Author: Melinda Rhodes-DiSalvo

Open Pedagogy Benefits Students

Rajiv Jhangiani, Ph.D., of Kwantlen Polytechnic University and an open education advocate, spoke to Ohio State participants at the 2017 Innovate Conference this May.

Jhangiani has studied the higher education environment, and he pointed to the state of Ohio as typical of lowered state educational funding placing an increasing burden on tuitions. One of the few aspects of higher education attendance costs that faculty have control over, he argued, is related to course materials.

Since 1971, he said, course material costs have increased over 1,000%. “There’s no other consumer good – AT ALL,” Jhangiani said, “that comes close …. Not even healthcare.” He asked faculty and administrators at OSU to put themselves in the mind of a student. A study of 22,0000 students in Florida in 2012 and 2016 showed that 66.5% don’t buy all the required textbooks; 47.6% take fewer classes as a result of course material costs; and 45.5% don’t take a particular course because of high course materials cost.

Moreover, publishers who sell students materials and restrict access to the materials afterwards or don’t allow printing after the course are “a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

Jhangiani argued for open resources to support classes, which allow faculty to “revise and remix” content, increasing and “reclaiming” academic freedom. The number of open resources available through sites like guttenberg.org, open.bccampus.ca, open.umn.edu, openstax.org, and others “look, smell, and taste like a Pearson book.”

Thirteen peer reviewed studies of the efficacy of open resources or textbooks representing 119,720 students showed 95% of are doing the same or better when these resources are used as opposed to traditional textbooks and materials. In addition, drops, retention, and passing grades are better.

In addition, Jhangiani said, “traditional assignments suck energy. What if we grow up and fix the problem?”

For example, he said, “Wikipedia is the first port of call for students, and … if we’re honest, the first port of call for faculty.” Wikipedia always needs more articles about scientists and sciences. “What if students write them?” he asked. Moreover, “what if students write the questions for assignments? It takes a deep understanding to write distractors.”

This process moves from the concept of open resources to OPEN PEDAGOGY. Jhangiani suggested educators craft policies and delivery systems with little thought about their effect on students. He pointed to learning management systems (Blackboard, Canvas) as exemplifying that “learning is best done by management.”

“Ideology is embedded in every technology,” he explained. “What are we here for?”

According to Jhangiani, deep learning is not about content transfer. “I’m going to challenge you,” he told participants, to think more and more about collaboration and sharing and not leaving decisions about student learning to only the people in the room.

Jhangiani’s presentation is available for viewing. His slides are open resources available for use or remixing. His book, Open: The Philosophy and Practices That Are Revolutionizing Science and Education, is available for anyone to download and read.

How to Design Programs for Significant Learning

Significant learning meets two criteria: 1) learning lasts beyond the end of a course, and 2) learning has an impact on personal, professional, social or civic life. The latter suggests significant learning changes how a person thinks, feels, or acts in their lives.

During the FAME First Friday Series on April 7, a group of presenters in the fields of medicine and education discussed ways they have encountered of “Applying Significant Learning Principles in Curriculum Design.”

Larry Hurtubise, M.A., from Nationwide Children’s Hospital, pointed to backward design as the first step to developing curriculum that promotes significant learning. Matching learning objectives with teaching and learning activities and using assessment to refine those activities creates a state of continual improvement.

Assessment across an educational program, he said, combines multiple individual student assessment activities to reach an accurate judgement of mastery (as opposed to high-stakes summative testing). Moreover, program assessment is more in line with current competency-based medical education and adult learning styles.

Competency-based medical education, he argued, requires a paradigm shift from a passive learner shaped by positive and negative reinforcement to a learner who constructs his or her own understanding and knowledge of the world through experiences. This empowered learner must question how an activity helps them gain knowledge and encourages them to become self-directed, “expert” learners.

The group, who also included Claire Stewart, M.D., of Nationwide Children’s, and Brenda Roman, M.D., of Wright State’s College of Medicine, shared 12 tips for programmatic assessment taken from a 2015 article in the journal Med Teach.

  1. Develop a master plan for assessment.
  2. Develop examination regulations.
  3. Adopt a robust system for collecting information.
  4. Ensure that every low-stakes assessment provides meaningful feedback for learning.
  5. Provide mentoring to learners.
  6. Ensure trustworthy decision-making.
  7. Organize intermediate decision-making assessments.
  8. Encourage and facilitate personalized remediation.
  9. Monitor and evaluate the learning effect of the program and adapt.
  10. User the assessment process information for curriculum evaluation.
  11. Promote continuous interaction between stakeholders.
  12. Develop a strategy for implementation.

FAME is the Faculty Advancement, Mentoring, and Engagement center at the OSU’s College of Medicine.

