Category Archives: Education Research

The Great Student Disengagement

With excitement and anticipation for a “return to normal,” faculty, staff and administrators were especially excited to launch Spring semester 2022.  People were vaccinated, students would be attending class with their peers on campus, and extracurricular activities would return to campus. However, it was soon discovered that a return to campus would not mean a return to “normal.”

In addition to the period of “great resignation” and “great retirement,” we soon discovered that a return to campus could be described as the “great student disengagement.”  Faculty observed concerning student behaviors that impacted academic success. Students on our campus have been vocal about their desire to remain at home and on MS TEAMS/ZOOM©. Classroom sessions were required to shift and were often a mixed modality (high flex) as students and faculty underwent COVID protocols that required remote attendance. In a curriculum in which all sessions are mandatory (approximately 20 hours each week in a flipped environment), students requested far more absences in the spring semester than ever before. Even when students were physically present in class, blatant disengagement was observed by faculty.  Attempts to appeal to students’ sense of responsibility and professionalism had little impact in changing behavior.

In attending the Chairs of Physiology meeting at Experimental Biology (EB), student disengagement was an impactful topic of discussion. Somewhat surprisingly, it quickly became apparent that the environment on our campus was somewhat ubiquitous across all institutions of higher education represented in the room that day. Although we shared similar observations, few potential solutions were offered.

Serendipitously, on the final day of EB meetings, the Chronicle of Higher Education published an article by Beth McMurtrie titled “A Stunning Level of Student Disconnection.”  The article shared insight gained from faculty interviews representing a wide range of institutions:  community colleges, large public universities, small private colleges, and some highly selective institutions. Ms. McMurtrie shared stories of faculty who described how students’ brains are “shutting off” and limiting their ability to recall information. The article reports that far fewer students show up to class, those who do attend often avoid speaking, and many students openly admit that they do not prepare for class or complete assignments. Faculty commonly described students as defeated, exhausted, and overwhelmed.

Although specific causes of the “great student disengagement” have not been substantiated, many believe it is the after-math of the pandemic. It seems plausible that the learning environment became more individualized and flexible with fluid deadlines and greater accommodations during the pandemic. Thus, a return to normal expectations has been difficult.

It also seems reasonable that amid the more pressing issues of life (deaths within families, financial struggles, spread of disease), students are reporting high levels of stress, anxiety and general decline in mental health. Perhaps being absent or disengaging while in class (being on cell phones/computers, frequently leaving the room) are simply avoidance mechanisms that allow the student to cope.

Although post pandemic conditions have brought student disengagement to our awareness, some faculty have seen this coming for years.  In a 2020 Perspectives on Medical Education article by Sara Lamb et al. titled “Learning from failure: how eliminating required attendance sparked the beginning of a medical school transformation,” the authors reported low attendance rates, at times as low as 10%, which they attempted to fix with a mandatory attendance policy.  However, over the next six years, student dissatisfaction rose due to the inflexible and seemingly patronizing perception of the policy. This led students to strategize ways to subvert the policies while administration spent significant time attempting to enforce them.  To address the situation, the school transitioned away from required to “encouraged” and “expected” for learning activities.  This yielded both positive and negative results, including but not limited to: increased attendance to non-recorded activities which students deemed beneficial to their learning; reduced attendance to activities that were routinely recorded and posted leading to increased faculty discouragement; reduced administrative burden and tension; and increased student failure rate and feelings of isolation and loneliness.  The authors go on to describe efforts to mitigate the negative outcomes including empowering faculty with student engagement data, and training in active learning pedagogies to enhance student engagement.

As the definitions and root causes of student disengagement pre-date COVID and are somewhat ambiguous, finding effective solutions will be difficult. Perhaps the rapid evolution of teaching and learning brought about by COVID now dictates an evolution of the academic experience and the rise of scholarly projects to address both causes and solutions.

Suggestions on solving the disengagement crisis were published by Tobias Wilson-Bates and a host of contributing authors in the Chronicle of Higher Education dated May 11, 2022. Although we will leave it up to the reader to learn more by directly accessing the article, a list of topics is helpful to recognize the variety of approaches:

  1. Make Authentic Human Connections
  2. Respect Priorities
  3. Provide Hope
  4. Require Student Engagement
  5. Acknowledge that Students are Struggling
  6. Fight Against Burnout

Although we rely on faculty to address student disengagement, it is also useful to consider the stressful environment of faculty. In addition to experiencing the same COVID conditions that students experience, faculty are being asked to continue to provide up-to-date content, utilize engaging teaching modalities, become skillful small group facilitators, as well as advise, coach and provide career counseling.  It is perhaps not surprising that faculty may also feel stressed, isolated, and burned out, surmising that nothing they do makes much difference – opting instead to remain hopeful that students will bounce back.

Regardless of the learning environment on your campus, it is safe to say that now is the time to come together as faculty, students and administrators to discuss the best path forward. Collectively we can work together to set solutions into motion and gather evidence for our effectiveness. It is time to leverage our shared experiences and lessons learned over the past several years of transitioning away from and back into face-to-face classroom instruction. Such reflection and study will support teaching and learning as we all seek to find a “new normal” that meets the needs of students, faculty, and administration alike.

Lamb, Sara & Chow, Candace & Lindsley, Janet & Stevenson, Adam & Roussel, Danielle & Shaffer, Kerri & Samuelson, Wayne. (2020). Learning from failure: how eliminating required attendance sparked the beginning of a medical school transformation. Perspectives on Medical Education. 9. 10.1007/s40037-020-00615-y.

A Stunning Level of Student Disconnection  https://www.chronicle.com/article/a-stunning-level-of-student-disconnection

How to Solve the Student Disengagement Crisis https://www.chronicle.com/article/how-to-solve-the-student-disengagement-crisis

 

Mari Hopper, PhD, is an Associate Dean for Pre-Clinical Education at Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine where she facilitates the collaboration of faculty curricular leadership and their engagement with staff in curricular operations.  Dr Hopper’s areas of professional interest include curricular development, delivery and management; continuous quality improvement including process efficiency and the development of positive learning environments and work culture; and mentorship of trainees in medical education.
Leah Sheridan, PhD, is a Professor of Physiology Instruction at Ohio University Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine where she serves in curriculum innovation, development and leadership. Dr. Sheridan’s areas of professional interest include the scholarship of teaching and learning, physiology education, and curriculum development.
Call for Papers: Physiology Core Concepts

In 2011, Michael and McFarland (1) described 15 core concepts of physiology, as defined by physiology educators. The core concepts provide an objectives-based teaching approach focused on the learning of unifying physiological concepts that can be applied across the discipline. Educators have used the core concepts to design and organize courses (2), as well as physiology-related curricula (3). Over the last 10 years, the core concepts have been further explained (4) and revisited (2). However, there remains a gap in the current understanding about how educators are using and assessing the core concepts in their own classrooms.

Advances in Physiology Education is issuing a Call for Papers to address this gap and highlight the work of educators implementing the core concepts in their teaching. We hope this work will demonstrate whether and how the implementation of the core concepts results in gains in student understanding of physiology. We encourage submissions from diverse perspectives and welcome authors from any career stage or title, a variety of educational institutions, and varying levels of education research experience.

To be considered for this Call, authors must first submit an abstract/pre-submission inquiry for review. If the abstract/pre-submission inquiry is accepted, the authors will receive a formal invitation to submit their article, which will then undergo the regular review process (see ABSTRACT SUBMISSION GUIDELINES below).

