During the semester, we talked about fostering student independence and increasing student engagement. In my opinion, both class objectives are critical to help them succeed in class and their career. Today, I would like to introduce a study by Elizabeth A. Mulligan where they applied a teaching method that helped increase both class objectives.

This study was established at the Kingsborough Community College (KCC) in a health microbiology course. This class has a module where students learn about the process of transformation. However, students found this module challenging and not interesting decreasing their engagement in class.

Because this kept happening in class, KCC saw this as an opportunity to change and improve their methods to help increase student engagement. They implemented an exercise called process-oriented guided-inquiry learning (POGIL) for the transformation module. POGIL, is a well-established method and an effective learning technique for chemistry and biology classes. This exercise consists in one type of small group activity (3-4 students) in which students become engage with the subject and they are assigned specific roles while they explore, develop and apply the material. In a group, one student will be the “manager”, which keeps the group on task, a “recorder”, which keeps written answers to assigned questions, and a “presenter” which will be in charge of present the group’s results. After assigning the roles, students where given questions and participated in a group discussion. While this occur, the teacher serves as a facilitator to lead them in the correct direction fostering their independence. Once discussion is done, each student follows their assigned role and conclude the exercise.

The study mentions that this method was modified since the student didn’t have to grade themselves. However, students were allowed to ask questions, so this created a good discussing among groups. Finally, the study reports that students found this exercise skeptical after completion, but they preferred to do this instead of having a lecture.

 

Mulligan, E. A. (2014). Use of a Modified POGIL Exercise to Teach Bacterial Transformation in a Microbiology Course. Journal of Microbiology & Biology Education, 15(1), 30–32. http://doi.org/10.1128/jmbe.v15i1.639