Designing and Planning Learning Activities
In my first year of graduate school, I served as a guest lecturer for the Duke Cognitive Neuroscience Research Internship program, a program run by graduate students and postdoctoral researchers designed to provide research opportunities for undergraduate students who otherwise have not had access to research training. In my lecture "Selective Attention in Normal and Impaired Hearing" based on a primary research article written by Drs. Barbara Shinn-Cunningham and Virginia Best (2008), I drew upon my training in backwards design (beginning with learning objectives, followed by designing assessment of those objectives, and then creating learning activities required to achieve those goals) through the Duke Certificate in College Teaching. At the end of the lecture, I challenged students to use the knowledge they had gained to brainstorm ways to help individuals with hearing loss attend to specific sounds in a complex environment. One of my students described this lecture as:
"Application of knowledge in an innovative way".
I bring this connection to the real world into all of the learning experiences I design. In my work as a teaching assistant for Introduction to Systems Neuroscience (see course evaluations), I am responsible for designing some of the laboratory experiences. In these experiences, students collaboratively apply what they have learned during the week to a complex problem. This follows the team-based learning approach, which has been shown to increase self-reported learning over other active learning approaches (Ng & Newpher, 2020). I designed a laboratory activity that encouraged students to explore the auditory and vestibular systems by conducting common hearing and balance tests and simulating results for a patient with a hearing or balance disorder. Then, students applied this knowledge by creating an infographic to describe possible treatment options to a patient with a hearing or balance disorder. This required students to diagnose the disorder based on symptoms, determine possible treatments, and explain the anatomy of these treatments in a clear and concise format. I both delivered this learning activity and trained my fellow teaching assistant and faculty instructor to implement this activity in another lab section. These laboratory activities also often incorporate a variety of learning platforms and technologies, including Lt learning.
Teaching and Supporting Student Learning
I also have experience teaching students in smaller group settings. I served as a tutor with the Duke Academic Resource Center for two years, hosting small-group tutoring sessions in Data Science, Chemistry, and Physics. In these sessions, I strived to create a supportive community of learners. I always utilized active learning techniques and made personal connections with students so they would feel comfortable with the learning environment. I brought what I have learned from this experience into my weekly office hours for the Intro to Systems Neuroscience course. For these office hours, I not only answer student questions, but I also ask probing questions, encouraging students to apply their knowledge in a risk-free environment.
I have also worked one-on-one with undergraduate students by serving as a research mentor. During my research rotation in the Mnemology Lab at Duke, led by Drs. Roberto Cabeza and Simon Davis, I mentored a first-year student in research. I introduced her to a variety of research methods in neuroscience through my project on how multisensory representations contribute to encoding and retrieval of visual objects. I designed learning objectives to accomplish her goals for the experience and assigned authentic activities, such as literature review, survey development, and coding tasks, to test her knowledge.
Supporting and Guiding Learners
I also have extensive experience supporting and guiding learners through university programs. As an undergraduate student, I served as a Duke Trinity Ambassador. In this role, I advised students from a variety of different departments interested in incorporating musical training into their undergraduate education. I identified resources within and outside the music department to serve students with a variety of different goals.
In my senior year, I became more involved in shaping the university curriculum as the Undergraduate Representative for the Duke Department of Music. Through this role, I served as the student voice in weekly faculty meetings, advocating for the needs of the students. I was involved in discussions surrounding a large curriculum shift at Duke, and I provided valuable feedback from the student perspective, working alongside faculty members as colleagues.
Assessing and Giving Feedback for Learning
I see assessing student learning as both an essential part of the learning process and as a crucial aspect of active course development. In my work as a teaching assistant for Introduction to Systems Neuroscience, one of my roles is to develop rubrics, give feedback to students, and give feedback to instructors based on student data to focus instruction where it is most needed. This dynamic process allows the instructor to calibrate teaching to a level that is challenging and exciting to students. Every week, students take a formative assessment on the course content. After this quiz, I analyze the data from every question, focusing on which questions were most challenging for students as well as which were most predictive of overall performance on the quiz. After analyzing this data, I provide feedback to the instructor about which questions should be covered in the subsequent review and which kinds of questions adequately challenge students for the next quiz.
Engaging in Professional Development as a Teacher
I have found multiple ways to engage in professional development at Duke. I am enrolled in the Duke Certificate for College teaching, in which I take courses and participate in peer teaching observations. I have implemented knowledge that I have gained from these courses into my teaching. Additionally, I have participated in mentoring workshops, including the "Entering Mentoring" workshop, designed for graduate students and post-docs just starting to mentor students in research. In these workshops, I learned through collaborative discussion amongst my peers. Finally, I engage in professional development by seeking out teaching mentors. I have received feedback on my teaching by two primarily teaching faculty at Duke, Dr. Leonard White and Dr. Thomas Newpher, in designing laboratory activities and active learning for guest lectures.
My teaching is characterized by real-world problem solving, team collaboration, and evidence-based practices. My main goal is to guide students in finding a passion for learning and prepare them to make a difference outside the classroom. I have demonstrated a commitment to active learning and authentic assessment in my teaching assistantships, tutoring, guest lecturing, and mentoring roles, and I intend to continue to deepen this commitment through my future teaching.
As I continue teaching, I aim to further my training in curriculum design and student experience. Working with faculty to tailor curriculum designs to meet student learning needs has inspired me to maintain a student-centered focus in all of my teaching. As Duke has recently restructured their curriculum, now is the perfect time to get involved with designing new courses. I would like to design a course that bridges science and the arts, drawing upon my background in both neuroscience and music. Additionally, I would like to take more of a leading role in the courses that I teach. Serving as an instructor of record for a course would be an excellent way to hone the skills I have been developing in the classroom and as a teaching assistant.
Ng, M., & Newpher, T. M. (2020). Comparing Active Learning to Team-Based Learning in Undergraduate Neuroscience. Journal of undergraduate neuroscience education : JUNE : a publication of FUN, Faculty for Undergraduate Neuroscience, 18(2), A102–A111.
Shinn-Cunningham, B. G. & Best, V. (2008). Selective Attention in Normal and Impaired Hearing. Trends in Amplification. 12(4), 283-299. doi:10.1177/1084713808325306