Psychology

Teaching with Humour (Alex Lloyd)

Statistics are a core component of any undergraduate Psychology programme and are crucial in allowing psychologists to make inferences about the brain and behaviour. However, statistics can generate a significant amount of anxiety in undergraduate students, which in turn impacts students’ feelings of mastery and overall confidence within the discipline (Onwuegbuzie, 2004). As educators within higher education, it is our challenge to support students to overcome their anxieties and succeed within their degrees. 

Alongside traditional pedagogical techniques, there has recently been evidence to suggest that selective and appropriate uses of humour can improve students’ experience of statistics classes (Neumann, Hood, & Neumann, 2009). This has been a successful strategy with prominent academics, and one of the widely recommended textbooks in the Field (no pun intended), is that of Andy Field (2018). Through the use of a creative and engaging teaching style, concepts that might seem complex and intimidating are spoken of in a manner that breaks down these assumptions, allowing students to break the stigma surrounding statistics. While this may not come naturally to all who teach statistics, there are several resources that can support a humours delivery of material without relying on your statistics teacher being a stand-up comedian. One of the images I frequently use to describe the difference between Type I (false positive) and Type II (negative) errors presents this as trying to tell a man that he is pregnant (see image below).

While humour can be an effective tool, instructors must be cautious not to over trivialise the content (Neumann et al., 2009). Thus, it is necessary that seminar leaders gauge the class environment to determine when to employ this strategy in order to support students to succeed in statistics classes. Overall, this tool can be an effective method of engaging students and facilitating their understanding of topics related to statistics in Psychology. 

Reference: 

Field, A. (2013). Discovering statistics using IBM SPSS statistics. SAGE. 

Neumann, D. L., Hood, M., & Neumann, M. M. (2009). Statistics? You must be joking: The application and evaluation of humor when teaching statistics. Journal of Statistics Education, 17(2). 

Onwuegbuzie, A. J. (2004). Academic procrastination and statistics anxiety. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 29(1), 3-19.

Response

I think you brought up something really important here, Alex! I remember having to learn statistics in my undergraduate degree, and I was very anxious about it even before I started my studies. One of my teachers incorporated humour. This lightened the mood in the classes allowing me to focus on the content rather than on my fears/stress. Although I still had moments of frustration whilst working on assignments for his classes, I felt much more comfortable reaching out to him when struggling and as a result felt much more confident in my stats skills at the end of the term. I think humour definitely helped him seem more approachable and built better rapport with the class - and made it a more fun experience at the same time! (Eke Bont, School of Law)

I found this blog post especially relevant for me, as I am very likely to teach statistics next year at the School of Law for first-year students, who are often easily scared of statistics having limited previous knowledge in the subject. I agree that humour is a very powerful tool to use, and I was pleasantly surprised that there are even research studies specifically on the relationship between statistics teaching and humour. Having read the post, I feel more encouraged to use humour or informal comments as a tool in my next academic year while discussing or explaining statistical concepts. (Emese Szász, School of Law)

Responses:

“It seems an interesting technique to teach complex topics. I can benefit from this approach as in my field (Computer Science), there are many topics that students do not understand and tag as 'boring' or 'hard to understand'. What I experienced in my teaching career so far is that students learn quickly and clearly through analogies. Humour can be a form of it. Also, it grabs attention quickly so if a teacher can blend humour with his teaching material then the success rate of learning increases. Now I am curious to search and explore relevant examples in my field as humour does not come naturally to me. Also, it will require more lecture preparation time, but I think it is worth it. Student's concept retention will also improve. One important aspect of this approach is to maintain the class decorum while adding humour because sometimes during the discussion, students start adding their examples and they don't realize the difference between good humour and loose talk(indecent) so this is a tricky part for a teacher as to how to avoid/handle this situation cleverly.  Overall good blogpost. (Nausheen Saba Shahid, Computer Science)”  

It’s so interesting to read an analysis on teaching with humour – an innately tricky approach. As you mention this doesn’t come naturally to everyone but I have certainly tried to use my own light-hearted nature to put students at ease in the classroom. While it’s a wonderful feeling when it works it’s pretty painful when it falls flat. I wonder if you see this as accessible to everyone or only to those who already deal in comedy in social situations? (Jessica Wax-Edwards, Modern Languages)

Thank you for your interesting and relatable post, Alex! I have read Field as well and I agree humour can definitely make statistics seem less daunting. However, I remember one of my undergrad statistics professors took it a step too far. All his lectures were packed with jokes and while they were fun to attend, I really struggled to understand the material. In this case, his sense of humour was distracting the students from what was really important. So while I agree with you that humour can be an effective tool, teachers must be careful not to overdo it. (Sahira van de Wouw, Psychology)

Alex, such an interesting post! Humour is definitely a very interesting way of using context to engage students if not overused; and, yes, it is indeed very popular in statistics lectures for psychology students. I wonder why though? It might be because statistics is hard for psychology students and jokes provide them with a funny worked example that help them understand the potential complicated difference between type I and II error, but what is the reason? What is so special about jokes? Is it because putting complex phenomenon into practice helps them to vividly consolidate it (the worked example) or the laugh? Maybe both? Or is it because, particularly psychology, students are not very inclined to study statistics, but a bit of humour is the magic secret to motivate them to at least try to understand it? (Benedetta Cevoli, Psychology)

I really like this approach, and it’s particularly important with a topic like statistics which can be a real turn off for a lot of people. Certainly, many of the sessions that stick in my mind from during my Undergraduate degree are those that have incorporated novel teaching methods, unexpected topics, and humour. I gratefully appreciate those teachers that have made an effort to communicate difficult topics like statistics; we need more people like you! (Jess Fisher, Geography)

I like that you have addressed this, Alex, and I think for many teachers (including myself) humour is an important and often helpful means of engaging students. I agree there is a careful balance to be struck, and that trivialisation effectively does everyone a disservice (students will certainly lose interest if they think the subject materials aren’t being treated seriously). I think there is a real skill to presenting scholarly topics in a light-hearted yet serious manner. Maybe the next step would be to identify which kind of humour works best in a given circumstance – visual, observational, witty/spontaneous? (James Savage-Hanford, Music)

I agree humour (when well timed and appropriate to the setting and audience) can make a huge impact on students' engagement, motivation and understanding of the material. I used Field's book Discovering statistics using IBM SPSS statistics to learn SPSS and still refer to it often when running advanced statistical analyses in SPSS. His humour is nerdy (which I personally feel fits well with statistics and potentially those who enjoy them) and he has pictures of his band and cat (that should make just about anyone happy... come on, cats pics are what keeps the internet afloat!) . All joking aside, I fully agree with your post and would no doubt enjoy attending one of your statistics with humour lectures, and learn more from it than without humour.  (Isabelle Verhulst, Psychology / StoryFutures)

Emotional responses towards feedback (Sahira van de Wouw) 

Sunday afternoon in the office. Christmas was coming up and I was determined to finish off marking before I left for the holidays. I have to admit, at this point all lab reports started to look the same to me. I know I am not the only one when I say it was becoming increasingly difficult not to react sarcastically to yet another error that I very clearly told them to avoid in class.* So I started wondering, what is the best way to give feedback anyway? Would it really harm a student if the feedback was a little bit harsh? Or would it serve as a kind of wakeup call? 

I won’t lie, when I receive critical feedback myself my initial response is not always acceptance. Feelings of disappointment and frustration would be more accurate. But the thing is, I do learn from it and I know I do implement the feedback in future work. Perhaps even more so because I want to avoid being disappointed again in the future. So would it not be a good thing to feel a little angry at your teacher once in a while? 

This is exactly what Mahfoodh investigated in his study "I feel disappointed": EFL university students' emotional responses towards teacher written feedback (2017). In support of my earlier remarks, Mahfoodh found that feelings of surprise, disappointment, and frustration can lead to successful revisions. However, it must be noted that this only works if students believe in their teachers’ authority. Do I have that kind of authority over my students? I can only hope so. If you really want to get a student to revise their work though, you need to aim for acceptance of feedback. According to Mahfoodh, acceptance of feedback as an emotional response towards teacher written feedback can definitely lead to successful revisions by the students. In contrast, and not surprisingly, rejection of feedback by the students can lead to no revised actions taken. This, of course, should be avoided at all times. 