Tips to Improve the Academic Lecture

OSU Department of Psychology instructor Anne Wilson typically found herself teaching in classrooms designed for didactic lecture. Then she had the opportunity to deliver her introductory psychology course in one of the university’s new active learning spaces.

That classroom, designed in much the same way as CVM’s new active learning classroom in VMAB, forced her to consider certain questions:
• Is active learning always better than lecturing?
• When should someone want or need to lecture?
• Is good lecturing better than bad lecturing?
• What makes a great lecture?

Great lectures, Wilson suggested during a Teaching Academy event on May 4, tell a story, use visual aids effectively and always consider the audience.

According to Wilson, storytelling in lectures makes the content more meaningful and memorable. The power of a story is evident when we consider our favorite childhood books and still remember their lessons decades later.

Faculty can define a unified meaning or message in a lecture and use their own stories or students’ stories to sequence content, promote discussion on or focus review of facts and concepts. Moreover, the stories behind academic studies — the Stanford Prison experiment, for example – “hook” a finding in the mind of the listener.

She also recommended including video and images in lectures to address the “Multimedia Principle”: People learn better from words and pictures than from words alone. At the same time, lecturers must concentrate on reducing cognitive load based on the “Coherence Principle,” which posits that people learn better when extraneous material is excluded.

(While students may clamor for fully loaded slides at CVM, putting all content on presentation slides doesn’t really do them much good from a learning perspective.)

Wilson also reviewed the “Signaling Principle,” which suggests learning is enhanced if instructors provide cues for how to process information. Small actions – like developing presentation slides with the assistance of an instructional designer – can accomplish this task by using tables, bolding key terms, or sequentially presenting data on graphs during an explanation so students’ attention is guided.

Ultimately, content that does not support or promote the central message of the lecture should be eliminated.

Assessing the students’ prior knowledge, laying a foundation of facts, and then making connections between new content and what the students already know also contributes to a deeper learning experience.

Wilson was just one of several engaging presenters at the University Center for the Advancement of Teaching’s annual conference. To review other resources, visit http://academy.osu.edu/annual-conference/session-materials/. The Office of Teaching & learning particularly recommends the slides from the keynote address.

Panelists Offer Tips for New Faculty Preparing First Lectures

On April 5, Dr. Maxey Wellman, Dr. Jason Stull, and Dr. Theresa Burns teamed up for a panel presentation on “Getting Started on Classroom Teaching” as part of the New Faculty Series. They provided the following observations, recommendations, and advice to participants.

On inheriting lecture materials

Because people have unique approaches in the classroom, Dr. Stull and Dr. Burns suggested new faculty give themselves plenty of time to review materials and make adjustments based on the learning outcomes/objectives for the lecture. Dr. Stull also urged them to contact the course team leader for clarification of course goals or design if needed. Dr. Wellman recommended making notes to oneself after delivering a lecture about what worked and didn’t work – a post-mortem of the lecture – and then refining presentation for the next delivery.

On appropriate level of instruction

Don’t hesitate ask a colleague or the Office of Teaching & Learning to review a lecture for appropriate content level and learning outcomes/objectives, panelists agreed. In particular, new faculty should consider the content as it assists in preparing Day 1 veterinarians.

On writing test questions

Dr. Burns said it’s critical to align test questions with learning outcomes. She also observed that tests can be viewed as another opportunity to learn material, and that students might benefit when faculty articulate this value. Dr. Wellman recommended writing the test questions before delivering a lecture “because it will remind you … to stress the topics that are important.”

While there’s no real template for writing questions, there are best practices, Dr. Stull noted. All panelists acknowledged writing a strong test question takes time and refinement, and that ExamSoft item analyses are helpful with refinement. They also recommended having interns, residents, and former students test out the questions to check for clarity. Finally, they suggested giving students an opportunity to practice what they will be tested on, and when possible reviewing tests with students to reinforce material and enhance learning.

The panelists directed participants to the Office of Teaching & Learning and University Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning (UCAT) for workshops and consultations.

On finding graphics and media for presentations and keeping content current

According to Dr. Burns, each department and each section almost always has one person who photographs or records a number of cases. They are often the best resource for multimedia and images. Dr. Stull keeps lecture or topic folders, and as he comes across material during the year, he puts it into the folder for review the next time the lecture is prepared. Dr. Wellman gathers journal articles in the same way and makes adjustments to her lectures to feature the most current findings in veterinary medicine.

On teaching style and engagement

Dr. Stull advised structuring lectures to always highlight the learning outcomes/objectives first, including as many cases as possible, and bringing “your own enthusiasm” to a topic. “You have to be you,” Dr. Wellman said. She also told new faculty to chunk material for presentation and in between topics returning to the lecture’s objectives slide and checking off what’s been completed so students understand the connection between content and objectives.

