Unit Assessments

There will be a total of 5 short unit assessments throughout the course. Unit assessments are designed to assess your knowledge and comprehension of the material covered in the units from the previous weeks. Each unit assessment consists of two parts: Part A and Part B. Part A  will consist of an "objective assessment" quiz with around 15–20  multiple choice, multiple answer, and matching questions. Part B will consist of a writing prompt for a short essay (typically, ca. 350 words minimum). The information that you will be assessed on will consist of major takeaway messages and key concepts, ideas, theories, and principles from class lectures, assigned reading/learning materials, videos, labs, and discussions from the units that you are being assessed on. To be successful on unit assessments, you should aim to be cognitively present and take notes in class, engage in classroom activities that strengthen your understanding of class material, complete the assigned readings and other learning materials, pay attention to cues indicating that information is particularly important (e.g., reoccurring information, concepts with illustrative examples), and take notes on key concepts, ideas, theories, principles, terminologies, and illustrative examples from each unit. 

I will upload PowerPoint slides from lectures on Canvas under the "Lecture Slides" module, which you can review before/during/after class and if you miss a lecture. Keep in mind, however, that lecture slides are limited in information and do not include the full breadth of material that is covered in class. For this reason, if you miss a class lecture, I will encourage you to review the lecture slides and any assigned learning materials from the day that you missed and then stop by my office so that I can help to clarify information, answer questions, and provide context to the lecture slides and learning materials. I also highly encourage you to work collaboratively with your classmates to learn from one another and fill in gaps in knowledge. Peer-to-peer learning fosters cooperation and communication skills, builds classroom community, and is a powerful mechanism for knowledge transfer and retention.

Unit assessments will be made available on Canvas on Friday mornings and their suggested due date is 11:59 pm on Tuesdays. They are open book and open note, and you have an unlimited amount of time to complete them. I want you to be able to master the material and to increase your capacity to learn and identify gaps in your understanding—to practice a growth mindset (the belief that it's possible to improve your intelligence and abilities through effort, learning, and input from others). This is why you are allowed three attempts on each unit assessment and your highest score will be kept. You may retake Part A up to two times and may resubmit Part B for regrading up to two time. Due to limitations in the functionality of Canvas, please make sure to leave me a submission comment when you resubmit Part B so that I know to regrade it. Each unit assessment is worth 12 points to total 60 points for the quarter.

Weekly Reflections

Nearly every week, you will submit a weekly reflection in a discussion forum wherein you will reflect on the material that was covered in class from the previous week in a manner that cultivates critical thinking, growth in content knowledge, metacognition (awareness and understanding of one's own thought processes), epistemic emotions (emotions that occur when someone encounters new information that contradicts their existing knowledge, causing a cognitive incongruity that leads to feelings like surprise, curiosity, or confusion; i.e., the emotions related to the process of acquiring knowledge and understanding), and intellectual risk-taking (contributing ideas, questions, or creative thoughts, even when you might be wrong or judged). Weekly reflections should help you to make sense of class material in relation to yourself, actively monitor your learning process and progress, and retain and transfer learning to new contexts. Weekly reflections are designed to help strengthen our learning community by encouraging you to share relevant and meaningful experiences from the course with one another in flexible ways. 

Weekly reflections consist of two parts: a reflection post and a response post. First you will make a reflection post, which should be a minimum of 250 words and include the following elements: 1) the information that you learned from the previous week that you found to be the most useful, insightful, or important, and why; 2) something from the previous week that you found to be curious, confusing, or surprising, and why; and 3) how the material from the previous week connects with your existing knowledge, experiences, and observations, potentially to include how it changes what you thought you knew, how it reinforces what you already knew, how it alters the way that you perceive something, or how you will apply the information in the future. 

Next you will make a response post, which should be a minimum of 250 words. You have two options for your response post. Option 1 is to respond to a post made by one of your peers in a way that either builds on the insights provided by the original poster, adds useful and relevant information to the discussion, contributes your own personal experiences as they relate to the discussion, or provides a different perspective from the original poster. Option 2 is to respond to a  thought provoking question created by the class that draws on a major concept or idea from the week (the class will determine the question at the end of each week). Providing these two options allows for flexibility in the way that students share their experiences and thoughts with one another. There are multiple ways in which you can respond in the discussion forum on Canvas—you may respond with text, audio, or video, and you may include relevant images or drawings if you wish. 