I suppose there is a fine line between feelings of surprise, disappointment and frustration, and flat-out rejection of feedback. Therefore, teachers should aim for a careful balance between criticism and praise in their feedback (Mahfoodh, 2017), which is exactly what we have been told to do. I want my students to improve their work through successful revisions, so next time I’m marking their lab reports, I’ll think of this and keep aiming for them to accept my feedback. 

* Don't worry, I didn't. 

References 

Mahfoodh, O. H. A. (2017). “I feel disappointed”: EFL university students’ emotional responses towards teacher written feedback. Assessing Writing, 31, 53-72.

Responses:

This is a really interesting post (and accompanying article), especially to someone uninitiated in psychology. I too have thought a lot about marking (as something I have never done until this year), and just as you I can feel disappointed and frustrated by critical feedback I myself am receiving on my own work. As a result I tend to prefer a combination of positive reinforcement and critical feedback when I mark. In the cases where I do not see any resulting improvement, however, I am wondering if it would be better to be a bit more critical overall to give them that wake-up call even if they were to resent me for it. (Markus Mindrebø, History)

What I really like about this post is your honesty. Not only does this ring true to me from a teaching perspective, but also from a learning one. At the beginning of my PhD, the slightest negative feedback from my supervisors was really tough to take – I, too, suffered frustration and my ‘imposter syndrome’ amplified no end. But what you say about students accepting feedback only if they accept their tutor’s authority is so accurate. I accept feedback (even if I don’t like it!) because I respect their expertise. Without it, the relationship just wouldn’t work. I hope to give my students the same confidence in my authority so they will respect any comments I make on their work. Thank you for your thought-provoking contribution. (Katie Docwra, Modern Languages, Literatures and Cultures)

I concur with the previous comment that this was indeed a really interesting post. I wanted to throw in the mix another sentiment — our need for praise, above and beyond helpful constructive feedback. For me this relates to the general human condition of needing validation and approval. I must say that in my first year as PhD student I have sometimes been guilty for falling in the trap of needing validation perhaps more than I should. Your post made me think of this because it posed the question of what is the type of feedback that is evoking the best response in a student. And while I agree that feelings of surprise and disappointment may lead to successful revision, as you convincingly elaborate, I also feel that we live in a time of exaggerated emotional and psychological burden which heightens our need for feeling successful and capable of managing our workload. As a result, critical, however constructive, feedback can have effects that span beyond one’s motivation to do well. I read recently an interesting article titled “How Millennials Became The Burnout Generation” by Anne Helen Petersen (https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/annehelenpetersen/millennials-burnout-generation-debt-work); it suggests the idea that young adults become so incapacitated by the demands of our contemporary times that they are in a constant emotional state of life-management deficit. This is a consequence of the modernity we live in and thus pertinent to post-millennial generations as well. My point here is that we live in fragile times, and traditional notions of ambition, strive to excel, perseverance and hunger for scholastic excellence are being redefined and nuanced by broader socio-cultural dynamics — and with that, so is the nature of the feedback we are to give and its effects on students. Thanks again for a thought provoking post. (Alex Atanasova, Management)

This is really interesting as I’d not really considered the importance of students respecting the authority of the teacher in accepting critical feedback which on reflection, I can identify in my experiences as a learner. I think it’s important to highlight the study’s finding that, of the emotional responses they identified, ‘acceptance of feedback’ provides the best rate of successful revisions by students, rather than disappointment. It’s also interesting that lack of clarity in feedback was identified by Mahfoodh as a cause of a ‘rejection of feedback’ or ‘dissatisfied’ response, both of which resulted in fewer successful revisions by students. Hence, I’d suggest it’s important that critical feedback in particular is accompanied with a clear suggestion for how students can improve their work, since that may make it easier to accept. Thanks for sharing the interesting post and article. (Max Coleman, Earth Sciences)

This was a very interesting post, instantly grabbing my attention. Remembering feedback given to myself as an undergraduate, I would agree that my emotional response to the feedback framed if and how I would action it. Something I had not considered until reading your post was that this response would differ based on my perception of the person giving the feedback.(George Skinner, Biological Sciences)

Let’s flip it! (Benedetta Cevoli)

Despite sharing the same fundamental moving force and impelling need to answer fascinating questions about the world, the role of the scientist has dramatically changed from the classical philosophical study of nature in antiquity to modern science. Besides acquiring diverse yet specific knowledge, researchers are required to be equipped with an incredible variety of technical skills to design, undertake and analyse experimental data. One of the most diffuse skills across disciplines a scientist is expected to master is programming. From stimuli presentation to statistical analysis, being fluent in one programming language gives a researcher the freedom to customise every single aspect of an experimental study. Nevertheless, learning to code is a rather complicated skill to teach and quite hard to acquire though traditional educational approaches teacher-centred, always not even taught outside the field of computer science, but as it is nowadays an essential requirement for psychologist, neuroscientist, linguists and many other scientists, is often badly self-taught. So, can you teach young aspiring scientists, who want to become well-equipped researchers, such technical skills? What is the best educational environment? Amongst several progressive approaches, I find Flipped Learning to be a very interesting one potentially suitable to teach the future generation of scientists rather technical skills. 

As the phrase suggests, Flipped Learning is a learner-centred approach where the traditional classroom lecture-like and the homework environments are completely inverted (Abeysekera & Dawson, 2015). The content delivery usually takes place outside the classroom, where students are introduced to the learning material with short video lessons, and several types of active learning, such as more traditional homework problems, are used in the classroom to deepen understanding through discussion with peers and problem-solving activities facilitated by teachers. In the flipped classroom students learn by participating and evaluating their learning with a personalized, less didactic interaction from the teacher (Alvarez, 2011). Even though, the relatively recent yet dramatic growth of online content creation and distribution tools of the early mid-2000s has shaped an excellent environment for flipped learning to develop, particularly in disciplines such as computer science, mathematics and physics. Studies investigating the causal effects and educational outcomes of Flipped Learning show an increase in academic performance as well as satisfaction of students who undertook flipped classes compared to traditional classes (Hamdan, McKnight, McKnight, and Arfstrom, 2016). 

I believe this interesting and promising educational setting of Flipped Learning could be a particularly beneficial one for young scientists with the desire to acquire the best skill set an influencing researcher could ever need. A lot of aspects of Flipped Learning are still debated as, for example, even if accessible technologies make it easy for teachers to create video content to provide students before class, often there are quite important logistical constraints for classroom activities with large cohorts. Could online learning environments with video lessons and question-based forums be a reasonable, and effective alternative? If so, do students inadvertently put flipped learning already into practice by combining video lessons from Coursera or YouTube and discussion from StackOverflow? 

References 

Alvarez, B. (2011). "Flipping the classroom: Homework in class, lessons at home". Education Digest: Essential Readings Condensed For Quick Review, 77 (8): 18–21 

Crouch, C.H. and Mazur, E. (2001) Peer Instruction: Ten Years of Experience and Results. American Journal of Physics. 69, 970–7. 