Because so many people have some discomfort talking in front of 150-plus people, Dr. Burns said, “Fake it ‘till you make it.” The more new faculty lecture, the more comfortable they will become, she assured participants. She pointed out it’s possible to be entertaining and teach well at the same time; the two are not mutually exclusive. Panelists also said students understand when faculty view them as colleagues and don’t lecture down to them, and they appreciate it when they see faculty enjoy teaching.

The New Faculty Series is organized by Associate Dean Mary Jo Burkhard. Presentations occur each month and provide extended onboarding on topics faculty have questions or concerns about. All faculty members are invited to attend if they see a topic that interests them.

How Note Taking Impacts Learning

During this week’s discussion of James M. Lang’s book, Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning, faculty spent quite awhile grappling with how students take notes and how to make that experience engaging and effective.

Continue reading How Note Taking Impacts Learning →

CarmenCanvas training sessions available

Instructional designer Jay Hsiao provided two training sessions on CarmenCanvas during spring break. For those faculty and staff who were not available to attend, the following links take you to recording of the training.

The Carmen Content Refresher covers the basics. You can access it here: https://mediasite.osu.edu/Mediasite/Play/bc07b56d236f4732bf025e5d49a9c45c1d

The Carmen Assessment Refresher covers creating question banks, assignments, and quizzes. You can access it here:  https://mediasite.osu.edu/Mediasite/Play/cf31085b8a7c4d43b79df2155bb83d6d1d

First-year students evaluate iPads in the classroom

The class of 2020 was the first cohort of students equipped with iPads to support administration of high-stakes tests through ExamSoft and applications related to classroom instruction.

Early this semester, the Office of Teaching & Learning surveyed first-year DVM students to assess their levels of satisfaction with iPads, as well as how they used the mobile device to support learning. The results were generally positive, with recommendations for making them even more valuable.

Continue reading First-year students evaluate iPads in the classroom →

Competency-based curriculum reinforces student learning

During a Faculty Advancement, Mentoring and Engagement (FAME) presentation in January, OSU College of Medicine’s Assistant Dean for Evaluation and Assessment Cynthia Ledford, M.D., promoted competency-based curriculum to make education explicit (or transparent) and to reinforce student learning.

The metaphor she used drew on advancements of the auto industry, during which technology moved it steadily from Model T to self-driving cars. Dr. Ledford posed the question of whether we can move from our current didactic state of medical education to a system where students self-drive their education, proving their practical skills and abilities at check points along the way.

Current research indicates that students have a difficult time learning in one context and transferring what they learned to another context. In addition, given the high level of performance of most professional students, moving people from one passing score to a higher passing score has relatively little meaning from a student learning and assessment standpoint. Instead, focusing on proficiency and competency levels creates meaningful context for knowledge and the opportunity for students to transfer that knowledge into practical skills that can be applied in the real world. Continue reading Competency-based curriculum reinforces student learning →

Antimicrobial work group early curriculum map user

One of the earliest uses of the recently completed curriculum map involved the college’s antimicrobial stewardship program. According to Dr. Jason Stull, VPM, the working group wanted to determine content hours and placement in the pre-clinical DVM curriculum of topics related to antimicrobial use, antimicrobial resistance and antimicrobial stewardship.

This search was part of a larger project aimed at addressing current education of and practices related to antimicrobial use and stewardship at the college.  “In summary, we were able to capitalize on all the excellent work our faculty has done in mapping preclinical course content,” Dr. Stull said. With the use of key word searchers the group was able to quickly determine content that addressed areas of interest, including:

  • Course in which the lecture occurred.
  • Lecture title and information on learning outcomes specific enough to know which of our areas of interest the lecture addressed.
  • Main animal species the content addressed.

“In summary, the mapping tool was instrumental in helping us quickly determine the current status of teaching in this area and identify potential gaps that should be further investigated,” he concluded.

Dr. Sue Johnson, interim associate dean, and Dr. Tod Drost, Council on Professional Education chair, will present a baseline report on the curriculum map during the March Faculty Development Series.

Visiting Author Focuses on Academic Integrity, Teaching Excellence

Dr. James M. Lang, author of Cheating Lessons: Learning from Academic Dishonesty and Small Teaching: Everyday Lessons from the Science of Learning provided faculty at the College of Veterinary Medicine insight into methods for promoting academic integrity, as well as small adjustments to teaching that impact student learning and retention.

Lang’s visit to the college began on Monday evening, Oct. 17, when he visited with a small group of DVM students in the second and third years of their program. The meeting was designed to present him with student perspectives on academic integrity and curricular experiences. Continue reading Visiting Author Focuses on Academic Integrity, Teaching Excellence →