Core Competency 2: Creating Effective Learning Environments

Core Competency 2: Creating Effective Learning Environments

Description of Core Competency

'Creating Effective Learning Environments' is the one of the vital aspects of teaching and learning, as it determines whether the course objectives will be successfully achieved.  Chemistry deals with abstract concepts and complex theories that sometimes challenging for students to grasp and it is easy to distract from the class. Therefore, it is challenging for all future educator to keep active engagements fostering effective learning of subject matter. As an educator, the ability to establish an environment conducive to learning is essential. This competency enables educator to foster active engagement among students, encourage their curiosity, and facilitate the connection of new knowledge with their existing understanding. Therefore, it is essential to concentrate on several aspects to ensure active learning environments and meet our goals as instructors. When designing a course, careful consideration should be given to factors such as employing instructional strategies that align with desired outcomes. Backward design is a great tool for planning lessons, connecting student activity, and assessments aligned with the learning outcomes. More focus should be given to student driven activity becasue that allows active learning as well as effective engagements. In post pandemic reality, most of the classes are in asynchronous-hybrid mode. As an facilitator, we need to incorporate multi-modality while designing a hydrid course to ensure active engagement as well as effective learning environment. It is also essential to provide appropriate resources and ensure equal opportunities for every student in the classroom, fostering an equitable learning environments that caters to the needs of all students, including those who may require additonal support. Learning is not what we have in pages of books, it’s more than that. As an Instructor, I want to familiarize the core concepts of chemistry to my students, have them build critical thinking ability and apply their knowledge to solve real life problems. My other objectives are inspiring students to initiate new work, lower down the stress level, incorporate students feedback to modify course materials, and to create a supportive culture. This core competency teaches us how to focus all the aspects vide infra. 

Workshop and Seminar List

"Certification in College Teaching Institute: Creating Effective Learning Environments"

• Date(s): May 12, 2022

• Course Instructor(s): Melanie Cooper, Ph.D. (Department of Chemistry)

• Offered By: Michigan State University

"Colleges of Online Learning Academy (COLA): Student Engagement via Active Learning Online"

• Date(s): June 17, 2022

• Course Instructor(s) Jun Fu, Ph.D.

• Offered By: Michigan State University

"Colleges of Online Learning Academy (COLA): Accessibility of Online and Digital Resources"

• Date(s): June 14, 2023

• Offered By: Michigan State University

Artifact(s) - Workshop materials

Artifact Rationale

The slides presented by Dr. Melanie Cooper introduced many concepts related to this competency including:

• As an instructor, it is important to set the goals of a course beforehand such as develop critical thinking, skills and ethics, inspire students, connecting learning with the real world. It is essential to have inclusive, equitable, and supportive culture in the classroom by incorporating student feedbacks. 

• In order to achieve the goals it is important to know the students background i.e., who the students are and their preferences. Then, it becomes easy to chosse course modality, of course, it is wise to use multimodality. At the very begining of course, we need to establish procedures and norms i.e., course culture. 

• While implementation, students should include in decision making by emphasizing their feedback. Feedbacks can be taken by the forms of formative assessments. Course design should be universal and need to make sure that students have access to all the available resources.

• Backward designing is very helpful to set the lesson plans and assessments aligned with the course goals and learning objectives. Tasks should be well articulated so that we can collect enough evidence to ensure that leranign objectives are met.

• Three dimensional learning (3-DL) can be a very handy in this regards, where educators ensure that students deveop core ideas of subjects, do scientific practices, and apply their skills to different settings. Three dimensional learning assessment protocol (3D-LAP) can be used for assessments where students know which types of evidences will be looked for.

Reflections

What skills and techniques did I learn that will help me become a better educator?

Setting goals as a instructor, course objectives and backward design method to design lesson plans and assessments aligning with learning outcomes. Design and implementation factors to achieve learning outcomes, modalities in teaching method, equitable spaces for all the students. Developing assessment to collect plausible evidence to make sure that students meet the course objectives. One of the vital aspects of teaching and learning is that we need to provide appropriate resources and ensure equal spaces for each and every student in the classroom. 

What things am I still uncertain about regarding this topic that I need to investigate further in the future?

Although, I practiced most of the materials during my ISE-870 course in Spring 2022. But this is not something 'once in a lifetime' rather I need to revisit again and work on backward design, assessment developing, collection of sufficient evidence to make sure that sutdents meet the learning outcomes.

How can I apply materials from this session to my own class to enhance the effectiveness of teaching and learning?

While designing a course, I should have a sound idea about the backgrounds of each and every student. It is somethings that can provide the real picture of the spaces around the students while staying at home. Need to think about the modalities that I can incorporate with the resources available. I should have a well-defined learning objective, backup plans if anything does not workout during the semester and always incorporate students feedback. At the beginning of the course, it is essential to establish the norms and procedures of the course like 'Dos and don'ts'.

While implementing course, I need to make sure to what depth of the subject matter I want to cover/teach in that course, inclusion of students in decision making which will give them ownership of the course. Make sure that I have all the necessary resources ready/available to use during the semester and chosse multi-modalities depending of the availability of the resources. In terms of assessments, both formative and summative assessments are necessary to collect enough evidence that students are achieving the course objectives.

While designing instruction, I need to make sure that what subject matters I want students know and how to collect convincing evidence that students have met the criteria. If the evidence is not satisfactory enough, I should have a backup plan and of course in all cases incorporate students to take decisions. Backward design is a very good tools to make lesson plans.