N. Hamdan, P. McKnight, K. McKnight, and K. Arfstrom, “A Review of Flipped Classroom”, Flipped Learning Network, 2013

Response: 

Whilst I come at this from a different discipline (drama), I appreciate  this post and find there to be value in Flipped Learning. I think as educators we tend to worry about the limitations of remote learning, especially since 2020, but I like that your post views this approach as placing the student at the helm of discovery, combined with still keeping the capacity for a personalised evaluation from the teacher. I find it interesting that the results seem to point towards student satisfaction. In my classes, now that we are back in person, the physical presence of myself and the students for learning is now a given, but perhaps there is room to also add online, video-content away from the physical location of the seminar/rehearsal room, much like blended learning. Thank you for sharing.  (Nicole Acquah - Drama Department)

Is uniformity necessary for seminars? (Giusi Pollicina)

To run seminars, a class is divided into small, more manageable groups, usually of 20-25 students, and each one is assigned to a tutor. Usually, tutors lead 3-4 separate groups of students and they work with them for the whole academic year. In order to guarantee uniformity in the content of the seminars, tutors are given directions on how to conduct the sessions by course coordinators. These are often quite detailed (i.e. they provide a structure of the seminar, activities and so on), to allow students to have the same learning experience with any tutor that is teaching that seminar. Although these directions might save a lot of time to tutors when preparing for seminars, there are some negative aspects to it that need to be addressed. Giving the same instructions to all tutors is limiting their ability to deliver the seminar, as some tutors might feel more comfortable using certain techniques more than others. In the same way, some students might find some activities really useful, while others might not. In my personal experience, I saw two groups react to an activity suggested by the course coordinator in very different ways. The seminar revolved around stereotypes regarding jobs, and the task suggested by the course coordinator mimicked the tasked used in an experiment evaluating stereotypes in children. I had to provide some pens and paper and ask students to draw a typical psychologist, so that we could all look at the characteristics that the majority of students attributed to psychologists and whether these were only stereotypes. The task was perceived as entertaining and useful by some students, who were happy to participate, while others expressed their lack of interest and said that they would have preferred to do something different in that session. Now, although it has been found that material presented in students’ preferred learning style does not make the learning experience more effective (Paschler et al., 2008), it can make the session more pleasant, which will make students more keen to come and participate. Attendance in seminars and tutorials is exceptionally low, so any action that can be taken to encourage students to come should be considered. A teaching method that actively takes into account their tendencies and adapts to how they prefer to be taught might do the trick.

References

Pashler, H., McDaniel, M., Rohrer, D., & Bjork, R. (2008). Learning Styles: Concepts and Evidence. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 9(3), 105–119. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6053.2009.01038.x

Responses:

I can really relate to this post as the atmosphere and approaches to tasks were markedly different between my tutor groups this year. I found it useful to provide a short, reflection activity with students at the end of each session and keep a diary myself so I could feedback to the course coordinator. I agree that teaching methods should allow elements of flexibility to keep students motivated and engaged. (Amy Walsh, Geography). 

Two tops to get the students involved in lectures (Farah Akthar)

Giving lectures can be challenging especially if you are new to giving them and there is only one of you and 200 students. Previous research has proposed that students who typically feel very under-challenged by the course content and under-engaged by the teacher have a higher chance of dropping out (Shernoff et al., 2003). The digitial world has advanced over the years therefore why not use this to our advantage as lecturers and teachers. Here are two suggested tips that I have tried to help engage students in lectures and my experience of applying these. 

1. Including online activities to encourage student engagement.The way I applied this was by including an online virtual quiz, whereby all my students had a countdown timer of 10 seconds to answer the question. This encouraged student engagement because all of the students got to pick a unique nickname and see themselves on a leader board with their peers – encouraging healthy competition and incorporating a sense of “fun” into a lecture. Although, I had to make sure there was time to incorporate this activity in the lecture, I think it was definitely useful in getting the students to talk and provide a positive learning atmosphere. There are many online virtual quizzes and fun activities you can create which are free and accessible to everyone, my personal favourite is ‘KAHOOT!’.

2. Encouraging the use of Social Media.When I mention ‘social media’ in this sense I mean forums. Forums are a great way to get the conversation started. Having a virtual place for students to post makes it easier for valuable conversations to be had and for introverted students to open up and feel more comfortable with their peers to express themselves. This also encourages students to share information with their peers and to create a sense of community. However, as the teacher it is important to monitor these forums nonetheless, this is a great and healthy way to get the students talking. 

I guess applying techniques for student engagement depends upon the students you teach and sometimes it takes 3 or 4 techniques to apply until you find the right one for you and your students. Don’t be discouraged if your first technique does not go down well, there are numerous student engagement techniques out there, so fear not and keep trying!

References

Shernoff, David & Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly & Shneider, Barbara & Shernoff, Elisa. (2003) Student Egagement in High School Classrooms from the Perspective of Flow Theory. School psychology Quarterly. 18.158-176.

Comment:

Thanks, Farah, for these tips. It is great to see how you have engaged students and tried different digital formats of discussion and engagement to break up the flow of lectures and to keep it interesting even in such a large group size. (Frankie Kubicki, Geography)

I agree that integrating digital tools such as online forums and virtual quizzes within traditional teaching methods is a great and an innovative way to encourage high levels of student engagement within a lecture. I would also suggest, either opening the lecture with a broad rhetorical or an open-ended question or putting out these questions at various points within the lecture. This would help rethink the lecture from an inquiry-based perspective and help you (the lecturer) create a space, which is not just about providing the right answers, but also a space to model how to ask the right questions. Students then get multiple opportunities from the beginning till the end of the lecture, to ask questions, contribute to and open up discussions, and critically engage with the topic.  (Priyanka Pandey, Management)

Making the student the teacher (Nali Moftizadeh)

 With pedagogical techniques such as peer assisted learning and peer collaboration often seen as effective ways to facilitate learning (Johnston, 2009), one thing I like to do in my statistics workshops is encourage students to teach/explain things to their peers. This allows you to see that the students have understood the concepts at a deep level.  In doing this, you can be sure that your initial explanations have been understood in depth, and at the same time someone else is learning too – it’s a win win situation. 

 In particular, where workshops involve practical work using particular software like mine do, you can assess how well the students have understood the tasks by getting them to demonstrate their knowledge through explanation/demonstration to a peer. A big advantage here is that peers are more comfortable and honest with each other, and are more likely to identify with each other – and this sets a good platform for them to learn from each other. 

Of course, as the teacher the responsibility to ensure that this technique is being utilised effectively lies with you. It may not be as easy as initially suggested for a number of reasons, and may also depend hugely on the particular lesson/topic. Using an example from my own experience, monitoring the interactions were crucial to observe whether the student themselves has understood the concepts and is explaining it to their peer in a way which helps them understand it too. If problems arise, your own intervention will be necessary to ensure that both students are on the right track. However, in cases where it works, it is hugely rewarding as you see first-hand that the student has processed what they have been told and understand it at a great enough level to be able to explain it to someone themselves. 

 References

 Johnston, J. (2009). How to implement peer learning in your classroom. Research and Resource Guide, 1(7), 1-4. 

 What Is It All About? (Elitza Ambrus)

Richard Feynman once said: "I would rather have questions that can't be answered than answers that can't be questioned." I could not agree more. My first lab class as a seminar tutor was on critical thinking skills in Psychology and I did my best to keep the message of this class alive throughout the whole course. I believe we learn the most through questioning assumptions and inferences.  Indeed, the ability to reason scientifically was outlined as an essential skill for researchers (Osborne, 2010). Research has also provided evidence that interactive, dialogue based sessions facilitate active engagement in exploration of ideas and building on them that leads to deeper understanding and successful learning (Applebee, Langer, Nystrand & Gamoran, 2003). 

Therefore, I decided to encourage discussions as much as possible. As my lab group was relatively large (forty students), my first challenge was to ensure high level of participation in the discussions. I started each class relating briefly our work for the day either to a recent social development or to intriguing research to ease our way into the topic. I also made sure I led the discussion in a non-judgmental manner and built on student responses by extending their thinking. As higher-order questions has proven to be most beneficial for successful learning (Redfield & Rousseau, 1981), I challenged student with “What if” type of questions, encouraging them to compare and link concepts, theories and methods. Gradually, more and more students would engage into discussions, which became the best part of each lab class for both the students and me.

References

Applebee, A. N., Langer, J. A., Nystrand, M., & Gamoran, A. (2003). Discussion-based approaches to developing understanding: Classroom instruction and student performance in middle and high school English. American Educational Research Journal, 40(3), 685-730.Osborne, J. (2010). Arguing to learn in science: The role of collaborative, critical discourse. Science, 328(5977), 463-466.

Redfield, D. L., & Rousseau, E. W. (1981). A meta-analysis of experimental research on teacher questioning behavior. Review of educational research, 51(2), 237-245.

Utilising media to create meaning of theoretical models. Vanita 

Understanding theoretical models are core for understanding human behaviour, further, applying them to research studies not only makes sense of them, but identifies the strengths and weaknesses. It encourages the researcher to consider, how applicable is the theoretical model of work-related stress (developed in the US), for German employees? Or does this model of work-related stress really capture the experience of the phenomena or are there important elements which are missing?