POTENTIAL TOPICS FOR MANUSCRIPT SUBMISSIONS:
A broad range of manuscript topics will be considered, including but not limited to:

  1. Impact of core concept-based strategies on student learning;
  2. Successful strategies for the implementation of the core concepts by instructors;
  3. Curricular development centered on the core concepts;
  4. Teaching of core concepts as a tool for more inclusive classrooms.

KEY CHARACTERISTICS OF SUBMISSIONS
Articles reporting original research will be prioritized, but reviews and perspectives submitted as essays will be considered as well. To be publishable in this special collection of Advances, scholarly work must:

  1. Connect in some way to the use of the physiology core concepts with students, instructors, programs, or innovations;
  2. Have implications for the use of core concepts in education research and practice;
  3. Align with one of the established article types currently listed here: https://journals.physiology.org/advances/article-types

ABSTRACT SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
Submitted abstracts should include the following and should be 300-500 words:

  • TITLE
  • AUTHOR(S): Include name(s), institutional affiliation(s) and email address(es); submissions are welcome from all.
  • NARRATIVE: Provide brief description of focus of anticipated manuscript submission, including 1) connection to students, instructors, programs, or innovations, 2) implications for biology education researchers and practitioners, and 3) align with one of the established article types in Advances in Physiology Education.
  • HOW TO SUBMIT ABSTRACTS: Abstracts/pre-submission inquiries should be submitted online by end of January 2022 for evaluation by the Guest Editors at https://advances.msubmit.net/cgi-bin/main.plex/submit
  • SELECT CALL FOR PAPERS: During the online submission process, under the “Keywords & Special Sections” tab, please use the “Category” drop-down menu and select “Call for Papers: Physiology Core Concepts.”
  • ABSTRACT REVIEW: Feedback on all submitted abstracts/pre-submission inquiries will be provided to authors by the end of February 2022 after review by the editorial team to ensure that a range of topics and viewpoints are represented in this special collection.
  • OPPORTUNITIES FOR CLARIFICATIONS AND SUPPORT: Interested authors are welcome to contact Advances Editor-in-Chief Barb Goodman (Barb.Goodman@usd.edu).
  • Contact Ed Dwyer (edwyer@physiology.org) with any submission issues.
  • MANUSCRIPT SUBMISSION: After evaluation of abstracts/pre-submission inquiries, authors who are encouraged to submit a full manuscript should do so by the end of May 2022.

References

  1. Michael J, McFarland J. The core principles (“big ideas”) of physiology: results of faculty surveys. Adv Physiol Educ 35: 336–341, 2011. https://doi.org/10.1152/advan.00004.2011.
  2. Michael J, McFarland J. Another look at the core concepts of physiology: revisions and resources. Adv Physiol Educ 44: 752–762, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1152/advan.00114.2020.
  3. Stanescu CI, Wehrwein EA, Anderson LC, Rogers J. Evaluation of core concepts of physiology in undergraduate physiology curricula: results from faculty and student surveys. Adv Physiol Educ 44: 632–639, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1152/advan.00187.2019.
  4. Michael J, Cliff W, McFarland J, Modell H, Wright A. What Are the Core Concepts of Physiology? In: The Core Concepts of Physiology: A New Paradigm for Teaching Physiology, edited by Michael J, Cliff W, McFarland J, Modell H, Wright A. New York, NY: Springer-Verlag, 2017, p. 27–36. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-6909-8.

About Advances in Physiology Education

Advances in Physiology Education promotes and disseminates educational scholarship to enhance teaching and learning of physiology, neuroscience, and pathophysiology. The journal publishes peer-reviewed descriptions of innovations that improve teaching in the classroom and laboratory, essays on education, and review articles based on our current understanding of physiological mechanisms. Submissions that evaluate new technologies for teaching and research, and educational pedagogy, are especially welcome. The audience for the journal includes educators at all levels: K–12, undergraduate, graduate, and professional programs.

 

Course-based Research Experiences Help Transfer Students Transition

As transfer student numbers increase at 4-year institutions, we need to provide opportunities for the formation of learning communities and research experience. Course-based research experiences allows for both. Students receive course credit toward their degree, work on independent research, and engage with peers and faculty in a small setting.

Several studies have been conducted to show the advantages of undergraduate research as a value-added experience. (1,2,4,6,8). As an R1 university, we have a tremendous amount of resources devoted to STEM research – but we are unable to accommodate all of our undergraduates who are looking for lab experience. The development of course-based research experiences (CUREs) across colleges and universities has increased the availability of research opportunities for undergraduates. (1,3,5). In addition, they have provided an increased sense of community and interaction with faculty – two factors that were highly valued by all students. The question for us was how can we provide more of these courses given space and personnel constraints and are there student populations that might benefit more directly from these courses?

Several years ago, we increased the number of transfer students we accepted from community colleges and elsewhere. But there was no transfer-specific programming for those students and they had little sense of community. Transfer students tend to be a much more diverse student population in several ways. Their average age is higher than our incoming first-year class, they are more likely to be PELL Grant-eligible (40% of transfer vs 20% of first-year students), first-generation college students (30% of transfer vs 15% of first-year students) and are more likely to work and live off-campus. Although they recognize the value of community and research experience according to surveys, they often state they don’t have the time to invest as they are trying to graduate as quickly as possible.

We received a grant through HHMI (in part) to train faculty to develop CUREs specifically for transfer students. STEM courses that “counted toward graduation” was a way to get buy-in from the students and to be funded by grants and aid. All transfer students needed additional life science courses to complete their degree, and this was a course that wasn’t transferred in through the community colleges so there was space in their degree audits. These were small enrollment courses that lent themselves to forming cohorts of student learning communities as they proposed hypotheses, designed and implemented their experiments, and presented their findings to the class. This allowed transfer students to receive course credit toward graduation in a lower-stress way during that first transition semester.

Course-based Research Experiences Help Transfer Students Transition

Lisa Parks 9.30.2021

Figure 1

Cell Biology CURE Example:

Testing whether environmental compounds or other chemicals induce cell death

Protocols Provided:  Cell seeding and growth, Cell counting, Measuring cytotoxicity, Bradford Assay, Western Blot, Immunofluorescent Analysis

There are thousands of chemicals and compounds that either potentially affect cell growth, metabolism, and death.

This project has a lot of room for student individuality. Students could do endocrine disruptors, for example, or Parkinson’s disease related compounds (i.e., things that kill mitochondria), environmental toxicants, heavy metals, etc. They could test across cell types, concentrations, diseases, etc.  They could use the cancer cells and we could get a screen of compounds. Or they can pre-dose with a potential protectant (GSH?) and then expose the cells to something toxic to see if cell death can be attenuated.

This is particularly important because one issue we struggle with is that students with a 2-year associates degree automatically receive credit for all general education requirements through the NC Articulation Agreement. This means that transfer students are left with stacks of required difficult STEM courses with little opportunity to balance their course load for their remaining semesters. In addition, they are often trying to graduate “on time” so they are starting at a new, much larger, state university with little formal introductory programming and often, unfairly heavy STEM course loads. This isn’t the best way to set these students up for success. We found our transfer students falling behind in GPA and time to graduation. Tracking transfer students that take these first-semester CUREs will help us see if this approach increases student retention in the STEM majors, their graduation rates, and through surveys, their feelings of community at NCSU.

