Research and Teaching: Teaching Students How to Check Their Work While Solving Problems in Genetics

An essential component skill of monitoring and reflection during problem solving is work checking, a process used by experts while solving problems to determine if their solution is achieving the goal. The results of work checking may reveal errors or inconsistencies, indicating a need for iteration. Using think-aloud interviews, the authors identified that most students in our undergraduate genetics course did not engage in checking while solving problems. In response, the authors made changes to the course curriculum to include explicit teaching of work checking, practice and feedback on work checking, and allotting a small number of course points for demonstration of checking on quizzes and exams.