A philosophy professor encourages this critical form of thinking through utilising the media (i.e. something abstract) to a particular form of thinking of a philosophical concept. This is a form of teaching which I have used with personal tutees rather than a whole class, however, from studying philosophy where a professor encouraged this form of learning, it is something which I would like to do at class level. 

The learning experience would be based on a particular theoretical model; this would essentially be the surface level learning where the learner would expand their current understanding on definitions (Offir et al., 2008). At this point, the teaching process would begin with a behaviourist approach i.e. learning the concept of resilience when experiencing stress at work. How this phenomena is understood, utilised and measured. This may involve class-based discussions combined with pre-reading material. When I have worked with private tutees, they often bring in a concept they have been taught at school/ college but struggled to understand. Once this element is understood (in my experience, during the private tutorial session), there would be further expansion on the knowledge base. This would be optional for students to pick one item (whether it's a book, movie, or even a blog post)-which would be pre-decided; this would happen outside of the class. The student would need to read or watch the media content and apply what they're learnt to the media content. So, applying the concept of resilience to Shawshank redemption or George Orwell’s 1984. This would be extending their understanding and knowledge further to deeper level learning; this would be intellectually challenging where you would be required to understand the concept, immerse yourself into the media and apply to what they have just watched/read. A concept which has been found to be successful on learners, particularly as it can be altered depending on the learner’s style. From my experience, this is the most challenging one so before the end of the class I would give some ideas on the perspective to take. This often sets them on the right track. Furthermore, to develop their critical voice; they may find the concept overlooks important elements when applied to these movies/books. Here they are creating meaning. This would be tapping into a constructivist perspective as the learning at this point is creating meaning of the concept/model they have learnt. To further expand on this, the activity of bringing the group together in a following class to discuss and debate how they have apply the concept to their chosen form of media. This would be a further extension of deep learning, essentially tapping into social learning perspective. 

This type of learning experience taps into the multidimensional nature of learning, it is dependent on the pace and learning style of the student and offers adaptation combined with intellectually challenging material. Essentially, becoming a learning journey where by the end, all students would be tapped into various forms of methods and learning styles.

Offir, B., Lev, Y., & Bezalel, R. (2008). Surface and deep learning processes in distance education: Synchronous versus asynchronous systems. Computers & Education, 51(3), 1172-1183.

Sahasrabudhe, V., & Kanungo, S. (2014). Appropriate media choice for e-learning effectiveness: Role of learning domain and learning style. Computers & Education, 76, 237-249.

Classroom Call Centres (Iqra Arshad)

The shift to online learning has changed the classroom environment. Where once cues from body language, class interaction and live demonstration would facilitate learning, we now engage with students via chat boxes. I have often felt like a call centre operator switching between questions and queries. How did I maintain the attention and engagement of students when they were a mere bubble floating on the screen?

The circumstances due to the pandemic meant teaching online via MS Teams. I utilised a positive attitude and empathy to ensure students felt part of an interactive classroom environment (rather than an eerie call centre). Keeping a positive tone through praising students built confident and encouraged them to ask more questions. Furthermore, as teachers, we often forget about the students’ circumstances. If a student is behind or unable to share their screen, this may not be a lack of attention on their behalf but rather issues with connectivity or a distracted working environment. To tackle such issues, we should offer solutions or alternatives, for instance a screenshot of the worksheet. We need to be aware of cognitive biases we hold and ensure we maintain a positive attitude.

I also found a smaller group of students became more comfortable with discussion and asking questions over time. If I did not hear from them, I would ask them directly how they were getting on (like the annoying PPI callers). I found students felt more supported through this. To encourage wider thinking, I would often ask students questions on individual and group chats. This two-way interaction ensured engagement through a blend of teacher-centred and student-centred approach. Highlighting the importance of interaction, others have also drawn parallels between the business sector and teaching (Wallfisch & Wallfisch, 1979; What Do Selling and Teaching Have in Common?)

Finally, as teachers we need to be realistic. Like the call centre operators, not everyone will answer the call, not every student will be as interactive. This is not a poor reflection on the teacher and instead may demonstrate the students are getting along just fine. It seems I am not alone in my thinking. The eerie online classrooms can be a positive and engaging learning environment rather than a space of awkward virtual silence.

           Wallfisch, M. C., & Wallfisch, C. M. (1979). On the Similarities Between Teaching and Selling. https://www.jstor.org/stable/41063279

  What Do Selling and Teaching Have in Common? | Eton Institute. (n.d.). Retrieved January 11, 2021, from https://etoninstitute.com/blog/what-do-selling-and-teaching-have-in-common

Comment:

I really enjoy this accurate representation of how teaching happens during COVID (i think of my own experience of the wall of empty screens, the terror inspired by breakout rooms). I think your suggestions to be understanding of our students and their situations is important - the onus should be on us to accommodate their needs, rather than expecting them to conform to ours. It can be easy to forget that by activating their screen or mics, they are making themselves the spotlight of attention - which we signed up for, and they did not. Thank you for the reflection that led to my own reflections !

Isaac (psychology)

Comment: 

Similar to Isaac (above) I also really enjoyed this representation of teaching during Covid. My own blog post addresses some similar issues but your references to call centres are really amusing and I think humour works very well in teaching and in reflections such as these.  The focus on being realistic is really important and I think will resonate with many as it has been hard to gauge how well teaching sessions will go via digital mediums for the reasons you outlined. Both us and students are doing what we can to adjust to "the new normal," I agree that it's imperative we approach such situations with empathy. Your focus on two-way interactions is insightful and I think could really diversify teaching methods for many- so thank you!
Jasmine Virhia (Psychology)

Online learning: Blurred Boundaries? (Elise Gear)

Gone are the days of busy lecture theatres, computer labs and seminar rooms. Replaced instead by the more issue prone equivalents: Teams, Zoom and breakout rooms. Despite problems, video conferencing and computer mediated communication (CMC) have provided solutions, on a global scale, to enable business to continue. Within the education sector such platforms have facilitated e-learning, provided flexibility to overcome the barriers of time and social distancing, and kept staff and students safe. However, their usage does require some adjustment.

Below are my tips for online teaching:

Typos: To prevent the appearance of unprofessionalism and the sending of potentially embarrassing messages - a recent one of mine being ‘what teat is this?’ - check carefully for typos. As a statistics demonstrator, I do not require the students to be experts in the identification of udders! It is however expected that they can determine the appropriate statistical test for a research question…Whilst boundaries are seemingly relaxing with the influx of CMC, don't forget the importance of proof reading!

Screenshots: It has become apparent to me that many students show a preference for messaging over video/audio calls. Unfortunately, this does make troubleshooting issues with statistical software a little difficult as I am reliant on the student’s articulation skills and their understanding of novel terminology. It was not until I found myself struggling to articulate a clear solution to a query that I realised the value of a screenshot. With as little as 10 accompanying words, the student was able to play a game of ‘spot the difference’ between their screen and mine – rectifying the issue in seconds. I now regularly send screenshots alongside explanations and will also ask for them from students, aiding my understanding of their questions. A picture is certainly worth a thousand words.

Emojis: In scholarly communication emoticons are rare, with many claiming their use to be unprofessional. However, in this new style of teaching, emojis can overcome the lack of non-verbal cues, helpfully conveying the message sender’s emotion (Lo et al., 2008), ultimately improving communication efficiency (Dunlap et al., 2016). Even pre-Covid, research has demonstrated that using emojis in staff-to-student CMC increases student perceptions of staff warmth and intention to act upon tasks outlined in messages (Marder et al., 2019). In this Covid-enforced digital age, emojis enable me to convey the elation I feel when a student finally grasps a concept I have been explaining to them. As such, I will continue to use them to motivate and encourage until the time as I can smile in person, without it being hidden by a mask!

References:

Dunlap, J. C., Bose, D., Lowenthal, P. R., York, C. S., Atkinson, M., & Murtagh, J. (2016). What sunshine is to flowers: A literature review on the use of emoticons to support online learning. In Emotions, Technology, Design, and Learning (pp. 163-182). Elsevier.

