Greetings readers!
In less than two weeks, another new school year will be upon us. I was reminded recently, maybe shocked, to be honest, that I need to write an update because new students read my blog! How awesome is that?!?!
Chem 1210 has changed quite a bit in the last year. For example, last year (2017-18) was the first year to use common midterms for all courses. In the past, each instructor would write and administer their own exam, but now we share a common exam. This change certainly introduces a challenge for all of us instructors to agree on things – for those who know us know that’s not easy! But in the end, I think our exams were as a whole better than they used to be individually. I’m also sure they’ll continue to improve into the coming school year.
So the for the coming year, all classes will have three midterm exams. There is a nice breakdown in midterm 1 covering chapters 1-3, midterm 2 covering chapters 4-6, and midterm 3 covering chapters 7-9. The final exam will be the only cumulative exam and it will cover chapters 1-12.
The biggest change for the coming year is that new first year students received an iPad Pro! My section is also an “iPad Only” course. The way OSU offered instructors iPads and some helpful sessions on what to do with these devices was to ask all of its instructors to apply for to be part of the “Digital Flagship” program – though a requirement was everyone participating must teach an “iPad Only” course. The major problem – one I wish OSU had a better solution to – is that very courses are taken by 95%+ freshman. Chem 1210 is close – probably about 10% of our fall class are not new students. If you happen to be in my class and you don’t have an iPad – the only thing I can is that I will assume everyone has one. One assignment in particular will all but require the use of a stylus pen. If you have concerns – please contact me and we’ll figure out a solution!
A big change I introduced last fall and will continue into AU18 is the use of pre-lecture assignments. The pre-lecture assignments include a timed (60 minute maximum) assignment of tutorials and a quiz. These items are best done after actively reading the covered sections for a given day (I’ll post a schedule on Carmen so you’ll know what to read and when to read it). You might wonder, what is “active reading”? I think active reading is first skimming the section titles, looking at and familiarizing yourself to the vocabulary and subsections, attempting to the do the sample exercise problems (each of which have a detailed solution that you can read through), and keeping track of any questions you have that you may be able to make sense of later in your pre-lecture work or in lecture. I might recommend then once you finish your pre-lecture assignments and come to class, then try to do a deep read – especially on topics you are still not quite clear on. Some topics may be memorable still from your high school chemistry classes – so spend your time where it is needed!
A new change coming for AU18 is I am preparing pre-lecture videos. These videos I think will help enhance your pre-lecture reading and assignments by giving you access to the lecture content in audio format, where you can pause, rewind, fast forward, speed up, or slow down as needed. These videos will be posted as Youtube videos via our course website. I will be recording these throughout the term and posting them a couple days in advance. My goal is to keep these videos in the 25-40 minute range. One aspect of the videos I want to point out is that I will end each video with 5-10 minutes solving sample problems – so even if you aren’t interested in the “lecture portion”, perhaps check out the sample problem portion.
Beginning last summer, I began adopting more active learning exercises. What I’ve found works well is beginning lecture with a challenging question – we’ll use Top Hat to administer these problems this semester. Top Hat is a free app for OSU students – it’s easy to use and allows an easy way for me to ask problems and get your responses. We will then discuss some of the lecture content (I find “lecturing” content in lecture is kind of a waste of time – it’s better if we can move on to “discussing” content in its place). During this discussion, problems will be presented so we can see how to use this content in problem solving. A small portion of your grade is from lecture participation – this score will be based on how often you answer questions and how often you are correct. My grading scheme gives 0.50 points (50%) for each question you answer and 0.75 points (75%) for each question you answer correctly – so you will earn a small bonus every time you are correct on a problem. I think you’ll find that our problems will be enhanced by our discussions and with the help of your classmates you can collaborate with so earning a perfect lecture score should not be too much of a challenge. The maximum lecture score though will be a 100% score.
A new change for AU18 for recitation is that we will require an “Explain Everything” problem to be completed prior to coming to recitation (beginning in week 2). You will chose one problem from an activity that you will write out a solution while speaking a solution to the problem. Try to talk through your problem as if you were the teacher trying to review a problem with a student perhaps like in an office hour setting. You will then go to recitation and work on the activity with a group and usually take a quiz toward the end of the session. Most quizzes will also allow a group round afterwards, where you can review the problems and resubmit your answers.
Finally, I wanted to wrap up with some remarks about the online homework. I mentioned above that pre-lecture assignments will be required. There will also be two homework sets of problems due most weeks on Wednesday and Sunday evenings. These assignments should take about 60-90 minutes – though these are not timed so you can do these in as many sittings as you wish. There will also be a variety of extra assignments available and you can earn some extra credit on these assignments – though the maximum homework score is 100%. The idea of the extra assignments is to provide you with additional assignments that some of you may find valuable and also so you know there will be extra credit available so that you don’t use unproductive homework habits. My advice is simple – your exam scores will struggle if you have to look up how to do a majority of problems and/or you rarely correctly answer questions on your first attempt. If you have active pre-read the sections, watched a lecture video, were engaged in lecture, more thoroughly read after lecture – then you should be able to do the homework problems fairly easily as an exercise of using the content you have learned. Looking up how do a problem and getting it right might give you the homework points, but you still would be missing a solid understanding of the material and an ability to apply that knowledge.
I go into every semester thinking this will be the best ever and this coming semester is no different! I am hopeful for a great AU18!