The suggested due date for reflection posts is 11:59 pm on Mondays and the suggested due date for response posts is 11:59 pm on Wednesdays. You are expected to successfully complete a minimum of 8 weekly reflections of 10 offered in order to receive full credit for this assignment category. Each weekly reflection will be worth 5 points to total 40 points for the quarter. Weekly reflections will be entered in the gradebook as complete/incomplete. If a weekly reflection does not meet the basic requirements of the assignment (e.g., it does not include both a reflection and a response post, it is well below the minimum word requirements, or it doesn't demonstrate a sincere attempt to meaningfully engage with the material), I will provided you with feedback and you will have the opportunity to resubmit the assignment until it is successfully completed. Due to limitations in the functionality of Canvas, please make sure to leave me a submission comment when you resubmit or add to your discussion post so that I know to regrade it. Completion of more than 8 weekly reflections will not result in extra points; however, engagement with the weekly reflections beyond the minimum requirements can be used to support your Course Engagement Self-Evaluation (see below). 

Most weeks, you will participate in labs that are relevant to the topics covered during the week and that are suitable for your level of knowledge in anthropology. Labs provide opportunities for active learning, which research shows is a powerful way to promote knowledge retention, problem-solving and collaborative skills, critical thinking, inclusivity, and a deeper understanding of class material while reducing achievement gaps and helping students to build a personal connection to their learning (see Active Learning: What Is It and What Are the Benefits? and this article on the 9 benefits of active learning). Labs will occur in class on Thursdays. The labs will provide you with the opportunity to actively engage in anthropology research and to learn the methods and skills that anthropologists frequently employ in lab and field settings. Labs are designed to be interactive, thought provoking, exploratory, and fun. Labs may include, but are not limited to, analyzing hominin and non-human primate skull replicas, examining human osteological specimens, analyzing stone tools similar to those created by our human ancestors, and engaging in forensic analytical methods and recovery techniques.  Please be sure to review any assigned readings or other learning materials prior to coming to class on lab days in order to familiarize yourself with what you will be encountering that day. 

This is not a lab designated course, so your labs are based solely on participation—even if you get something wrong (and very likely you will because you presumably haven’t been trained in anthropological methods and techniques) or don't complete the lab, you will still get full credit as long as you fully participated in the lab. Feedback will be provided in verbal form during and after labs in order to help to clarify misunderstandings and key points. There will be two opportunities to makeup a missed lab, which will occur on Week 6 and Week 13. For each of these lab makeup days, students will have the opportunity to makeup up to two missed labs. You are required to complete a minimum of 6 labs of 8 offered in order to receive full credit for this assignment category. Each lab is worth 5 points to total 30 points for the quarter.  Labs will be entered into the gradebook as complete/incomplete. Completion of more than 6 labs will not result in extra points; however, participating in more labs than the minimum requirement can be used to support your Course Engagement Self-Evaluation. 

Labs

Most weeks, you will participate in labs that are relevant to the topics covered during the week and that are suitable for your level of knowledge in biological anthropology. Labs provide opportunities for active learning, which research shows is a powerful way to promote knowledge retention, problem-solving and collaborative skills, critical thinking, inclusivity, and a deeper understanding of class material while reducing achievement gaps and helping students to build a personal connection to their learning (see Active Learning: What Is It and What Are the Benefits? and this article on the 9 benefits of active learning). Labs will occur in class on Thursdays. The labs will provide you with the opportunity to actively engage in anthropology research and to learn the methods and skills that biological anthropologists frequently employ in lab and field settings. Labs are designed to be interactive, thought provoking, exploratory, and fun. Labs may include, but are not limited to, analyzing hominin and non-human primate skull replicas, examining human osteological specimens, analyzing stone tools similar to those created by our human ancestors, and engaging in forensic analytical methods and recovery techniques. Please be sure to review any assigned readings or other learning materials prior to coming to class on lab days in order to familiarize yourself with what you will be encountering that day. 