Lo, S. K. (2008). The nonverbal communication functions of emoticons in computer-mediated communication. Cyber Psychology & Behavior, 11(5), 595-597.                                                

Marder, B., Houghton, D., Erz, A., Harris, L., & Javornik, A. (2020). Smile (y)–and your students will smile with you? the effects of emoticons on impressions, evaluations, and behaviour in staff-to-student communication. Studies in Higher Education, 45(11), 2274-2286.

Addressing the disappointment gap (Isaac Halstead)

Reflecting upon previous posts to this forum from 2018, I came across the work of Bellamy (2018), who discussed the idea of the disappointment gap students experience. This is the notion that students have high expectations of themselves at university, and are ultimately confronted with the reality that they may not meet these unrealistic expectations (Mancuso et al., n.d.)

As a first year statistics teacher, I am constantly confronted with this phenomena – students that believe their performance at A-level is indicative of their performance undertaking a psychology degree (and is very rarely the case). Through this experience, I have found the best approach or ‘strategy’ in this situation, is to help them allow themselves to fail.

While I do everything within my power to get them the best grade possible, given how drastically different their first lab reports are compared to what they are used to, it is inevitable that they are unhappy with their initial grades. In order to counter this, I cultivate an atmosphere of being ambitious, trying approaches that they haven’t used before, taking risks, and having fun while failing. If anyone has marked work before (especially lab reports), they will know the pain of reading an uninspiring, boiler-plate piece of work. Compare this to a marker’s reaction to an ambitious, but ultimately flawed piece of work – it is clear which markers prefer.

This also allows markers to provide more positive feedback – which can in turn provide students with the sliver of hope that they need and deserve in order to continue to improve themselves. This gives students the impetus to keep trying, the freedom to experiment, and develop their own style. When students discover the disappointment gap first-hand, it is essential that we do what we can to cushion the fall and help them realise it is an essential part of the scientific process.

References

Mancuso, M., Desmarais, S., Parkinson, K., & Pettigrew, B. (2010) Disappointment, Misunderstanding and Expectations: A Gap Analysis of NSSE, BCSSE and FSSE. Toronto: Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario.

Supporting Autistic Students' Learning (Isabelle Verhulst)

I write this as an autistic InSTIL student and RHUL staff member, thinking about about how I can be aware of the unique challenges and strengths of autistic students, and take these into consideration while planning lessons, so I can provide even better teaching to this diverse group of students.

The number of autistic university students is increasing. Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs) are neurodevelopmental disorders, impacting people’s social and communication skills and (limited) interests / (repetitive) behaviours (APA, 2013) However, they also have strengths, like sincerity, fairness and willingness to listen to others (Gurbuz et al., 2019), good eye for detail and a strong passion for their study topic. At university, autistic students have significant challenges, leading to specific needs for awareness from peers, and support from lecturers and other university staff. Increased knowledge and acceptance of their differences will improve their university experience and grades. Therefore I will here explain some of these differences, so you as teachers can be more aware of them and consider them in your lesson planning and working with these diverse students.

A number of meta-reviews (e.g. Anderson et al., 2017, Elias et al., 2018; 2019, Jackson et al., 2018) have shown the following challenges of autistic students at university, as listed below. Not all of these are directly teaching related, but knowing about them will aid your understanding and working relationship with autistic students. Please note that the below is an over-simplification by nature of the spectrum nature of autism; there is a diverse range of e.g. social, emotional and sensory difficulties (Anderson et al. 2017b), so some challenges may apply to some autistic students but not (or not so strongly) to others.

Academic: Problem-solving, time management, organisational and decision-making skills, difficulty to understand abstract and ambitious concepts (note for teachers to remember to e.g. check understanding from autistic students, or offer additional time for questions), difficulty to express thoughts in writing. Considering these challenges, I intend to make a verbal assessment available as an alternative for written assessments to those who need this, and make materials available multiple days before the lecture, to aid planning and lecture preparation by the students. 

Non-academic:

Social; limited social skills, uncomfortable in groups (I intend to offer an alternative to group work), low self-advocacy skills,

Emotional; low emotional independence, problems with emotional regulation, co-morbid mental health problems (depression and anxiety)

Sensory: around 80% of autistic people experience the world differently through their senses than typically developing people do. For example, many autistic people struggle with loud and unexpected noises (I intend to create opportunities for discussion away from large groups and online Q&As) and bright or fluorescent lights (which are in most class rooms, but can be turned off or replaced if helpful).

Other: low independence, stigma from peers and staff and intolerance of uncertainty and change. I will consider how can I create a clear routine, structure and forewarn about upcoming changes (as much as possible), which is likely to help all students, not only autistic students.

Often, support is available for academic skills, but less often for non-academic skills, which could be addressed by university diversity teams. This may be complex, as given the heterogeneity of autism, to provide optimal support it needs to be tailored to his or her unique challenges and strengths.

Key take outs for my fellow InSTIL students, soon to be teachers: Keep an open mind, embrace neurodiversity, and talk to diverse students about how you can support their learning so they can get the most out of your teaching. Consider going on a ‘disability training’, which will help you understand and interact more effectively with these and other diverse students. Let's remember, “Strengths lies in differences, not in similarities” (Covey, 2013).

References

American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (DSM-5®). American Psychiatric Pub.

Anderson, A. H., Stephenson, J., & Carter, M. (2017). A systematic literature review of the experiences and supports of students with autism spectrum disorder in post-secondary education. Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders, 39, 33–53.

Covey, S. R. (2013). The 7 habits of highly effective people: Powerful lessons in personal change. Simon and Schuster.

Elias, R., & White, S. W. (2018). Autism goes to college: Understanding the needs of a student population on the rise. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 48(3), 732-746.

Elias, R., Muskett, A. E., & White, S. W. (2019). Educator perspectives on the postsecondary transition difficulties of students with autism. Autism, 23(1), 260-264.

Gurbuz, E., Hanley, M., & Riby, D. M. (2019). University students with autism: The social and academic experiences of university in the UK. Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 49(2), 617-631.

Jackson, S. L., Hart, L., Brown, J. T., & Volkmar, F. R. (2018). Brief Report: Self-reported academic, social, and mental health experiences of post-secondary students with autism spectrum disorder. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 48(3), 643–650.

Making the most of online learning: how the impact of COVID could positively influence teaching by encouraging more efficient self-directed learning - Lucy Gallagher

COVID-19 had provided challenges for every industry, including academia, posing the question; how can we teach the next generation of academics online effectively? Since the mode of delivery for psychology changed to online, students have had mixed responses; some like the independence, and relief from social pressures, whereas others despise not being physically in the room and face barriers from being at home. Despite these factors, literature suggests that online learning can in fact produce better outcomes by encouraging more self-directed learning (SDL). 

Garrison (1997) proposed a model of SDL which relies on the interaction between three dimensions; self-management, self-monitoring, and motivation, with a focus on use of learning strategies, resource use and motivation to learn (Song & Hill, 2007). Specifically, self-management refers to the learners control of the session context and using it to achieve the desired outcome (the session aims and objectives). Garrison (1997) stresses that this control does not have to be independent, and instead is a collaboration with others, which can be compared to a Vygotskian approach to learning (i.e. scaffolding). 

To explain this in the context of my own teaching, my role as a tutor on a first year statistics module is to assist students with completing worksheets on running statistical tests and designing research studies. In Garrison’s model, as a tutor I am a resource available to the students. When a student identifies that they need help (self-monitoring) they show motivation by approaching a tutor, take control of the learning context (a live session where tutors are available on MS Teams), and select a resource (the tutor). Of course, a large part of degree level learning is about the selection of multiple resources and identifying important elements of each to acquire a well-rounded knowledge base, therefore it is imperative that I encourage students to seek other resources too, thus encouraging SDL and increasing their range of knowledge. Therefore when a student asks a question, I often suggest that they seek other resources before I tell them the answers, for example the lecture presentation slides, statistical test decision tree charts and text books. This gives the student a range of ideas, rather than just “spoon feeding” the answers. This can be seen as the collaboration that Garrison refers to, between the tutor and the student. 

