I was a demonstrator for 2019-2020 batch undergraduate students in the department of physics. It was my first ever teaching-assisting experience in physics labs. In physics, doing experiments is important to test the theories and provide the basis for scientific knowledge. The physics experimental courses are designed to develop the subject knowledge as well as to gain the training in various skills which one needs both during the degree course and to prove oneself outside the world.
Physics lab experiments are performed in a group more often than an individual student conducting experiments alone. The allocation of the group would mostly be random. The formation of a group in the lab session has a lot of advantages for the students to develop their team spirit which is crucial in the science community to make research collaborations and networking.
Katzenback and Smith (1993) defined that a team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and an approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable. Since the formation of the group is random, students with different backgrounds, cultures, skills are involved to conduct the experiments, the teaching assistant in the science labs can encourage and support the students to develop the team spirit in them. K Dunnett (2019) discusses in his article about the implementation of a model called working grade (w-grade) for the assesses aspects of the student's laboratory practice. One of the aspects of the w-grade model is ‘group work mark’, where the demonstrator has to consider how the students interacted within their group and prevent one student from dominating the other(s) and/or prevent others from being passive. The demonstrators can asses the team or improve the team effectiveness by monitoring their roles and responsibilities, team process responsibilities, team process and procedures, and interpersonal relationship and interactions to achieve the common goal of getting an outcome of the experiments expected along with the development of the subject knowledge. If we adopt this model to practice in the laboratory to assess the students we could also train the students to develop their team spirit while learning a subject.
References:
Katzenback and Smith (1993), The Wisdom of Teams.
K Dunnett (2019), K Dunnett et al 2019 Eur. J. Phys. 40 015702
Response (Christina Heflin, Media Arts)
The concept of team spirit within the lab setting is indeed essential, and I like how you related it to the importance of later professional success. Indeed, much of scientific lab work is collaborative and necessitates equal participation from all team members. I remember working with my classmates in group lab sessions and developing bonds with them while working together to solve these theoretical problems. The application in the lab setting also brought these concepts out of the text book and into the real world, which helped for deeper understanding.
Once a group of students have attended lectures for some time, group dynamics start to emerge that can reflect how students are socialised with respect to their gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, (dis)ability, and other demographic characteristics. In my teaching experience, I face this when teaching undergraduates, and when interacting with school pupils in the classroom. An interesting way this can play out is when I teach undergraduate students how to interact with younger pupils, how to be aware of social biases, and how they impact learning, all the while being aware of that myself.
Social pressures in education are quite strong since very early on, and there are more and more efforts to counter them from primary school age, see for example the guide linked below produced by a team of schools and educators for the Scottish government. We want to enable students to reach their best potential by following their inclination, rather than being pigeon-holed by prejudice and stereotypes. This happens through the instructor analysing their own biases about individual pupils, and through building an inclusive teaching environment, henceforth facilitating positive peer relationships.
Dewsbury and Brame (2019) have compiled a list of recommendations based on previous research specifically for inclusive teaching practices in a STEM environment. I personally recommend the tips in the sections about having the instructor developing self-awareness and empathy. Being an empathetic instructor has greatly improved my teaching style as it is much easier to keep students' attention and increase information retention once an emotional connection has been established.
In this guide developed by the IOP there is a collection of tips for teachers and instructors to develop an inclusive classroom. Some of these are more suited for younger students rather than undergraduate students, but I find tip 8 to be particularly relevant also in the latter. Monitoring the depth/frequency of interactions between the instructor and pupils depending on their gender/ethnicity can be very revealing of internal biases and can have a real effect on learning. Another technique I use regularly is, after I have asked a few questions and noticed who the most eager students are, to solicit responses from students who haven't yet offered an opinion. This generally is successful as it acknowledges that some people are more prone to sharing without shaming them, and at the same time opening the conversation to people who may not feel as confident in speaking up first. This diversifies the conversation and boosts confidence in students that may have different reasons for being reticent to ask questions or offer insight in the classroom.
References:
Dewsbury and Brame (2019), Inclusive Teaching
Response (Harry Rollison, English)
Thanks for bringing attention to this, Claudia! I think inclusive teaching practices are becoming an increasingly pertinent feature of higher education, and therefore warrants as much attention as possible. It is as much about student awareness as it is our own, and as you mention, I similarly believe empathy and recognising our unconscious biases go a long way in contributing to this. In that regard, the resources you linked are really useful and informative; like you, I also find Dewsbury and Brame’s section about self-awareness and empathy, and IOP’s Tip 8 on monitoring gender interactions, to be of particular note. Royal Holloway is itself actively attempting to bring greater awareness to this through a series of equality, diversity, and inclusion workshops; I attended one in March of last year (2022), which focused upon transgender and non-binary gender identities, for example.