Teams of tenured or tenure-track research faculty and teaching-track faculty along with a handful of post-docs continue to develop these courses. As you can imagine, COVID interrupted this effort as we scrambled to go online and closed our lab spaces to undergraduates, but the CURE development continued.  Anecdotally, we noticed an increased collaboration and a sense of community among the faculty that extended beyond the workshop training. This has been seen in several studies at other institutions (7,9). As these labs have been developed, it has led to increased team teaching, research projects, and publications. Teaching faculty have had another mechanism for staying current and being engaged in research and literature while giving them another outlet for scholarly work. Research faculty have had another mechanism for exploring side projects that they may not have had the time or funds to pursue in their own labs and allowing them an opportunity to get into the classroom.

Faculty write up or discuss a proposal with each other – an idea that they wish they had time or space to devote to. It’s typically no more than a page. Students take it from there. They spend the first third of the semester learning techniques and protocols, and writing their experimental designs. The rest of the semester is devoted to implementing their experiments, presenting results and receiving feedback at weekly lab meetings, and re-working or replicating their experiments. Final findings are presented as a poster session in our main lobby where all faculty and students are encouraged to stop by. A sample CURE is provided in the box.

As this approach to teaching has increased in our department, it has begun to influence space allocation within the buildings. We are beginning to influence how future buildings are designed and how renovations to existing space can accommodate this approach. We have begun to question whether we need large amphitheaters for 300+ students in a classroom and we are starting to see how we can divide up that space into learning labs and rooms with moveable chairs and tables – facilities that will promote the formation of learning communities and critical thinking skills as opposed to memorization of content.

Thank you to Dana Thomas and Jill Anderson for collecting and providing data about our transfer students.

REFERENCES

  1. Auchincloss LS, Laursen SL, Branchaw JL, Eagan K, Graham M, Hanauer DI, Lawrie G, McLinn CM, Pelaez N, Rowland S, Towns M, Trautmann NM, Varma-Nelson P, Weston TJ, Dolan EL. Assessment of Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experiences: A Meeting Report. CBE Life Sci Educ 13(1):29-40, 2014.
  2. Banasik MD, Dean JL. Non-Tenure Track Faculty and Learning Communities: Bridging the Divide to Enhance Teaching Quality. Inn Higher Educ 41: 333-342, 2016.
  3. Bangera G, Brownell SE. Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experiences Can Make Scientific Research More Inclusive. CBE Life Sci Educ 13: 602-606, 2014.
  4. Beckham J, Metola P, Strong L. Year-long Research Experiences in Drug Discovery May lead to Positive Outcomes for Transfer Students. FASEB Journal 31:S1. 589.8, 2017.
  5. Eagan MK, Hurtado S, Chang MJ, Garcia GA, Herrera FA, Garibay JC. Making a Difference in Science Education: The Impact of Undergraduate Research Programs. Am Educ Res J 50:683-713, 2013.
  6. Griswold W. Launching Sustainability Leadership: Long-Term Impacts on Educational and Career Paths in Undergraduate Research Experiences. J Coll Sci Teach 49:19-23, 2019.
  7. Kezar A. Spanning the Great Divide Between Tenure-Track and Non-Tenure-Track Faculty, Change: The Magazine of Higher Learning, 44:6, 6-13, 2012. DOI: 10.1080/00091383.2012.728949
  8. Nagda BA, Gregerman SR, Jonides J, von Hippel W, Lerner JS. Undergraduate Student-Faculty Research Partnerships Affect Student Retention. Rev of Higher Educ 22:55-72, 1998.
  9. Ward HC, Selvester PM. Faculty Learning Communities: Improving Teaching in Higher Education, Educational Studies, 38:1, 111-121, DOI: 10.1080/03055698.2011.567029
Lisa Parks is a Professor of Teaching and Director of Undergraduate Programs in Biological Sciences at North Carolina State University. In addition to her regular teaching load of cell biology and advanced human physiology, she has helped develop several courses and is currently developing several course-based research opportunities for transfer students. She has been a participant, a mentor, and a current grant recipient with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute where she was bitten by the “research as pedagogy – inquiry-based learning – critical thinking” bug. She gladly drops what she is doing to talk about this. Lisa received her BS in Zoology from Duke University and her PhD in Biology with a concentration in cell physiology at Georgia State University.
Reworking the recipe: Adding experimentation and reflection to exercise physiology laboratories

What do you get when you follow a recipe? We suppose it depends on how carefully you follow the instructions, but assuming you stay true to the steps and have the requisite skills, you get something that approximates the taste described on the food blog (it never looks as good). While following a recipe can get you an expected result in the kitchen, it does not make you a chef—you probably will not learn to create new dishes, improve tired ones, or reverse-engineer your favorite take-out order. What do you do if you run out of vanilla!? We think the same is true in a science laboratory: You don’t develop the skills of a scientist by just following instructions. Sure, scientists follow instructions, but they also need to choose, create, and improve instructions. How do scientists become nimble with their craft? They experiment, make mistakes, troubleshoot, and iterate (or “Take chances, make mistakes, and get messy” for those who grew up with Miss Frizzle). If we asked you where undergraduate students learn to become scientists, we expect “laboratories” would be the most common answer, but unless laboratory activities are intentionally designed to develop the curiosity, creativity, and skills to pose and answer questions, they won’t produce adept scientists. In contrast to traditional laboratory activities, inquiry-based laboratory activities allow learners to develop important scientific skills.

Two years ago, we began a project aimed at improving student learning by replacing recipes with authentic science in exercise physiology laboratories. With one year remaining in our project, this blog post will explore our rationale, progress, and future plans.

Section 1: Put the scientist cookie-cutter back in the drawer

In undergraduate exercise physiology courses, laboratory-based learning is common, but it focuses more on students learning techniques than experimenting (9). In our experience, a typical undergraduate laboratory activity requires students to follow step-by-step procedures to measure one or more variables in a limited number of participants, most commonly their lab mates. Students administer exercise protocols on bikes, treadmills, and dynamometers to collect a variety of data, including oxygen uptake, heart rate, and muscle strength. These labs are largely descriptive. For example, a quintessential undergraduate exercise physiology laboratory involves performing a graded exercise test to measure the maximal rate of oxygen uptake (V̇O2max). Students assume the role of physiologist, repeatedly increasing the speed of a treadmill (or power output of a cycle ergometer) while sampling expired gases until the participant is unable to continue due to exhaustion. Students are discouraged (actually, prohibited) from altering the protocol and rarely given the chance to fix mistakes in a future laboratory (don’t forget the nose clips!). While the specific results may not be known in advance—they depend on characteristics of the participant—this activity is not an experiment. This traditional approach to laboratory teaching is standard (8, 11, 13). In contrast, an inquiry-based approach allows students to act like scientists and experiment.

There is a terrific description of levels of student inquiry in science for interested readers outlined in Bell et al. (4) and summarized in Table 1 below. The authors describe four levels of inquiry, and in our early stages of reforming labs, we found these levels very helpful for grappling with and revising laboratory learning activities and assessments. In our experience, only level 1 inquiry-based activities are regularly included in undergraduate laboratories: For example, our students compare post-exercise blood lactate concentration responses to passive and active recovery. Even though the results are known in advance and students are following the instructor’s procedures for level 1 inquiry, learners are frequently assessed on their ability to create laboratory reports where they find themselves toiling over uninspired post hoc hypotheses and rewriting a common set of methods in their own words. This process is disingenuous. Furthermore, knowing that they are attempting to verify a known result may lead some students to engage in questionable research practices to obtain that result (14).

