INTERVIEW QUESTIONS
Concept that I will be teaching:
Polymerase Chain
Reaction Methodology (PCR)
Interview Setting:
·
The interview setting will be comfortable, quiet
and without distractions.
·
I will ask the interviewee if I may record our
interview.
·
I will explain the purpose of the interview.
·
I will explain that he can decide not to answer
any of the questions and we can stop the interview at any time.
·
I will explain that if he is unsure whether
his/her answer will be correct, to attempt to do his/her best.
·
His/her name will not be used in my class.
1.
Was there a course in high school or college
where you covered polymerase chain reaction (PCR)?
2.
Which course was this?
3.
What did you think about this method?
4.
What does the term polymerase chain reaction
mean to you?
5.
What is a chain reaction?
6.
What is deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA)?
7.
What are the repeating units that make up DNA?
8.
Where can we find DNA?
9.
What part of learning this method was difficult
for you and why?
10.
Polymerase is an enzyme. How can this enzyme
survive the high temperatures required for the PCR reaction to occur?
11.
What does the term target sequence mean?
12.
Why would we want to amplify DNA sequences?
13.
What are the “ingredients” required for PCR to
occur?
14.
What is a thermocycler?
15.
What are the small single stranded pieces of DNA
that are needed to get DNA synthesis started?
16.
At the end of the first PCR cycle, you end up
with very long flanking pieces of DNA. By the end of 30 cycles, you end up with
only short double stranded pieces. Why is this?
17.
What is an amplification plot? Can you draw one?
18.
What does the term “crossing threshold” mean?
19.
How will you assess for the products of PCR?
20.
Who invented PCR?
I appreciate the attention you paid at the beginning to some of the ethical issues with interviewing a person. It's difficult to ask questions that are pointed enough to focus the interviewee on the desired topic, but open-ended enough to capture any of their alternative conceptions. I would expect students might have difficulty with PCR because they have difficulty with ideas related to DNA. I would omit questions like #13, 14, and 20, which probe factual recall not understanding. #6, 7, and 8 could be answered with memorized responses as well, and limit your ability to really "see" their understanding. Similarly, #12 isn't probing the concept, but rather the implications or purpose of using the technique. Remember the goal of the interview is to characterize a student's conceptual understanding of a topic. I very much like #16 because it is a contextualized example which requires the interviewee to explain why. Overall, I would say shorten your interview protocol and strive for more open-ended questions that require the interviewee to make connections between ideas.
ReplyDeleteI think your interview questions are very comprehensive. I thought you have a good combination of questions with different depth. Some open-ended questions are really testing an interviewee's ability to apply his/her knowledge in a different context. I have a slightly different comment from Wackademia, I think that some factual questions are necessary to examine an interviewee's knowledge on the surface. Also, I think that probing the implications of a concept is important as well because that's like a deeper understanding of a concept (application). I do agree with Wackademia that the structure of the interview may benefit from more flexibility that allows more expressions of ideas from the interviewee.
ReplyDelete