Hands-on Teaching
A hands-on classroom experience is the academic foundation for many disciplines. But how can faculty inject experiential learning techniques when teaching online? The faculty panel shares their challenges and successes in the lab, studio, music and art rooms, and highlight ways to bring the “hands-on” experience to the online classroom. Topics include:
Approaches to Remote Laboratory Instruction: A Long-term View
Look, Feel, Sound: Translating the Applied Music Lesson to the Remote Classroom
Moving the Engineering Lab Experience Out of the Lab
Promoting Interaction in Synchronous Classrooms with Google Jamboard
View the one-hour presentation above or access individual Lightning Talks below.
View the Hands-on Teaching Presentation
Approaches to Remote Laboratory Instruction: A Long-term View
Overview
A challenge facing the re-structuring of hands-on (e.g., laboratory) courses in a remote environment involves the reassessment of the skills, content knowledge, and ways of thinking that are most important to the class. This task can be approached utilizing a “backward design” development process. This Lightning Talk presentations highlights concepts behind the transformation of an upper level chemistry lab, including thoughts on how to place a particular course in the context of a student’s undergraduate laboratory experience.
Presenter
John Caradonna
Associate Professor, Department of Chemistry
Look, Feel, Sound: Translating the Applied Music Lesson to the Remote Classroom
Overview
The applied music teacher’s diagnostic toolbox has three main compartments: look, feel, and sound. In order to translate a lesson into the remote classroom each of these tools needs to be considered. BU College of Arts & Sciences Senior Lecturer Daniel Dona discusses how finding the right cues via language and visual demonstration are vital in teaching an applied music lesson in a remote classroom. He also discusses the importance of camera placement and offers tips to maximize the use of audio technology in the course.
Presenter
Daniel Doña
Senior Lecturer, BU College of Fine Arts
Chair, Student Life and Honors Committee
Violist, Arneis Quartet
Testimonials
“One of the bigger revelations was seeing how Jamboard can be used in multiple ways, testing it out on one’s own (as I had done previously), I’d missed so much. I can see this in use not only in class but in committee….brainstorming, planning….”
“The technical solutions were great (two cameras, whiteboard, etc.). I also loved the idea of incorporating Wikipedia authoring into the course activities.”
– Hands-on Teaching Lightning Talk Attendees
The Engineering Lab Experience
Overview
Laboratory exercises can play an important role in deepening students’ understanding of engineering concepts and bringing them to life. The transition to BU’s Learn from Anywhere modality has required us to wholly redesign the laboratory environment, from a resource whose equipment and access we maintain and control, to an experience the students will oversee. Master Lecturer Caleb Farny shares the approach the Department of Mechanical Engineering has taken to make this transition.
Presenter
Caleb Farny
Master Lecturer
Department of Mechanical Engineering
BU College of Engineering
Teaching with Wikipedia
Overview
In this presentation, BU College of Arts & Sciences Lecturer Malavika Shetty describes how Wikipedia can be successfully incorporated into the classroom, especially in a remote-learning environment. Malavika discusses how Wikipedia can be effectively used not only as a pedagogical tool to teach research and writing skills and information literacy, but also as a way to empower students to contribute information to a website that is visited by millions of people every day.
Presenter
Malavika Shetty
Lecturer
BU College of Arts & Sciences Writing Program
Interaction with Google Jamboard
Overview
This presentation introduces Google Jamboard, an interactive tool that provides creative and flexible options for real-time hands-on interaction in synchronous class meetings.
Presenter
Amber Navarre
Senior Lecturer of Chinese
Department of World Languages and Literatures, BU College of Arts & Sciences
About the Moderator: Seth Blumenthal
Seth Blumenthal is a Senior Lecturer in Boston University’s College of Arts and Sciences Writing Program. His research focuses on the intersection of youth culture and conservative politics in the 20th century. Blumenthal’s first book, Children of the Silent Majority: Youth Politics and the Rise of the Republican Party, 1968-1980, won the New England Historical Association’s James P. Hanlan Book Award. He brings his own interests and research to his teaching, with classes like “Imagining Vietnam: The Big Muddy in American Culture,” “Marijuana in American History,” and “High Stakes: Creating Social Equity in the Massachusetts Cannabis Industry,” which he co-taught this year in the Hub Cross College Challenge. In addition, his service-learning course, titled “The Educated Electorate,” requires his students to volunteer with political campaigns, nonprofits, and other groups, and then present a research paper related to students’ own experience in political activism. In 2020, Seth was recognized with Boston University’s Metcalf Award for Teaching Excellence.
About Boston University's Remote & Hybrid Teaching & Learning Lightning Talk Series
The Remote Teaching & Learning Lightning Talks Summer and Fall 2020 series, co-hosted by Digital Learning & Innovation and The Center for Teaching & Learning, is a reflection and learning forum where Boston University faculty and invited guests identify areas of challenge and opportunity and share strategies for engaging educational experiences in the remote-learning environment.