The principle of traditional education has transformed fundamentally within the last few years. The growth of new computer and communication technologies has provided learners with access to a variety of quality online education. Many educational institutions have shifted partially or completely to distance learning and online lectures as their…

Both lecture and laboratory courses of biochemistry are important professional courses for undergraduates with biology related majors. Course optimization and update is crucial but challenging, especially for the laboratory course. Although taught separately, here we showed a strategy to bridge the two courses and promote the improvement of both.…

Courses: This activity will work in any face-to-face communication lecture course. Objectives: By the end of the semester in a face-to-face lecture class, every student will have engaged in verbal discussion.

The authors are developing and using a fill-in workbook system that allows faculty members to ascertain the attitude of all students to classes including students who are not active, and to improve lectures through well-timed and appropriate actions. In this paper, in order to help teachers improve lessons and teaching materials, and to help…

After spending several years investigating the needs of non-native English speakers in undergraduate courses at a large public university, it became apparent to Jenifer Rice that one of the main challenges facing these students is speaking up during large lecture classes. In such classes, two specific speaking skills students need are (1) asking…

Using technology to enhance the classroom environment can have a tremendous impact on student learning, as well as on an instructor's teaching. This paper describes one instructor's transition from traditional chalkboard lectures to a fully technological presentation of content. After carefully reviewing the literature, clicker technology was…

Purpose: This paper seeks to report on the conception of a novel digital backchannel, Backstage, dedicated to large classes, aiming at empowering not only the audience but also the speaker, at promoting the awareness of both audience and speaker, and at promoting an active participation of students in the lecture. In learning settings with a large…

Interactive teaching with larger groups of students can be a challenge, but the use of mobile electronic devices by students (smartphones, tablets, laptops) can be used to improve classroom interaction. We have examined several types of tasks that can be electronically enacted in classes and practical courses using these devices: multiple choice…

This instructional paper is intended to provide an alternative approach to developing lecture materials, including handouts and PowerPoint slides, successfully developed over several years. The principal objective is to aid in the bridging of traditional "chalk and talk" lecture approaches with more active learning techniques, especially in more…

Despite their flaws as teaching and learning environments, large lectures remain a standard teaching approach because of their relatively low cost, ease of preparation, and long tradition in education. Research shows that active inquiry yields positive results in learning outcomes, and one way to make the large lecture class more active and…

Participation of environmental chemistry students in mock congressional hearings is described, as a means of helping them better develop their speaking and debating skills. The activity brings active learning principles into the classroom and greatly increases student participation in an otherwise traditional lecture course.

Rice University has created a team-taught interactive biology course for nonmajors with a focus on cutting edge biology in the news--advances in biotechnology, medicine, and science policy, along with the biological principles and methodology upon which these advances are based. The challenges inherent to teaching current topics were minimized by…

Twenty years of research shows that using interactive techniques more often can make a class more effective. For example, a study of six thousand physics students compared classes using passive lecture to classes using interactive techniques that allowed for discussion among students and between the professor and students. The study showed that…

The traditional, didactic lecture is under attack from diverse quarters. With its origins rooted in the emergence of orality, the lecture now stands as only one of a plethora of educational communication tools, and has been subject to criticism particularly by constructivists for failing to deliver deep and effective learning experiences. This…

Increased student involvement using a feedback lecture format demonstrated that lectures can be more active and assignments can be tailor-made for students. Guided learning activities (managed by a feedback lecture study guide) are used prior to, during, and after lectures. (Author/JN)