To conclude, the distance associated with online learning can actually prove beneficial to the student, by encouraging more SDL. 

References: 

Song, L., & Hill, J. R. (2007). A conceptual model for understanding self-directed learning in online environments. Journal of Interactive Online Learning, 6(1), 27-42.

Comment:

Online teaching has definitely opened up opportunities to explore new tools and methods of more effective learning and even of more personalised learning. Self-directed learning does require more skills of self-management and time management. Students gain some control during the learning process which can improve their motivation. Attention needs to be given though on the different needs of students, which means the teacher needs to provide the tools and mechanisms to support them. (Maria Bada, Information Security) 

Teaching teachers to teach associative structures. (Rebecca Crowley)

It has long been known that a deep-level approach to teaching and learning is preferred to surface-level approaches (Biggs, 1999). Specifically, when a student is taught in a way that engages ideas and causes them to extract deeper and inter-related meanings behind concepts, this benefits their learning and memory. Why, then, does much teaching still focus on “learning enough to pass the exam” and rote learning facts, dates, and references?

Recently, scientists in the learning and memory literature have begun to investigate how linking to-be-remembered items benefits memory (Joensen et al., 2020). Specifically, participants were presented with word triplets containing a location, a person, and an object, and they were asked to imagine each element interacting and to remember them for a subsequent memory test. Crucially, half of the word triplets were presented with a missing link. For example, for a word triplet consisting of Obama-Hammer-Kitchen, participants might only be presented with Obama-Hammer and Hammer-Kitchen but never the Obama-Kitchen link. After running statistical analyses, the results showed that when participants were presented with all of the elements together, their memory for one item (e.g. Hammer) was highly related to their memory for the other items (e.g. Kitchen and Obama). In contrast, if participants were presented with the elements with a missing link, their memory for all of the items would fragment. This study comes from a body of literature demonstrating that when we present information in a way that creates an associative structure, the strength and completeness of that memory is maintained, whereas the memory trace breaks down in the brain as soon as information is presented in a way that lacks an associative structure.

Evidence such as this demonstrates the need for curricula to be designed in a way that helps teachers to form associative structures behind information that students need to learn. In this way, students will no longer be playing the exam game where they need to learn to answer questions in a specific way or rote learn enough information in the two weeks before an exam to then forget it 3 days after. Instead, students will be forming memories about their subjects that can be maintained long-term. This is surely the purpose of teaching afterall.

References 

Biggs, J. (1999). Teaching for Quality Learning at University.SHRE and Open University Press

Joensen, B. H., Gaskell, M. G., & Horner, A. J. (2020). United we fall: All-or-none forgetting of complex episodic events. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General,

 149(2), 230.http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/xge0000648

Response: 

Thank you Rebecca - this is such a great topic to consider. There is so much more accessible information out there, (and at the click of a button), that it can muddy the objective.  Understanding how best to get a message across to a student that sticks is invaluable. Herman Ebbinghaus was the first psychologist to systematically study learning and memory. He concluded that forgetting facts is most rapid in the first nine hours. If however, those facts are associated with something meaningful then they are remembered for ten times longer than prosaic facts. And, if those meaningful things are over-learned or studied beyond mastery, they are remembered for even longer. 

Gordon Bower took this a step further and investigated the effect of emotion on memory. His work on 'mood dependent retrieval' is seminal work that concluded that if a person learns something when they are happy, it is easier for them to recall when they are once again happy. Events and emotions are stored together. The upshot of this is facilitating a happy environment and teaching a student within that, facilitates a greater chance of recall. He termed this 'Mood-congruent processing'. The associative structure that you speak of may be intangibles, such as comfortable environment and approachable lecturer.

(1) Ebbinghaus, H (1885) Memory: A contribution to Experimental Psychology

(2) Bower, G.H (1981)  Mood and Memory

Kish Alam (English)

How to get students to contribute in a digital classroom (Jasmine Virhia)

The way in which we teach and the way in which students learn has drastically changed since the start of 2020. Academics and students alike have adapted incredibly quickly to what has now become “the new normal” but getting students to engage in discussions has often been like pulling teeth! This was more so at the start of the pandemic when we were all adjusting to new teaching and learning methods and thankfully, classes are now a lot more fluid and interactive. Here are two lists, the first details the issues I noted whilst teaching online and the second is how I overcame them.

1. Online class etiquette- lateness, noise. (See A below)

2. No cameras on meaning no visual feedback for me as a teacher, “speaking into the void” as it were. (See B below)

3. Very few, if any, students contributing to discussion when given the opportunity. (See C below)

4. When they did discuss, all agreed with each other evidencing “group think” and “information cascading.” (See D below)

A) Sending out an email with general rules, please enter the call with your microphone muted especially if you are arriving late to the session. Reiterating this at the start of each session for future reference. Being understanding that of course, we all have technical malfunctions and accidents happen so not to worry if it did. The rules are just in place to make it a better experience for all of us.

B) Explaining that it’s very hard to know whether students are following the content so some reassuring nods would be great. If they really don’t wish to put their cameras on, they could send emoji’s in the chat (happy, sad, confused…dependent on what was being discussed).

C) Again, if students were uncomfortable with speaking on camera, I would suggest use of the chat box function however I strongly advocated for cameras on and verbal discussion. My manner of speaking whilst teaching is not unnecessarily formal. I’ve been told I’m very easy to speak to and I feel like students find me approachable so after one or two awkward sessions, most students in small group classes did verbally participate. I also reinforced that this type of contact with their peers would be beneficial for their mental health and improve their skills should they be interviewing for roles or starting jobs in the near future.

D) Ensuring that not all the same students spoke in the same order (i.e., those most happy to speak first). Whilst I avoided singling students out, I would say that I am working clockwise from the faces or names I can see on my screen. This meant that everyone was to required to participate (writing in the chat if they preferred) and meant that different opinions were heard. I also used anonymous polls to gather opinions and relay these to the group to avoid information cascade. 

Response:

I also have an experience that all students put their cameras off despite my constant requests. In this respect, I think this post is very useful as teachers have to adapt themselves to dramatically changed education settings into online sessions. (Kim Jongsoo, Management)

Breaking into the Breakout Room (Ryan Jefferies)

Breakout rooms on Microsoft Teams offer a semi-private zone beyond the main virtual classroom. Here are two perceived barriers to using breakout rooms, and my small breakthrough.  

Barrier 1: Group size

I teach research methods and statistics to undergraduate psychology students. During our weekly Lab classes there is plenty of classroom discussion, a bit of interpretive dance as I try to animate statistical theory, and many group activities. Depending on the activity, in a face-to-face class of roughly forty learners, the groups can range between two to eight students. Now, I also teach a separate class of six students who are enrolled for online learning. Therefore, my initial reasoning was: if a group of six works well face-to-face, no need to break up my online group. 

Barrier 2: Disrupting the flow

Some group activities work well with pairs (e.g., Cooper et al., 2021), but I decided the whole button-pressing process would disrupt the flow, wasting valuable discussion time. When it came to group activities, I encouraged my six students to work together and then I stepped into the virtual background. This seemed to work well and feedback from my students was positive.

Breakthrough: Not the virtual background

From necessity, I was pushed to overcome these barriers. Findings: when the activity and timing is right, the breakout room is not disruptive, it is liberating. I noticed my quieter students discussing ideas more freely in pairs. Under the cloak of semi-privacy they seemed less concerned about making mistakes. The constructive chatter that frequently fills a face-to-face class had occurred less often in my online classes. I’d falsely blamed the online medium, but there was a bigger issue at hand: my big head. When I’d metaphorically stepped into the virtual background (i.e., turning off my mic) my big head was still central in the virtual classroom. Turning off my camera wasn’t going to fool anyone either, but the breakout rooms worked.

In my effort to be a friendly guide, I sometimes forget my presence is weighted by a student’s prior experience with teachers (i.e., my big friendly head hangs over them in perceived judgement). A little semi-privacy removed that pressure and worked wonders. I was pleased to find an insightful study conducted by Chandler (2016) corroborated my experience. The author also pointed out something key. The only actual barriers to breakout room use, were my skills and confidence as a teacher. Breakthrough!

