Education research: pre-instruction survey protocol

Pre-instruction surveys are administered as students walk into the first day of class, without even mentioning the course the students are in (however, course and section information is already written on the whiteboard, in order to assure perplexed students that they have found the right classroom). The reasons for this immediacy are that:

1. Student preconceptions should be minimal, with so little exposure to the course and/or instructor.
   
2. Students immediately get acclimated to the policy that all assessment in this course starts promptly.
   
3. Students who come in a few minutes late (usually lost in locating the classroom) do not interrupt lecture time, and can usually make up the few minutes lost in taking the pre-instruction surveys.
   
4. Students who are trying "crash" the course can be given something to do while the instructor resolves their enrollment status.

After the end of the allotted time for the pre-instruction surveys is over (excepting any extremely late stragglers who are instructed to complete the surveys any time before they leave class that day (no surveys are taken out of class by students)); a general introduction to course policies and/or instruction begins.

Astronomy 10 pre-instruction surveys:

• SPCI: Stellar Properties Concept Inventory
  Bailey, J. M. (2006), "Development of a concept inventory to assess students' understanding and reasoning difficulties about the properties and formation of stars," unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ.
  
• SATA: Student Attitudes Towards Astronomy
  Zeilik, M., & Morris, V. J. 2003, "An Examination of Misconceptions in an Astronomy Course for Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Majors," Astronomy Education Review, 2(1), 101.

Physics 5AB/8AB pre-instruction surveys:

• FCI: Force Concept Inventory
  D. Hestenes, M. Wells, and G. Swackhamer, Arizona State University, "Force Concept Inventory," Phys. Teach. 30, 141-158 (1992).
  
• MPEX: Maryland Physics Expectations Survey
  E. F. Redish, J. M. Saul, and R. N. Steinberg, "Student Expectations in Introductory Physics," American Journal of Physics, 1998, 66(3).