in biochemistry and different instructional approaches for teaching non-covalent interactions.