References

Chandler, K. (2016). Using Breakout Rooms in Synchronous Online Tutorials. Perspectives in Applied Academic Practice, 4(3), pp. 16-23. https://doi.org/10.14297/jpaap.v4i3.216

Cooper, K. M., Schinske, J. N., and Tanner, K. D. (2021). Reconsidering the Share of Think-Pair-Share: Emerging Limitations, Alternatives, and Opportunities for Research. Life Sciences Education, 20(1). DOI:10.1187/cbe.20-08-0200

From Zoom to face-to-face (Gaia Giampietro)

Teaching was significantly altered at the start of 2020, due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. Therefore, as expected, many helpful T&L Space blog posts have been written about adapting to online teaching. However, Universities are now returning to face-to-face teaching, and this change has presented its own set of challenges, which need to be discussed. The majority of undergraduate students were adolescents when online learning started to be implemented as a COVID-19 safety measure. Adolescence is a developmental stage, in which individuals refine personal relationships and social skills (Shaffer & Kipp, 2013). As a consequence, I have noticed that students now feel uncomfortable vocalising their opinions in class, and even talking to one another. This issue might moreover be amplified by an increase in cognitive demands compared to online learning; individuals have in fact been observed to perform better in complex tasks when presented with minor social demands (Bond & Titus, 1983).

Therefore, during the academic year, I developed a few strategies which helped students become more confident, and improved their learning experience. After a first very difficult session, I decided to instruct students to work in small groups, trying to implement collaborative learning, as this has been suggested to enhance socio-emotional features of interpersonal relationships (Gillies, 2016). At first, students seemed not to be able to work in these small groups; after a couple of sessions, however, they started getting to know each other, and their confidence quickly increased, leading to good class discussions. In addition to this, I decided to frequently utilise a tool which they became well acquainted with during online learning: Mentimeter. This effectively helped promote interactivity in class, as students were able to ask questions and provide peer feedback anonymously, as they used to do on Zoom. These strategies indubitably increased students’ confidence in their social and academic skills, leading to very pleasant sessions.

References:

Bond, C. F., & Titus, L. J. (1983). Social facilitation: a meta-analysis of 241 studies. Psychological bulletin, 94(2), 265.

Gillies, R. M. (2016). Cooperative learning: Review of research and practice. Australian Journal of Teacher Education (Online), 41(3), 39-54.

Shaffer, D. R., & Kipp, K. (2013). Developmental psychology: Childhood and adolescence. Cengage Learning.

Teaching in a Post-Pandemic Classroom (Gemma Rides)  

I started teaching in January 2022, just as the UK was exiting their (hopefully) last COVID-19 lockdown. I was excited to start my face-to-face small-group teaching classes and was looking forward to expressing my interest and enthusiasm about the subject and facilitating interesting class discussions with the students. However, within the first half an hour, it was evident that the students did not like speaking in front of the class. Class discussions consisted of me posing a question to the class and twenty blank-looking faces staring back at me. It dawned on me that for the past two years, these students had experienced minimal face-to-face teaching or interactions with their peers. Their normal was to talk on the MS Teams chat with their video and microphone off, so the idea of returning to an in-person classroom setting may have been anxiety-provoking for some students (Mind, 2021). 

Throughout the term, I implemented the following tips to develop a learning environment that encourages more student participation in a post-pandemic classroom: 

1. Change your activities if they are not going as planned: At first, I introduced more group discussions opposed to class discussions. This was received well by the students, and they appeared more comfortable to share their ideas to the rest of the class after a brief discussion with their peers.  

2. Be wary when cold-calling on students: Although cold-calling can be useful in some situations (Dallimore et al., 2012), it has also been shown to increase embarrassment for students if they do not know the answer, and therefore might be less likely to participate in the future (Marangell, 2021). Instead, I used alternative strategies to generate class-level participation, such as asking each group in advance to nominate an individual that will feedback their ideas. 

3. Introduce digital tools: Using digital tools in the class increased student engagement. I used Mentimeter frequently as it allowed for quieter students to participate in class discussions whilst keeping their responses anonymous. 

References 

Dallimore, E. J., Hertenstein, J. H., & Platt, M. B. (2012). Impact of Cold-Calling on Student Voluntary Participation. Journal of Management Education, 37(3), 305–341. https://doi.org/10.1177/1052562912446067 

Marangell, S. (2021). Asking Questions to Support Student Learning in Class: Strategies and Tips for Small-Group Teaching. Melbourne Centre for the Study of Higher Education. https://melbourne-cshe.unimelb.edu.au/data/assets/pdf_file/0006/3637923/asking-questions-to-support-student-learning_final.pdf 

Mind (2021). Student mental health during coronavirus. https://www.mind.org.uk/information-support/coronavirus/student-mental-health-during-coronavirus/ 

Comment:

Thank you for sharing your experiences Gemma, it’s really useful to hear how you overcame the issue of engaging students to contribute to discussions. It’s particularly valuable to hear that getting them to discuss in smaller groups before feeding back to class is an effective alternative if class discussions are not quite working. I also wonder whether the use of ‘icebreakers’ particularly when teaching a series of seminars with the same group might also be useful, if students had not had the opportunity to get to know each other given the circumstances of COVID. A seminar lead that I observed recently also brought chocolate along which was really effective at turning an awkward atmosphere into a relaxed one! (Will Barnes, Geography) 

I completely agree with you Gemma- having been both a student during COVID and then a teacher coming out of COVID, I know those awkward silences all too well! I have also trialled these techniques with my class and found them to work well but the use of digital tools like Mentimeter have been revolutionary for my class! They stated that they felt more inclined to get involved than if I just asked for someone to give me an answer. (Courtney Hooton, Psychology)

The power of sharing (anonymous)

'Any fool can know. The point is to understand' - Albert Einstein. As education has become more accessible in the past decades, it has increased the feeling of competition within the educational system. There is always the need to get higher grades, access the best institutions and a drive to be 'the best'. This mentality leads to competition among students, where they see their peers are their competitors due to comparative standards. Comparisons start to affect students from the ages of 7 and 9 (Ruble and Frey, 1987). However, competition can strongly negatively influence the positive influence of peer support (To and Panadero, 2018). For this, students often resolve by working alone and in direct competition with their peers. 

As a demonstrator of statistic workshops, I am aware that this is a trait easily bred in this environment. Students will strive to get the right answer first, before their peers and before anyone in the class. Whilst this is evident in some students, this is not always the case. Nonetheless, I think it is important that this act of peer support and working in groups is encouraged more widely. There is a wealth of evidence emphasising the benefits of peer learning (Awan, 2021; Straub, 2019), not only in enhancing learning but also increasing the confidence as well as team-working skills of the learner (Markowski et al., 2021). These are all relevant real-world skills that a student should have. 

Due to competition, there might also be a tendency for students to superficially know the material but not understand it. Especially in statistics, it is easy to follow the steps given but not understand why each step is taken. However, evidence suggests that students that understand the concepts, compared to those that follow instructions, use their knowledge flexibly (Carpenter and Lehrer, 1999). This could lead to academic success as they can generalise their learning elsewhere and draw from past material to build their future knowledge. 

As a result, in these workshops, I hope to integrate more group discussion and teamwork. In this way, students can make maximise peer support. They could even gain explanations of concepts from peers that will be in an appropriate language for them to understand (academics can use unfamiliar jargons). These would improve student confidence and help them build novel skills. Importantly, exposure to peer influence, could help them realise the non-essential need for this competition and hopefully end years of academic competition. 

References:

Ruble, D. N., & Frey, K. S. (1987). Social comparison and self-evaluation in the classroom: Developmental changes in knowledge and function.

