Be Prepared! How Pre-lab Modules Affect Students’ Understanding of Gene Mapping

Lab activities are characteristic of life science education. In the current study, we investigate whether pre-lab modules can improve students’ understanding of the theories and experimental procedures associated with lab activities. Such effects were studied in context of an expository lab on gene mapping in biology undergraduate education. An experimental group of 126 students had access to an online pre-lab module to prepare for the lab activity; a control group of 90 students did not have access to this pre-lab module. The data revealed that students who studied the pre-lab module had a better understanding of the gene mapping theory, at the onset of the class, when compared with the control group. Additionally, these students appeared to ask fewer questions on what needed to be done in the lab, suggesting more awareness of the experimental procedure. Further, students who studied the online pre-lab module showed greater understanding of the theory in their lab reports. These findings suggest that students’ understanding of background theory and its relation to practice can readily be improved by enriching existing expository labs with pre-lab modules that contain information and questions on the complex conceptual information relevant to the lab experiment.