Research Day
BRAIN EXPLORERS: A NEUROSCIENCE-BASED OUTREACH FOR MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENTS
Document Type
Abstract
Date
2021
Abstract
Introduction: Educational outreach events often fail to evaluate their own effectiveness. Brain Explorers is a neuroscience outreach program developed to increase student interest in STEM and for medical students to practice science communication skills. The purpose of this study was to assess the educational effectiveness Brain Explorers has on middle school students' knowledge of neuroscience concepts.
Methods: Learning objectives were derived from the Next Generation Science Standards. Neuroscience topics were presented to the students through an introductory presentation followed by three hands-on application activities. To assess the level of learning, students were asked two free-response questions, both before and two weeks after the session. One question was covered in the content presented in the lesson and actively reinforced, while the control question was not a focus of the lesson. Investigators were given guidelines and rated deidentified responses on a scale of 0-5. Investigators were blind to whether the response was given before or after the session. Ratings were averaged and statistically analyzed using Students' t-test to assess learning outcomes.
Results: Of the 71 students that took the pre-event quiz, 58 students completed the post-event quiz. Student scores for the question related to content discussed during the event significantly improved (p < 0.001), whereas scores for the control question did not.
Conclusion: The work presented here lays out a clear and assessable middle school neuroscience lesson plan. The results of this study demonstrate that participating students achieved learning advances from the session and demonstrate the educational effectiveness of this outreach program.