To, J., & Panadero, E. (2019). Peer assessment effects on the self-assessment process of first-year undergraduates. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 44(6), 920–932. https://doi.org/10.1080/02602938.2018.1548559 

Awan, O. A. (2021). Peer to Peer Learning: Its importance and benefits. Academic Radiology, 28(5), 747–748. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.acra.2021.01.032 

Straub, J. (2019). Assessment of the educational benefits produced by Peer Learning activities in cybersecurity. 2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition Proceedings. https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--32131 

Markowski, M., Bower, H., Essex, R., & Yearley, C. (2021). Peer learning and collaborative placement models in Health Care: A systematic review and qualitative synthesis of the literature. Journal of Clinical Nursing, 30(11-12), 1519–1541. https://doi.org/10.1111/jocn.15661 

Carpenter, T. P., & Lehrer, R. (1999). Teaching and Learning Mathematics With Understanding1. Mathematics Classrooms That Promote Understanding, 19.

How to teach students to learn more effectively (Cheng-Yu Hsieh)

As a PhD student in Cognitive Psychology, I find that rarely will lecturers, even if they are expert in cognitive psychology, will indicate “how to study in an efficient way” by applying some knowledge derived from cognitive science. I think it would be super useful and helpful for all teachers to tell students how to study and learn effectively. This essay consists of two parts:

1.       How to study?

It is useless to use rote memorisation. Research has shown that when stimuli are repeated for an extended period, participants' neuronal activity can diminish, a phenomenon known as fMRI repetition suppression (e.g. Larsson & Smith, 2012). This implies that mere repetition can make content more monotonous and lead to superficial encoding, resulting in poor memory retention (Sporer, 1991). Bloom's taxonomy on learning aligns with this idea, emphasizing the need for deep processing of material (see Chandio et al., 2016 for review).

To facilitate deeper learning, it is crucial to connect new knowledge to prior knowledge and apply it to everyday life. By doing so, newly acquired knowledge becomes anchored to already well-consolidated information, creating more connections in the brain. This approach stands in contrast to the shallow processing that often results from mere repetition of stimuli. By encouraging deep processing, we can ensure that students are better equipped to retain and apply what they have learned, creating a more meaningful and enduring learning experience.

2.       How to revise?

After a period of studying, it is quite useful if we try to retrieve the materials that have been revised by giving us a brief test. Research has shown that practicing retrieval of previously studied materials, commonly known as testing effects, can significantly enhance long-term retention of information (e.g. Roediger & Karpicke, 2006). Learners who tested themselves after studying retained information more effectively compared to those who did not. In other words, actively recalling information rather than simply re-reading notes is a more effective way to consolidate knowledge. Moreover, another powerful means of retrieval practice is teaching. The Feynman technique, named after the Nobel Prize-winning physicist Richard Feynman, involves teaching a concept as if you were explaining it to someone else (e.g. Reyes et al., 2021). This technique not only enhances the learner's understanding of the concept but also improves their ability to apply it to different contexts.

This testing effect is sometimes correlated with the so-called spacing effect (e.g. Delaney et al., 2010), which indicates that taking a rest between learning session is very important to memory retention. This finding highlights the importance of taking breaks between study sessions to consolidate the knowledge acquired.

References:

Chandio, M. T., Pandhiani, S. M., & Iqbal, R. (2016). Bloom’s taxonomy: Improving assessment and teaching-learning process. Journal of Education and Educational Development, 3(2).

Delaney, P. F., Verkoeijen, P. P., & Spirgel, A. (2010). Spacing and testing effects: A deeply critical, lengthy, and at times discursive review of the literature. Psychology of learning and motivation, 53, 63-147.

Larsson, J., & Smith, A. T. (2012). fMRI repetition suppression: neuronal adaptation or stimulus expectation?. Cerebral cortex, 22(3), 567-576.

Reyes, E. P., Blanco, R. M. F. L., Doroon, D. R. L., Limana, J. L. B., & Torcende, A. M. A. (2021). Feynman technique as a heutagogical learning strategy for independent and remote learning. Recoletos Multidisciplinary Research Journal, 9(2), 1-13.

Roediger III, H. L., & Karpicke, J. D. (2006). The power of testing memory: Basic research and implications for educational practice. Perspectives on psychological science, 1(3), 181-210.

Sporer, S. L. (1991). Deep—deeper—deepest? Encoding strategies and the recognition of human faces. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 17(2), 323.

Creating Inclusive Spaces in Small Group Teaching (Elizabeth)
For some students, small group teaching can seem daunting. The perceived anonymity of a lecture theatre fades, often going from learning in a group of over 250 to less than 30. The anxieties that may naturally come with this change may be exacerbated for people who don’t feel like they fit the mould of a traditional university student. 

It would be thoughtless as teachers to assume that every student has the same previous and current experiences and circumstances. This can be true for the knowledge and academic skills students may have had the opportunity to learn (e.g., having previously studied psychology, an opportunity which may not be equal across socioeconomic demographics), as well as the ‘social’ elements of studying in Higher Education (for example, knowing the terms often used in HE, or navigating the structures of HE – particularly salient for first-generation university students). 

So how can we adapt our teaching to include students of all backgrounds, especially when we do not have organisational input or complete discretion over the content we teach? How do we cater to all of our students without leaving someone out? I pose two methods informed by pedagogic literature that I have found personally helpful in doing this:

First, we can use evidence-based principles uncovered in pedagogic research such as the Universal Design for Learning principles. These aim to accommodate diverse learning needs by providing several pathways, through multiple different methods of representation, expression, and engagement. For example, in a seminar, we can use a range of visual aids, applied tasks, group work, individual work etc. This makes our teaching more inclusive because students can choose tasks that align with their preferences and goals, whilst still giving them the opportunity to stretch themselves with one of the alternative tasks (e.g., Rose, 2000). 

Secondly, pedagogic research has indicated that by integrating the cultural backgrounds and experiences of students into teaching (Culturally Responsive Teaching), we can validate students’ identities, increase their sense of belonging, and therefore bolster their academic success (e.g., Ladson-Billings, 1995). Reflection on our own biases, incorporating culturally diverse materials into our teaching, and collaborating with colleagues (especially those with differing experiences to us) are three ways in which we can begin to implement Culturally Responsive Teaching.

References:

Ladson-Billings, G. (1995). Toward a theory of culturally relevant pedagogy. American Educational Research Journal, 32(3), 465-491.

Rose, D. (2000). Universal design for learning. Journal of Special Education Technology, 15(4), 47-51.

Bringing the words to life (Courtney Hooton)

We’ve all been there- spending weeks stressing over a presentation, making sure your slides are pristine and you know exactly what to say on each slide. The day arrives and you feel you delivered the presentation beautifully just for the assessor to say that you were just reading from the slides.

Slides are a helpful resource in teaching, and it is easy to just read straight from the screen. However, this will likely leave your students frustrated and wondering why they bothered coming when they can just read the presentation at home (Voss, 2004). Over the course of the year, I have learnt the following with regards to what does/doesn’t work with using slides while teaching (the main thing being do not just read from your slides!):

1)  Keep text on slides to a minimum: As tempting as it is to cram as much information on the slides as possible, this is actually a surefire way to lose your students’ attention. Cognitive load theory dictates that working memory has a limit, meaning there is only so much information people can take in in one go (van Merrienboer & Ayres, 2005). By overloading slides with text, students are less likely to take in the information. Stick to short bullet points that you can elaborate on rather than whole chunks of text as this will be easier for your students to digest.                                                             

2)  Include pictures, animations, graphs etc.: Instead of just listing all the information, include a diagram that explains it instead or include images so students can visualize what you are explaining. Research by Pate and Posey (2016) compared the efficiency of a PowerPoint presentation containing only text to a PowerPoint presentation on the same topic but included text, images and animations. From this, they found that students performed better on a topic exam when they learnt from the multimedia PowerPoint compared to the students that learnt from the text-only PowerPoint

References

Voss, D. (2004). Points of view: Powerpoint in the classroom. Cell Biology Education, 3(3), 155–156. https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.04-06-0045

van Merriënboer, J. J., & Ayres, P. (2005). Research on cognitive load theory and its design implications for e-learning. Educational Technology Research and Development, 53(3), 5–13. https://doi.org/10.1007/bf02504793

Pate, A., & Posey, S. (2016). Effects of applying multimedia design principles in Powerpoint lecture redesign. Currents in Pharmacy Teaching and Learning, 8(2), 235–239. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cptl.2015.12.014