Table 1. The four levels of inquiry, as described by Bell et al. (4).

Level Type Description of student activities
1 Confirmation Students verify or confirm known results
2 Structured inquiry Students investigate instructor-determined question using instructor-determined procedures (results not known in advance)
3 Guided inquiry Students investigate instructor-determined question using student-determined procedures
4 Open inquiry Students develop questions and procedures for rigorously answering them

 

We think traditional laboratory teaching goes against the spirit of what science actually is: The application of rigorous methods in the pursuit of answers to questions. Although students may develop technical skills by completing descriptive activities and low-level inquiry activities (e.g., data acquisition, data analysis, technical writing), there is a missed opportunity to develop the habits of mind and skills of a scientist in traditional laboratories. More than that, there is a misrepresentation, or at least obfuscation, of science. If we pretend these laboratories represent the scientific process, how do we expect students to become curious about, inspired by, and ultimately capable of doing science on their own? Students need to progress to higher levels of inquiry-based learning, but implementing these types of laboratories can be challenging in exercise physiology.

It is understandable that exercise physiology laboratories tend to exclude inquiry-based learning, as all tests are performed on human participants. First, there are legitimate safety concerns in exercise physiology laboratories, as participants are asked to exert themselves, often maximally; manipulations have physiological consequences; and some techniques are invasive. It would be irresponsible to let students change data collection protocols on the fly and jeopardize the health and safety of their peers. Second, as multiple testing sessions may be required to collect experimental data, manipulating independent variables may also be impractical for an undergraduate course aiming to cover a broad curriculum. For example, with sessions spread over multiple weeks, standardizing for diet is difficult. Third, the types of interventions that would have large enough effect sizes to be observable with small sample sizes (with a reasonable amount of “noise”) may be impractical or inappropriate in an undergraduate laboratory. For example, learners may not want to exercise for prolonged durations in the heat or deplete their muscle glycogen in advance of an exercise test. And finally, laboratory instructors may be uncomfortable or inexperienced with facilitating inquiry-based laboratories that go beyond level 1 (to say nothing of the confidence and ability of the learners themselves).

In addition to the practical concerns of adding more inquiry to undergraduate labs, we know students must learn the technical skills associated with fitness assessment, as exercise physiology is a health profession. If students pursue exercise physiology as a career path, they will apply advanced technical skills to accurately measure variables that impact exercise prescription, health assessments, and disease prognosis. Technical rigor is paramount in this profession, and imparting these skills is a major reason to offer exercise physiology laboratories. Unless specializing in research, exercise physiologists may not perform scientific experiments in their occupation. It is also challenging to collect most physiological data, and certainly learners cannot become scientists without acquiring data collection skills. Students need to practice and develop confidence using laboratory equipment before they can answer their own questions.

We understand that performing true experiments (especially student-led experiments) is difficult in undergraduate exercise physiology laboratories and we also appreciate why technical skills are essential. Yet, we do not believe that an exclusive focus on technical skills is the best strategy for students to learn scientific reasoning, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills. Regardless of a students’ career path, these are transferrable skills, and a laboratory is the ideal venue to nurture scientific thinking.

Section 2: Can we move beyond cookbook style laboratories?

What makes a good scientist? This answer probably varies across disciplines: Some scientists may be skilled in animal surgery, some may interrogate enormous data sets, and others may focus on theoretical concepts and proofs. There is probably no single skill set that is common among all scientists. But, if we put the specific technical skills aside, students need to ask questions, create hypotheses, solve problems, and think critically in order to conduct experiments. The mechanism for developing any skill is practice: Learners need opportunities to develop and refine their skills, whether they are technical or cognitive. Some students may be able to walk into a first-year laboratory and create an experiment, but many more will need additional support to reach this level of competency. In short, students need to practice being scientists. To be effective, this practice must be authentic: As scientists do not just follow instructions, a recipe-based approach to laboratory learning will not develop a good scientist. The higher levels of inquiry, (see Table 1), are where students get to practice being scientists.

Including higher level inquiry-based learning in exercise physiology isn’t entirely novel. For example, Kolkhorst et al. (11) described the implementation of an inquiry-based learning model in an undergraduate exercise physiology course. The structure of this course was (i) an introductory laboratory session; (ii) five laboratory sessions focused on key concepts in exercise physiology; and (iii) nine laboratory sessions to complete two separate research projects (4-5 sessions each). In the latter portion of the course–an example of level 4 inquiry (Table 1)–students proposed research questions and hypotheses and worked with instructors to devise an experiment, collected and analyzed data, and presented their results to the class. After addressing one research question, students repeated this process with a new research question focused on a different physiological system. Following the initial iteration—from which Kolkhorst et al. (11) noted students were not sufficiently prepared for undertaking the research projects—the authors devised a more structured transition, providing students with more opportunities to practice answering research questions and developing technical skills (i.e., level 2-3 inquiry). The results of this shift in laboratory learning were largely positive: The authors reported that students were more enthusiastic about the inquiry-based labs and better able to describe and discuss physiological principles. A separate study (8) indicated that students reported preferring high-level as opposed to low-level inquiry in exercise physiology laboratories, crediting the independence, responsibility, freedom, and personal relevance as key influences on their satisfaction. These qualitative results are further supported by quantitative data from Nybo and May (13), which demonstrated greater test scores for students who completed an inquiry-based laboratory session related to cardiopulmonary exercise physiology compared to a traditional laboratory on the same topic. Collectively, these studies demonstrate that enabling students to experiment in undergraduate exercise physiology is possible and beneficial.

Although writing specifically about physics education, Drs. Emily Smith and Natasha Holmes (14) advise us to eliminate confirmation (level 1) work and attempts at learning theory in laboratories. Based on extensive research, they suggest increasing the amount of laboratory time students spend (i) making predictions about what they think might happen; (ii) doing activities that involve trial-and-error; (iii) practicing decision making; and (iv) processing how things went. By allowing students to devise questions, design experiments, and collect data (with the opportunity to fix mistakes), students are practicing being scientists. By design, inquiry-based laboratory activities facilitate the first three suggestions; however, whether Smith and Holmes’ fourth recommendation occurs in inquiry-based laboratory activities is hard to determine, but this recommendation is important. This processing phase of laboratory learning improves students’ capacities to make good decisions over time. Including this reflective step in laboratories is something we have taken to heart and into all of our reformed labs.

Section 3: Adding inquiry and mixing reflection into exercise physiology laboratories

In our project, we are focused on two specific exercise physiology courses, an introductory undergraduate course (n = 80-200 students, depending on the semester) and an advanced graduate course (n = 10), both of which have a weekly 3-hour laboratory session. Prior to intervening, we surveyed the nature of laboratory teaching in each course, finding that students indeed followed step-by-step instructions without the opportunity to make decisions or investigate new questions. The only form of inquiry-based learning was level 1 (Table 1). We planned to make two broad types of changes: (i) provide students with more autonomy in the laboratory, and (ii) encourage students to reflect on the activities they were completing. As the graduate course was much smaller, this was deemed the easier place to start, and because of its size, this course was also allowed to remain in-person during the COVID-19 pandemic. Accordingly, most of our progress to date has been in revising this graduate exercise physiology course.

