Purpose

To monitor whether students have issues understanding and applying core ideas in the biological sciences. Consists of a set of 30 questions on a range of foundational ideas including.

- Stochastic processes: Q1,5,25, 29, 30

- Energetics & molecular interactions: Q2, 3, 17, 18

- Molecular properties: Q10, 11, 13, 19, 20

- Genetic behaviors: Q7, 15, 16, 21, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28

- Evolution: Q4, 6, 12, 14, 26

- Experimental design: Q8, 9

Population

Appropriate for all stages of an undergraduate biology curriculum, focused on foundational concepts in cell, molecular, and evolutionary biology. Like all mulitple-choice based instruments, it is not appropriate as a summative assessment of learning gains, but rather useful in identifying areas that may need to be reconsidered in the course of instruction.

Example question:

What makes DNA a good place to store information?

☐ The hydrogen bonds that hold it together are very stable and difficult to break.

☐ The bases always bind to their correct partner.

☐ The sequence of bases does not greatly influence the structure of the molecule.

☐ The overall shape of the molecule reflects the information stored in it.

Validity

• Work on the BCI began in 2003 (Klymkowsky, M. W., K. Garvin-Doxas & M. Zeilik (2003). "Bioliteracy and teaching efficacy: what biologists can learn from physicists." Cell Biol Educ 2: 155-161).

The development and validation of the BCI, based on student and expert responses, and its use in revealing student thinking about core concepts in biology has been described in a number of papers including:

• Klymkowsky, M. W., R. Gheen and K. Garvin-Doxas (2006). Avoiding reflex responses: Strategies for revealing students' conceptual understanding in biology. Physics Education Research Conference, Syracuse, NY.

• Klymkowsky, M. W. and K. Garvin-Doxas (2008). "Recognizing Student Misconceptions through Ed's Tool and the Biology Concept Inventory." PLoS Biol 6: e3.

• Klymkowsky, M. W., S. M. Underwood and K. Garvin-Doxas (2010) "Biological Concepts Instrument (BCI): A diagnostic tool for revealing student thinking." arXiv http://arxiv.org/abs/1012.4501.

• Queloz, A. C., M. W. Klymkowsky, E. Stern, E. Hafen and K. Köhler (2017). "Diagnostic of students' misconceptions using the Biological Concepts Instrument (BCI): A method for conducting an educational needs assessment." PloS One 12(5): e0176906.

Research

Perhaps the most important insight from the BCI has been the recognition of students consistent misunderstanding of stochastic processes, which underlie a range of processes in evolutionary and molecular biology (Garvin-Doxas, K. and M. W. Klymkowsky (2008). "Understanding Randomness and its impact on Student Learning: Lessons from the Biology Concept Inventory (BCI)." Life Science Education 7: 227-233.)

Example LASSO Report

Please follow this link to our example report for concept inventories.

Similar Instruments

Concept Inventory of Natural Selection

More Information

For more information, please visit bioliteracy.colorado.edu.