First-year engineering students´ self-reported knowledge of nanotechnology — The development of a coding scheme

Different types of instruction are used at the college-level for increasing students´ knowledge of nanotechnology. Purdue University introduced nanotechnology to first-year engineering students in an introductory engineering course through two nanotechnology-related projects. The students were split into two groups. Group 1 students (8 sections, n=703) implemented only a mathematical modeling project related to nanotechnology. Group 2 students (6 sections, n=496) implemented both the mathematical modeling project and a simulation design project related to nanotechnology. Students were asked to complete a nanotechnology assessment at the start and end of the semester. In this assessment, one prompt asked students to describe five things they know about nanotechnology. This work-in-progress describes the development of the coding scheme for categorizing the student responses. Researchers had ten meetings to revise the coding scheme, the final meeting resulting in the inter-rater reliability (TRR) estimate of 82% One of the researchers applied the coding scheme to 2000 responses and initial results are reported here. The coding scheme will be used to inform educators about the impact of their nanotechnology-related projects and attain their desired learning goals.