Initially, our changes to the graduate course’s laboratory focused on asking students to make and validate predictions while using a standard set of protocols (i.e., level 1 inquiry). In our first iteration, we modified four laboratory sessions to focus on the “unexpected” breakdown in the linear relationship between oxygen uptake and cycling power output that occurs during exercise with constant-load efforts and the difficulty in identifying the boundary between the heavy and severe exercise intensity domains (10). We (and students in the course) felt these activities were successful, so we modified the laboratory again the following year to allow students to focus on answering novel questions rather than verifying results. Using a gradual implementation approach similar to Kolkhorst et al. (11), students were first asked to create and test unique hypotheses for a set of data they collected over four laboratory sessions, combining aspects of level 2 and 4 inquiry (i.e., instructor-led procedures and student-led questions). Next, based on an article read earlier in the course (1), students worked as a group to determine whether fatiguing one limb influenced measures of exercise performance and fatigue in the contralateral limb when contractions were isometric (level 2). Finally, with a focus on inquiry-based learning and professional development, students were challenged to develop their own laboratory activity for a hypothetical course, which required devising an experiment to teach an important concept in exercise physiology and collecting pilot data to demonstrate feasibility (nearing level 4). To fully understand the impacts of these changes, we have collected survey and semi-structured interview data from students in reformed laboratories, which we hope to formally report at the end of the project.

Despite teaching our undergraduate exercise physiology course online this year, we attempted to create a virtual exercise physiology laboratory that focused on developing the skills needed to answer research questions. Learning activities focused on hypothesis creation, research design, data analysis, and statistical analysis. For one activity, we asked students to design a hypothetical study comparing mechanical aspects of sprinting for two groups of athletes (e.g., bobsleigh vs. fencing). Although new to research design, students were given the freedom to choose the sample size, the variable of interest, and the two types of athletes (selected from normative data published by Haugen et al. (7)). Martin used the students’ choices to simulate datasets, and students performed statistical analysis to test their hypotheses. While students couldn’t collect their own data, this activity allowed them to pose and answer a question, while learning about sprinting and research design. When this lab returns to in-person learning, plans are being formulated to include inquiry-based learning, similar to the structure that Kolkhorst et al. (11) and Henige (8) reported.

After two years of tinkering with our graduate course and beginning to reform our undergraduate course (despite its online format), we have realized that we simply need to give students more time in the laboratory to work on their own questions. Note that Kolkhorst et al. (11) and Henige (8) each provided 4-5 sessions for their level 4 inquiry laboratory activities. This can be a tough sell for instructors (ourselves included): It means we need to cover fewer topics. But, sometimes the best addition to a recipe is a subtraction (e.g., prohibiting pineapple on pizza). The battle over which absolutely essential topic has to be removed has already begun!

While we think increasing autonomy and inquiry in the lab is an important part of enhancing student learning, we also think students need to be able to debrief learning activities and process their experiences to enrich their learning. For both courses described above, students were asked to engage in reflective activities each week. We know reflection can move learning from surface to deep and even transformative levels (12). Reflection is a form of cognitive housekeeping and processing that enables students to develop their understanding of complex or unstructured ideas (12). When students actively engage in a constructive sense-making process, they understand complex systems and concepts better (6). Metacognitive practices are shown to improve self-regulation and commitment to lifelong learning; however, instructional strategies often neglect or assume students are engaging in metacognition (2). Evidence suggests metacognition at the end of STEM learning activities enriches learning (17). Based on this evidence and our experiences with reflection as a catalyst for curiosity and connection-making, we integrated a small amount of reflection with learning activities and added a low-stakes assessment in both courses. Students were asked to thoughtfully reflect on and respond to a specific prompt in approximately 100 words at the end of each lab. Questions like those listed below acted as a call to metacognition:

What did you find most challenging (or surprising, or interesting) in this lab and why?

What did you learn in this lab? What would you still like to know?

What do you think is the major obstacle to performing high-intensity interval training?

How would you explain the importance of fat oxidation to a lay person interested in exercise?

By asking students to connect their experience, knowledge, ideas, and sometimes uncertainty to their lab learning activities, we hoped to support them in deepening, extending, and amplifying their learning.

As we reformed student learning activities and move away from recipe-only laboratories, our teaching practices needed to change too. Recognizing that the laboratory instructors had mostly been trained through traditional style laboratories, we identified a need for some targeted professional development for our group of educators. To meet this need, Cari developed an asynchronous learning module called “Teaching to Enable Learning in Exercise Physiology,” for the instructional team to complete prior to the start of term, and we debriefed this 6-8 hour module together at our first meeting. This meeting set the tone and expectation in many ways for the teaching practices we were expecting teaching assistants to try in labs. We took a community of practice (CoP) approach to supporting laboratory teaching and learning throughout the semester. A CoP is a group of practitioners who meet regularly, reflect and problem solve collaboratively to learn to do their practice (for us, teaching) better (16). CoPs have been used to facilitate teaching and learning change in many higher education projects (5, 15). Each week, we (Martin and Cari) invited the lab technician, the teaching assistants (i.e., laboratory instructors), and a graduate student researcher (Joy Camarao) to reflect on and share both positive and negative teaching experiences from the week that was.

Conclusion

Years after completing an undergraduate degree in biology, the laboratory activities that stuck with me (Martin) the most are those that let me experiment. My favorite laboratory activity involved transplanting barnacles from the exposed side of a breakwater to the inner harbor on the coast of Nova Scotia to examine phenotypic plasticity in leg morphology. My lab mates and I chose the topic and designed the experiment, basing our question on a relationship observed in a related species of barnacle (3). We drove to the coast to find and transplant the barnacles, and we returned weeks later to collect the barnacles for analysis, hypothesizing that they would increase their leg length to optimize feeding in the calmer waters. Unlike most of my other laboratory experiences, we were performing a real experiment with real hypothesis and a (somewhat) novel question. Our study had flaws, and our results weren’t perfect, but the laboratory report was authentic, and so was my excitement. This type of lab is a challenge in exercise physiology, but it’s possible and worthwhile. As we enter the final year of our project, we hope to give students more opportunities to experiment.

Image Credits: Image 1- Nicole Michalou, Image 2- Maarten VanDenHeuvel, Image 3 William Choquette, Image 4- Frans VanHeerden.

 