This is not a lab designated course, so your labs are based solely on participation—even if you get something wrong (and very likely you will because you presumably haven’t been trained in anthropological methods and techniques) or don't complete the lab, you will still get full credit as long as you fully participated in the lab. Feedback will be provided in verbal form during and after labs in order to help to clarify misunderstandings and key points. There will be two opportunities to makeup a missed lab, which will occur on Week 6 and Week 13. For each of these lab makeup days, students will have the opportunity to makeup up to two missed labs. You are required to complete a minimum of 6 labs of 8 offered in order to receive full credit for this assignment category. Each lab is worth 5 points to total 30 points for the quarter.  Labs will be entered into the gradebook as complete/incomplete. Completion of more than 6 labs will not result in extra points; however, participating in more labs than the minimum requirement can be used to support your Course Engagement Self-Evaluation. 

Course Engagement Self-Evaluations 

In educational contexts, "engagement" often refers to the degree of attention, curiosity, interest, inquisitiveness, passion, inspiration, and investment that a student shows when they are learning. Engagement might include observable behaviors like attendance and class participation, but these factors do not reveal the true depth and breadth of engagement. Engagement can occur in many different forms, including cognitive, emotional, behavioral, and social engagement, and it can be understood as a relationship between students and many elements of their learning environment to include their classroom and college community, their instructor, and the curriculum. Research consistently shows that engagement significantly and positively impacts student growth (see this blog post on why student engagement matters). 

Regular, authentic, and meaningful engagement with this course through class activities, peer discussions, lectures, assigned reading/learning materials, and other means helps to ensure your success in this course and will determine how much you will get out of the class and your intellectual and personal growth from it. Course engagement directly effects your ability to think deeply and critically about class material and your success on assignments; it is critical to meeting the learning outcomes for this class and helps to build a strong classroom community. That said, I recognize that every student comes to the class with a different background and set of knowledge, skills, learning styles, communication preferences, academic goals, and comfort levels, all of which may impact how you engage with a class. You each have different obligations, time commitments, and lived experiences, which might differentially effect your cognitive or emotional bandwidth and the amount of time that you can invest in a given class. While class engagement leads to improved academic outcomes and a deeper level of learning, engagement is hard to measure. It looks different for everyone and can take many different forms—this is why you are the best judge of how much you engage in a class and whether you meet or exceed your own expectations for engagement given your unique background, circumstances, goals, and experiences. 

In this class, you will be asked to honestly and authentically evaluate and grade your own engagement in this course. In the middle of the quarter (Week 7) and at the end of the quarter (Week 13), you will be asked to submit a Course Engagement Self-Evaluation form, wherein you will answer questions about and rate your course engagement, suggest an engagement grade for yourself, and provide a narrative that describes your engagement and justifies the  grade that you determined for yourself. You are expected to keep track of your engagement in this course throughout the quarter as supporting evidence to justify your engagement grade. This may include but is not limited to keeping track of the types and number of class activities and group discussions that you participated in, documenting the ways that you engaged in peer collaboration and learning, keeping a tally of the number of classes that you attended, describing your study habits, recording the number of weekly reflections and labs that you completed and the level to which you engaged with them, documenting any extra curricular activities related to anthropology that you participated in, keeping track of the number of assigned and suggested reading/learning materials that you completed, documenting the degree to which you invested cognitively/emotionally/behaviorally in assignments, documenting any instances in which you applied class material to real-world experiences, and tracking the number of learning outcomes you confidently accomplished. 

At the beginning of the quarter, the class will work collaboratively to determine some of the criteria for measuring student engagement, which will help you to become active stakeholders in your learning and which will allow you agency in how you are graded and evaluated. That said, I reserve the right to give you a higher or lower grade than the one you suggested if it doesn't align with my observations, data, and analytics; however, this usually isn't necessary as students tend to be honest judges of their own achievements and where they have areas for improvement, if not tend to be overly critical of themselves (when this happens I will increase the proposed grade accordingly). Your mid-quarter self-evaluation will be worth 8 points and your final self-evaluation will be worth 12 points to total 20 points for this grade category. Your final self-evaluation is worth more because it is a reflection of your progress and growth throughout the quarter. The suggested due date for your Course Engagement Self-Evaluations are 11:59 pm on November 3rd for the mid-quarter evaluation and 11:59 pm on December 11th for the final evaluation.