Who here feels a bit drained when it comes to how this year or semester is progressing? My hand is raised! Often when I feel this way, I find that attending a workshop, conference, or even reading a book and discussing with colleagues, reignites my excitement for education and all things learning. This fall our reading group continues (for those counting, this is the 6th book we have read, having started in Spring of 2019)! We selected the book by Sarah Rose Cavanagh called, The Spark of Learning: Energizing the College Classroom with the Science of Emotion . This book was calling to us because with the return to in-person learning and consideration of various digital modalities, we felt there was a need for conversations around questions such as: What have we learned this past year about our students? How can we engage and find connections with our students, after all that we have been through? What have we learned this past year about our teaching methods? What can be kept, and what...

Are you looking for ways to mix up your video lectures or announcements? Do you want to streamline and enhance your step-by-step instructions? Loom is an asynchronous presentation and video tool that is easy to use and offers a variety of sharing options that can help enhance your presence and levels of instruction online. From demo GIFs to content lectures, there are many ways to “show it, say it, and send it” with Loom! What is Loom? Loom is a recording tool that can capture your desktop, camera, and microphone to create interactive videos and presentations. In addition to HD video and sound recording, other recording features include an emphasized mouse cursor to highlight areas of the screen, a drawing tool to emphasize content, pop-up buttons that call viewers to action, and emoji reactions to take your screencasting videos to the next level. You have the option to turn any of these features on or off to customize your preferred recording experience. There are multiple ways to get...

Students are more tired than ever before and it’s impacting their well-being . In 2020, we suffered through a pandemic, social unrest, and a lot of uncertainty. We are now four months into 2021 and there is no clear end in sight. Although the prospect of vaccines and social justice accountability gives us hope, we can not discredit that students are still struggling and may continue to struggle for months to come. Not to mention it is the end of the academic semester, where motivation and energy are lacking for students and instructors alike. Students are hard at work studying for finals and putting the finishing touches on culminating projects. Many students respond to these increasing demands in classes by putting in longer hours (i.e, all-nighters), which in turn takes a toll on students’ overall wellbeing. What we know from Dr. Sara Goldrick-Rab’s Hope Center and the #RealCollege movement is that basic needs have a significant impact on student success. When students aren’t doing w...

How do you know if your assessments are inclusive? How can you reconsider your assessments to make them more inclusive? Last week, we learned from K. Supriya, Ph.D. , Postdoctoral Researcher in the ASU School of Life Sciences , on ways we can assess our assessments for inclusiveness.  During the webinar we discussed the purpose of assessments in class, examined the various assessment practices we have experienced as students or teachers in various STEM courses with a critical lens, and then came up with an assessment plan for a course we will/might teach in the future.  Watch the discussion here . Purpose of Assessment Let's consider the differences between assessment and evaluation. The purpose of assessment is to increase quality, as seen in formative quizzes, building upon each other. The purpose of evaluation is to judge quality, which is seen more as summative or at the end of the unit or course.  Define Inclusive Assessment Two definitions that Dr. K. Supriya shared...

In these challenging times, students are experiencing additional stressors exacerbating their anxiety and depression. As instructors who want students to succeed, how can we support our students with anxiety and depression in order to foster belonging and maximize learning? In this week's Resilient Teaching webinar, we talked with SOLS assistant professor Katey Cooper, Ph.D , who shared her research examining what worsens and alleviates anxiety and depression in biology undergraduates. Dr. Cooper discussed two overarching research questions during the presentation that relate to creating inclusive biology learning environments: How does depression and anxiety impact students' affective learning experiences in biology learning environments? What strategies can be implemented to improve the cognitive and affective experiences of students with anxiety and depression in biology learning environments? We began by discussing the percentages of undergraduates who have anxiety and depr...

Summer. That time of year you think you’ll catch up and have more time for “light” reading and thinking. And yet, here we are, summer in the rearview mirror, a new semester already begun. Perhaps you did successfully catch up on your projects? Way to go! One success we had was hosting a “light” version of our SOLS Reading Group. We chose to meet every other week on a Wednesday afternoon, ultimately reading five articles from June through July. One thing we realized is, even if you don’t have the time to devote hours to developing your teaching methods and crafting better learning experiences for students, you can find small moments to read shorter articles with evidence-based practices that you can implement. I encourage you to take breaks from your screen, get a cup of coffee or tea, and spend 15 minutes each day or week reading to develop yourself for teaching. Set a timer. Create a habit. Schedule it into your calendar, and don’t give it up. It’s your time to develop yourself for th...

We are excited to announce 16 events this term that all focus on racial justice in biology. These events are open to the School of Life Sciences (SOLS) community.  Please join our suite of virtual workshops, seminars, and discussions to learn and become more self-aware of how we can become more inclusive.  The sessions are for faculty, staff, and students – all of the seminars will be recorded and posted on the  RISE Center website  for viewing afterwards.  For a full description of the events, click the links below: SABER events An initiative sponsored by the Society for the Advancement in Biology Education Research (SABER) focused on promoting awareness, understanding, and commitment to change academic biology environments to be more inclusive and strive for racial justice in STEM Education.  RISE Up events An initiative sponsored by ASU’s Research for Inclusive STEM Education (RISE) Center focused on enhancing awareness, understanding, and commitment to...

One of the beautiful things about a semester is that we are banded together in a learning experience for a specified period of time. Every class we teach has a unique makeup of students from all across the university. Many will be from different majors and all of them will have different backgrounds, cultures, and ways of seeing the world. It, therefore, becomes important to establish a community where students know their peers and are comfortable speaking to them. We also want them to see the instructors as part of this community, not just as wizened sage, but as a guide for their learning and experiences. This poses the question “How DO we establish a supportive community of learning in our courses?”. This can be largely based upon our introduction activities that pave the way for all other interactions in a course. We need to “ break the ice ”. In both online and face-to-face teaching modalities establishing community is important for creating space for discussions, as well as effec...

The ability of students to think abstractly and formally is one of the major challenges instructors have faced over time. This is true across all disciplines but more so in the sciences. Concepts such as molecular bonding, biochemical pathways and cellular communication bring the biggest challenges to students as they require one to think outside of one’s normal schema. Arizona State University Emeritus Professor Anton Lawson , states, Concrete thinking is just regarding the facts. On the other hand, abstract thinking goes down below the facts. While some mental process is involved in abstract thinking, no such effort is evolved in concrete thinking. A person with concrete thinking does not think beyond the facts. They do not have the ability to think beyond a certain limit. Concrete thinkers only have a generalized concept for all things. On the other hand, abstract thinkers have a very specific concept of things. Is there a secret to teaching abstract thinking to learners? One of the...