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MINI REVIEW article

Front. Educ.
Sec. STEM Education
Volume 9 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/feduc.2024.1470040
This article is part of the Research Topic Utilization of Neuroscience Core Concepts to Guide Programs, Curricula, Courses, and Assessment in Diverse Institutional Contexts View all 4 articles

Core Concepts: Views from Physiology and Neuroscience

Provisionally accepted
Jennifer E. Schaefer Jennifer E. Schaefer 1*Joel Michael Joel Michael 2
  • 1 College of Saint Benedict and Saint John's University, Collegeville, United States
  • 2 Rush Medical College, Rush University, Chicago, Illinois, United States

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Core concepts are "big ideas" that are central to a discipline, provide frameworks of understanding for disciplinary content, and aid student transfer of learning. Core concept lists have been developed for increasing numbers of higher education STEM disciplines. This mini-review uses physiology and neuroscience core concepts as examples to inform core concept pedagogies in these and other disciplines. The article reviews the development of physiology and neuroscience core concepts and compares the resulting concept lists. It then provides suggestions or "lessons learned" for educators and researchers who wish to utilize core concept pedagogies or who wish to develop core concepts for other STEM disciplines.

    Keywords: Core concepts, Physiology, Neuroscience, STEM higher education, pedagogy. (Min.5-Max. 8)

    Received: 24 Jul 2024; Accepted: 07 Oct 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Schaefer and Michael. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Jennifer E. Schaefer, College of Saint Benedict and Saint John's University, Collegeville, United States

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.