References

  1. Amann M, Venturelli M, Ives SJ, McDaniel J, Layec G, Rossman MJ, Richardson RS. Peripheral fatigue limits endurance exercise via a sensory feedback-mediated reduction in spinal motoneuronal output. J Appl Physiol 115: 355–364, 2013.
  2. Ambrose SA, Bridges MW, DiPietro M, Lovett MC, Norman MK. How learning works: Seven research-based principles for smart teaching. John Wiley & Sons., 2010.
  3. Arsenault DJ, Marchinko KB, Palmer AR. Precise tuning of barnacle leg length to coastal wave action. Proceedings Biol Sci 268: 2149–2154, 2001.
  4. Bell RL, Smetana L, Binns I. Simplifying inquiry instruction. Sci Teach 72: 30–33, 2005.
  5. Elliott ER, Reason RD, Coffman CR, Gangloff EJ, Raker JR, Powell-Coffman JA, Ogilvie CA. Improved student learning through a faculty learning community: How faculty collaboration transformed a large-enrollment course from lecture to student centered. CBE—Life Sci Educ 15: 1–14, 2016.
  6. Eyler JR. How humans learn: The science and stories behind effective college teaching. West Virginia University Press, 2018.
  7. Haugen TA, Breitschädel F, Seiler S. Sprint mechanical variables in elite athletes: Are force-velocity profiles sport specific or individual? PLoS One 14: e0215551, 2019.
  8. Henige K. Undergraduate student attitudes and perceptions toward low- and high-level inquiry exercise physiology teaching laboratory experiences. Adv Physiol Educ 35: 197–205, 2011.
  9. Ivy JL. Exercise Physiology: A Brief History and Recommendations Regarding Content Requirements for the Kinesiology Major. Quest 59: 34–41, 2007.
  10. Keir DA, Paterson DH, Kowalchuk JM, Murias JM. Using ramp-incremental VO2 responses for constant-intensity exercise selection. Appl Physiol Nutr Metab (2018). doi: 10.1139/apnm-2017-0826.
  11. Kolkhorst FW, Mason CL, DiPasquale DM, Patterson P, Buono MJ. An inquiry-based learning model for an exercise physiology laboratory course. Adv Physiol Educ 25: 117–122, 2001.
  12. Moon JA. A handbook of reflective and experiential learning: Theory and practice. Routledge, 2013.
  13. Nybo L, May M. Effectiveness of inquiry-based learning in an undergraduate exercise physiology course. Adv Physiol Educ 39: 76–80, 2015.
  14. Smith EM, Holmes NG. Best practice for instructional labs. Nature 17: 662–663, 2021.
  15. Tinnell TL, Ralston PA, Tretter TR, Mills ME. Sustaining pedagogical change via faculty learning community. Int J STEM Educ 6: 1–16, 2019.
  16. Wenger-Trayner B, Wenger-Trayner E. What is a community of practice? [Online]. 2011. https://wenger-trayner.com/resources/what-is-a-community-of-practice/ [25 Jun. 2021].
  17. Wieman C, Gilbert S. The teaching practices inventory: A new tool for characterizing college and university teaching in mathematics and science. CBE—Life Sci Educ 13: 552-569., 2014.
Dr. Martin MacInnis is an assistant professor who studies exercise and environmental physiology from an integrative perspective, focusing on the skeletal muscle mitochondrial content, red blood cell volume, interval training, and applications of wearable technology. Martin teaches courses in exercise physiology at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and his SoTL research, in collaboration with Dr. Cari Din, focuses on using labs to develop scientific thinking.
Dr. Cari Din, PhD,  is an instructor, leadership fellow, and teaching scholar at the University of Calgary in the Faculty of Kinesiology. She works closely with Dr. Martin MacInnis, to support continuous improvement in teaching and learning experiences for students and graduate teaching assistants in the courses Martin leads. Cari works to enable agency, curiosity, and connection between learners in all of her work. She lives near the Rocky Mountains and appreciates hiking in them.
SEND YOUR EDUCATIONAL SCHOLARSHIP TO ADVANCES IN PHYSIOLOGY EDUCATION!

The Editors of Advances in Physiology Education have recently changed Advances article types to clarify the broadness of articles in physiology and life science education which Advances would like to publish.   Details of the article types are found at https://journals.physiology.org/advances/article-types.  Advances articles do not have page charges and the journal is available online from publication.  While the kinds of articles are not new, the new titles of the article types broaden the definitions of how educators can get credit for scholarship for many of the responsibilities that they have.  Article types include:

  • Education Research – hypothesis and data driven research papers with succinct reviews of background literature
  • Teaching Innovations – educational innovations to improve teaching and learning that may not have rigorous assessment or evaluation
  • Illuminations – good ideas conceived and tested in the classroom that may or may not have been successful
  • Curriculum Development and Assessment – design and implementation of curricula at any level in any program with some references to its success
  • Training and Mentoring – descriptions of projects for training and mentoring of students or other faculty with some evaluation of learning outcomes
  • Sourcebook of Laboratory Activities in Physiology – detailed descriptions of activities and experiments for student laboratory settings with class testing (specific template)
  • Historical Perspectives – scholarly essays about the history of physiology or particular physiologists
  • Personal Views – essays that present philosophical perspectives on physiology education which may be provocative, pointed, candid, or reflective
  • Staying Current – short reviews intended to help educators stay current with recent advances or new methods in physiology and learning science in order to better teach a concept
  • Editorials related to the journal’s mission, Mini-Reviews as summaries of important new and emerging fields (often from presentations), Meeting Reports of an international or national meeting hosted by an academic institution or professional society (specific template), and Letters to the Editor (reaction to previously published work in Advances).

All types of papers are peer-reviewed except for Letters to the Editor.  The Editors of Advances encourage you to write up some of these scholarly activities and submit them to the journal.  Articles do not need to specifically be about physiology education.  For more information, contact Barb Goodman at Barb.Goodman@usd.edu.

Barbara E. Goodman, Ph.D., Professor of Physiology, Sanford School of Medicine of the University of South Dakota, Editor-in-Chief, Advances in Physiology Education.

Barb received her Ph.D. in Physiology from the University of Minnesota and is currently a Professor in the Basic Biomedical Sciences Department of the Sanford School of Medicine at the University of South Dakota. Her research focuses on improving student learning through innovative and active pedagogy.

 
Physiology Education Manuscripts in Demand

Advances in Physiology Education is one of the family of journals published by the American Physiological Society (https://journals.physiology.org/journal/advances).  Submissions of manuscripts to Advances cost nothing and accepted papers are available with free access from their initial posting online.  Annually a printed copy of the journal with all 4 issues is available to those who request it.  Publications in Advances are contributed from the global community of physiology educators and carefully peer-reviewed by expert colleagues.  Of all the APS family of journals, 7 out of the 10 most accessed articles (full-text accesses) during 2019 were published in Advances. The top three accessed Advances articles are briefly described below.

Number 1 Most Accessed 2019:

“Applying learning theories and instructional design models for effective instruction” by Mohammed K. Khalil and Ihsan A. Elkhider from the University of South Carolina School of Medicine in Greenville, South Carolina, USA published on April 11, 2016 (Adv Physiol Educ 40:147-156, 2016).  In this article from the Best Practices series, the major learning theories are discussed and selected examples of instructional design models are explained.  The objective of the article is to present the science of learning and instruction as the theoretical evidence for the design and delivery of instructional materials in the classroom and laboratory.  As of June 2020, this article has been downloaded 81,467 times!

Number 2 Most Accessed 2019:

“Measuring osmosis and hemolysis of red blood cells” by Lauren K. Goodhead and Frances M. MacMillan from the School of Physiology, Pharmacology, and Neuroscience of the University of Bristol, Bristol, UK published on May 19, 2017 (Adv Physiol Educ 41: 298-305, 2017).  This article from the Sourcebook of Laboratory Activities in Physiology series, describes classroom laboratory experiments to help students visualize and appreciate osmosis (the movement of water and small molecules across selectively permeable membranes of mammalian cells).  Animal blood is bathed in solutions with differing osmolarities and tonicities to explore the concept of water movement by osmosis and the resultant hemolysis.  As of June 2020, this article has been downloaded 71,180 times.

Number 4 Most Accessed 2019:

“Attention span during lectures: 8 seconds, 10 minutes, or more?” by Neil A. Bradbury of the Department of Physiology and Biophysics of Chicago Medical School, Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, North Chicago, Illinois, USA published on November 8, 2016 (Adv Physiol Educ 40:509-513, 2016).  This article presents a Personal View by reviewing the literature on the “common knowledge” and “consensus” that there is a decline in students’ attention 10-15 min into lectures.  The author believes that the most consistent finding from his literature review is that the greatest variability in student attention arises from differences between teachers and not from the teaching format itself.  Thus, it is the job of the instructor to enhance their teaching skills to provide not only rich content but also a satisfying lecture experience for the students.  As of June 2020, this article has been downloaded 39,910 times. 

