MACROINVERTEBRATES.ORG
  • PROJECT
  • PEOPLE
  • PRODUCTS
  • Blog
  • Resources
    • Help
    • FAQ

Macroinvertebrates at the London Festival of Learning

6/27/2018

 
by Jessica Roberts, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Carnegie Mellon University
In June I traveled to London for the International Conference of the Learning Sciences, this year presented as part of the London Festival of Learning, to present our work on the cognitive task analysis (CTA) studies conducted with eight entomology experts in Phase 1 of this project. 

Our subjects ranged in expertise from early career scientists to experienced citizen science trainers to professional entomologists with over 20 years of experience doing macroinvertebrate ID. We asked each expert to identify three specimens to the lowest taxonomic level they felt comfortable (typically genus), using whatever resources they had.

Our analysis focused on strategy shifts: how did experts combine multiple kinds of knowing and observing in order to complete this task? While all the experts used at least one dichotomous key at some point, they rarely went step-by-step through all the couplets associated with a specimen in a single key. Instead, they used prior knowledge, informed colleagues, multiple keys, and even Internet searches to find the information they needed to move the identification forward in the most efficient and strategic way possible. They also knew how to look at the specimen -- whether at a particular angle, in a certain light, or with appropriate magnification -- to quickly see the features they needed to confirm an identification.

Newcomers to taxonomic ID don't have access to the same variety of resources, nor do they necessarily know when a different resource or way of looking at a specimen will help them find the necessary information faster. Understanding experts' strategy shifts in identification can help us know what kinds of supports we need to build into our expanded version of our website as well as inform us when and where such supports need to be accessible to novice users.

To convey this knowledge to our design team and various stakeholders, we created multiple representations of the expert task processes. The most fruitful representation is a diagram we call Shared Externalization of Expertise, or SEE, which maps moves toward an ID as steps down and strategic shifts as moves to the right. This spatial layout of the ID process helps us see where a particular tool or strategy is limited and identify the break points where a novice (without additional resources) might flounder. These SEE diagrams have helped us understand the design space and convey information challenges to our co-design partners. 

The poster presenting this work generated great discussions about how we can make sense of expert practices to design for learners who are not seeking to become full disciplinary experts but rather to develop "vernacular expertise" in order to be proficient citizen scientists. 
Picture

Roberts, J., Crowley, K., & Louw, M. (2018) Creating a Visual Representation of Expert Strategies to Inform the Design of Digital Tools for Citizen Science. In Proc. of the 13th International Conference of the Learning Sciences. London, UK.


Comments are closed.

    Project Team

    An interdisciplinary team
    ​of entomologists, learning scientists, software engineers and designers collaborating to improve macroinvertebrate identification training and technologies with volunteer biomonitoring organizations.

    Categories

    All
    Broader Impacts
    By Clemson
    By CMU
    By Educators
    By Powdermill
    By Stroud
    Design Studies
    Educator Innovations
    Entomology
    Imaging
    Learning Research
    Mobile App
    NSF REU
    User Research

    Archives

    April 2022
    August 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    May 2020
    November 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    March 2018
    December 2017
    August 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016

    RSS Feed

Project INFO

ABOUT
www.ept.macroinvertebrates.org
NSF Award  Listing

Partners

Learning Media Design Center@CMU
CREATE Lab @CMU
​
Clemson University 
Stroud Water Research Center
Carnegie Museum of Natural History

Collaborators

ALLARM
MD Streamwaders
Senior Environmental Corp
Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy

Trout Unlimited
Picture
This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant #1623969.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of NSF. ​​

  • PROJECT
  • PEOPLE
  • PRODUCTS
  • Blog
  • Resources
    • Help
    • FAQ