The other four Advances articles in the top 10 most accessed in 2019 included an APS Refresher Course Report on “Smooth muscle contraction and relaxation” by R. Clinton Webb, a Best Practices series article on “Learning theories 101: application to everyday teaching and scholarship” by Denise Kay and Jonathan Kibble, an editorial on “The ‘African gene’ theory: it is time to stop teaching and promoting slavery hypertension hypothesis” by Heidi L. Lujan and Stephen E. DiCarlo, and a Staying Current review on “Recent advances in thermoregulation” by Etain A. Tansey and Christopher D. Johnson.  These articles ranged from >20,000 to almost 30,000 downloads. 

This short article shows the variety of offerings in Advances in Physiology Education and documents the global demand for these contributions to the literature.

Editor-in-Chief, Advances in Physiology Education

Barb Goodman received her PhD in Physiology from the University of Minnesota and is currently a Professor in the Basic Biomedical Sciences Division of the Sanford School of Medicine at the University of South Dakota. Her research focuses on improving student learning through innovative and active pedagogy.

 

Evidence-based teaching: when evidence is not enough
Gregory J. Crowther, PhD
Everett Community College

On June 23, Dr. Chaya Gopalan of Southern Illinois University spoke at the APS Institute of Teaching and Learning on the topic of “The Flexibility of Using the Flipped Classroom as a Virtual Classroom During the COVID-19 Pandemic.” The presentation was great — full of empirical data, practical tips, and audience participation.

One of the questions that arose was, assuming that one is flipping a class with video lectures, how long should those video lectures be? I can’t remember what Chaya said about this at the time, but many others used the chat window to weigh in. They mostly argued that shorter is better, with 10-12 minutes being a commonly prescribed upper limit.

The author droning on during a long video lecture.

I had heard this “shorter is better” mantra many times before, and believed that it was well-supported by the literature. Still, I had resisted any impulse to shorten my own videos. I was already generating one video per chapter per course — 50 videos per quarter in all. If I divided each video into four shorter videos, that would be 200 videos per quarter to manage. Couldn’t my students just hit “pause” and take breaks as needed?

Thus, the video-length issue was making me increasingly uncomfortable. I think of myself as an evidence-based teacher, yet I seemed unwilling to go where the evidence was pointing.

Having battled myself to an impasse, I decided to email Chaya. I wrote:

…If you — as an expert flipper who has read the literature and published your own papers on this — were to tell me, “Come on, Greg, the evidence is overwhelming — for the good of your students you just need to make your videos shorter — stop whining and do it!” then I probably would comply. So … what do you think?

Chaya declined to respond with an ultimatum, but she did note that her own videos vary greatly in length — from 8 minutes to an hour! A lot of this variation is topic-specific, she said; some “stories” need to be told as a single chunk, even if it takes longer to do so.

Chaya’s point about chunking the material according to natural breakpoints was exactly what I needed to hear. While the idea of shortening videos because “shorter is better” did not itself inspire me, the idea of finding those breakpoints and reorganizing the material accordingly seemed utterly worthwhile. Maybe this would help my students more easily track their progress within each chapter. And off I went — I was finally ready to shorten my videos!

So, what lessons can be extracted from this bout of navel-gazing?

The thing that jumps out at me is this: my long-held resistance to a fairly mild idea (“make your videos shorter!”) was suddenly overcome not by conclusive new research, but by a subtle shift in perspective. When Chaya made a particular point that happened to resonate with me, I now wanted to make the change that I had been guiltily avoiding for months.

This was — for me, at least — a valuable reminder that, while evidence-based teaching is undoubtedly a good thing, behavior is rarely changed by evidence alone. There’s just no substitute for direct conversations in which open-minded people with shared values can stumble toward a common understanding of something.

It may be slightly heretical for me to say so, but I’ll take a good conversation over a peer-reviewed paper any day.

Greg Crowther teaches human anatomy and physiology at Everett Community College (north of Seattle). He is the co-creator of Test Question Templates, a framework for improving the alignment of biology learning activities and summative assessments.

Can the Flipped Classroom Method of Teaching Influence Students’ Self-Efficacy?
Chaya Gopalan, PhD, FAPS
Associate Professor
Departments of Applied Health, Primary Care & Health Systems
Southern Illinois University Edwardsville

Self-efficacy is the belief in one’s ability to succeed in a specific situation or accomplish a specific task (Bandura, 1977). Students with high self-efficacy have higher motivation to learn and, therefore, are able to reach higher academic goals (Honicke & Broadbent, 2016). Gender, age, and the field of study are some factors that are known to affect self-efficacy (Huang, 2013). Genetics plays a significant role (Waaktaar & Torgersen, 2013). Certain physiological factors such as perceptions of pain, fatigue, and fear may have a marked, deleterious effect on self-efficacy (Vieira, Salvetti, Damiani, & Pimenta, 2014). In fact, research has shown that self-efficacy can be strengthened by positive experiences, such as mastering a skill, observing others performing a specific task, or by constant encouragement (Vishnumolakala, Southam, Treagust, Mocerino, & Qureshi, 2017). Enhancement of self-efficacy may be achieved by the teachers who serve as role models as well as by the use of supportive teaching methods (Miller, Ramirez, & Murdock, 2017). Such boost in self-efficacy helps students achieve higher academic results.

The flipped classroom method of teaching shifts lectures out of class. These lectures are made available for students to access anytime and from anywhere. Students are given the autonomy to preview the content prior to class where they can spend as much time as it takes to learn the concepts. This approach helps students overcome cognitive overload by a lecture-heavy classroom.  It also enables them to take good notes by accessing lecture content as many times as necessary. Since the lecture is moved out of class, the class time becomes available for deep collaborative activities with support from the teacher as well as through interaction with their peers. Additionally, the flipped teaching method allows exposure to content multiple times such as in the form of lecture videos, practice questions, formative assessments, in-class review, and application of pre-class content. The flipped classroom therefore provides a supportive atmosphere for student learning such as repeated exposure to lecture content, total autonomy to use the constantly available lecture content, peer influence, and support from the decentered teacher. These listed benefits of flipped teaching are projected to strengthen self-efficacy which, in turn, is expected to increase students’ academic performance. However, a systematic approach measuring the effectiveness of flipped teaching on self-efficacy is lacking at present.

References:

Bandura, A. (1977). Self-efficacy: toward a unifying theory of behavioral change. Psychological review, 84(2), 191.

de Moraes Vieira, É. B., de Góes Salvetti, M., Damiani, L. P., & de Mattos Pimenta, C. A. (2014). Self-efficacy and fear avoidance beliefs in chronic low back pain patients: coexistence and associated factors. Pain Management Nursing, 15(3), 593-602.

Honicke, T., & Broadbent, J. (2016). The influence of academic self-efficacy on academic performance: A systematic review. Educational Research Review, 17, 63-84.

Huang, C. (2013). Gender differences in academic self-efficacy: A meta-analysis. European journal of psychology of education, 28(1), 1-35.

Miller, A. D., Ramirez, E. M., & Murdock, T. B. (2017). The influence of teachers’ self-efficacy on perceptions: Perceived teacher competence and respect and student effort and achievement. Teaching and Teacher Education, 64, 260-269.

Vishnumolakala, V. R., Southam, D. C., Treagust, D. F., Mocerino, M., & Qureshi, S. (2017). Students’ attitudes, self-efficacy and experiences in a modified process-oriented guided inquiry learning undergraduate chemistry classroom. Chemistry Education Research and Practice, 18(2), 340-352.

Waaktaar, T., & Torgersen, S. (2013). Self-efficacy is mainly genetic, not learned: a multiple-rater twin study on the causal structure of general self-efficacy in young people. Twin Research and Human Genetics, 16(3), 651-660.

Dr. Chaya Gopalan received her PhD in Physiology from the University of Glasgow, Scotland. Upon completing two years of postdoctoral training at Michigan State University, she started her teaching career at St. Louis Community College. She is currently teaching at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. Her teaching is in the areas of anatomy, physiology, and pathophysiology at both undergraduate and graduate levels for health science career programs. Dr. Gopalan has been practicing evidence-based teaching where she has tested team-based learning and case-based learning methodologies and most recently, the flipped classroom. She has received several grants to support her research interest.

Teaching Physiology with Educational Games
Fernanda Klein Marcondes
Associate Professor of Physiology
Biosciences Department
Piracicaba Dental School (FOP), University of Campinas (UNICAMP)

Educational games may help students to understand Physiology concepts and solve misconceptions. Considering the topics that have been difficult to me during my undergraduate and graduate courses, I’ve developed some educational games, as simulations and noncompetitive activities. The first one was the cardiac cycle puzzle. The puzzle presents figures of phases of the cardiac cycle and a table with five columns: phases of cardiac cycle, atrial state, ventricular state, state of atrioventricular valves, and state of pulmonary and aortic valves. Chips are provided for use to complete the table. Students are requested to discuss which is the correct sequence of figures indicating the phases of cardiac cycle, complete the table with the chips and answer questions in groups. This activity is performed after a short lecture on the characteristics of cardiac cells, pacemaker and plato action potentials and reading in the textbook. It replaces the oral explanation from the professor to teach the physiology of the cardiac cycle.

I also developed an educational game to help students to understand the mechanisms of action potentials in cell membranes. This game is composed of pieces representing the intracellular and extracellular environments, ions, ion channels, and the Na+-K+-ATPase pumps. After a short lecture about resting membrane potential, and textbook reading, there is the game activity. The students must arrange the pieces to demonstrate how the ions move through the membrane in a resting state and during an action potential, linking the ion movements with a graph of the action potential.  In these activities the students learn by doing.

According to their opinions, the educational games make the concepts more concrete, facilitate their understanding, and make the environment in class more relaxed and enjoyable. Our first studies also showed that the educational games increased the scores and reduced the number of wrong answers in learning assessments. We continue to develop and apply new educational games that we can share with interested professors, with pleasure.

Contact: ferklein@unicamp.br

Luchi KCG, Montrezor LH, Marcondes FK. Effect of an educational game on university students´ learning about action potentials. Adv Physiol Educ., 41 (2): 222-230, 2017.

Cardozo LT, Miranda AS, Moura MJCS, Marcondes FK. Effect of a puzzle on the process of students’ learning about cardiac physiology. Adv Physiol Educ., 40(3): 425-431, 2016.

Marcondes FK, Moura MJCS, Sanches A, Costa R, Lima PO, Groppo FC, Amaral MEC, Zeni P, Gaviao KC, Montrezor LH. A puzzle used to teach the cardiac cycle. Adv Physiol Educ., 39(1):27-31, 2015.

Fernanda Klein Marcondes received her Bachelor’s Degree in Biological Sciences at University of Campinas (UNICAMP), Campinas – SP, Brazil in 1992. She received her Master in Biological Sciences (1993) and PhD in Sciences (1998). In 1995 she began a position at Piracicaba Dental School, UNICAMP, where she is an Associate Professor of Physiology and coordinates studies of the Laboratory of Stress. She coordinates the subjects Biosciences I and II, with integration of Biochemistry, Anatomy, Histology, Physiology and Pharmacology content in the Dentistry course. In order to increase the interest, engagement and learning of students in Physiology classes, she combines lectures with educational games, quizzes, dramatization, discussion of scientific articles and group activities. Recently she started to investigate the perception of students considering the different teaching methodologies and the effects of these methodologies on student learning.

The Benefits of Learner-Centered Teaching

Jaclyn E. Welles
Cell & Molecular Physiology PhD Candidate
Pennsylvania State University – College of Medicine

In the US, Students at Still Facing Struggles in the STEMs

Literacy in the World Today:
According to the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), there are approximately 250 million individuals worldwide, who cannot read, write, or do basic math, despite having been in school for a number of years (5, 8). In fact, UNESCO, is calling this unfortunate situation a “Global Learning Crisis” (7). The fact that a significant number of people are lacking in these fundamental life skills regardless of attending school, shows that part of the problem lies within how students are being taught.

Two Main Styles of Teaching – Learner or Teacher-Centered

Learning and Teaching Styles:
It was due to an early exposure to various education systems that I was able to learn of that there were two main styles of teaching – Learner-centered teaching, and Teacher-centered teaching (2). Even more fascinating, with the different styles of teaching, it has become very clear that there are also various types of learners in any given classroom or lecture setting (2, 6, 10). Surprisingly however, despite the fact that many learners had their own learning “modularity” or learning-style, instructors oftentimes taught their students in a fixed-manner, unwilling or unable to adapt or implement changes to their curriculum. In fact, learner-centered teaching models such as the “VARK/VAK – Visual Learners, Auditory Learners and Kinesthetic Learners”, model by Fleming and Mills created in 1992 (6), was primarily established due to the emerging evidence that learners were versatile in nature.

VARK Model of Learners Consists of Four Main Types of Learners: Visual, Auditory, Reading and Writing, and Tactile/Kinesthetic (touch)

What We Can Do to Improve Learning:
The fundamental truth is that when a student is unable to get what they need to learn efficiently, factors such as “learning curves” – which may actually be skewing the evidence that students are struggling to learn the content, need to be implemented (1, 3). Instead of masking student learning difficulties with curves and extra-credit, we can take a few simple steps during lesson-planning, or prior to teaching new content, to gauge what methods will result in the best natural overall retention and comprehension by students (4, 9). Some of methods with evidence include (2, 9):

  • Concept Maps – Students Breakdown the Structure or Organization of a Concept
  • Concept Inventories – Short Answer Questions Specific to a Concept
  • Self-Assessments – Short Answer/Multiple Choice Questions
  • Inquiry-Based Projects – Students Investigate Concept in a Hands-On Project

All in all, by combining both previously established teaching methodologies with some of these newer, simple methods of gauging your students’ baseline knowledge and making the necessary adjustments to teaching methods to fit the needs of a given student population or class, you may find that a significant portion of the difficulties that can occur with students and learning such as – poor comprehension, retention, and engagement, can be eliminated (4, 9) .

Jaclyn Welles is a PhD student in Cellular and Molecular Physiology at the Pennsylvania State University – College of Medicine. She has received many awards and accolades on her work so far promoting outreach in science and education, including the 2019 Student Educator Award from PSCoM.

Her thesis work in the lab of Scot Kimball, focuses on liver physiology and nutrition; mainly how nutrients in our diet, can play a role in influencing mRNA translation in the liver.