September 2014

This clicker case study will be designed to use existing knowledge gained from class helping make connections between what they might consider separate concepts (chemistry, mitosis, genetics and cancer). This case study will allow student to plan and diagnose, treatment plan, analyze the results of the treatment plan and evaluate if this treatment plan would be ideal for this particular patient.

What I will assess: I will be assessing the comprehension of material to answer multiple choice questions assessing their knowledge of

A quick way, I can check for understanding, is by having the students do thumbs up, thumbs down or sideways to a given student answer.

I will give a practice problem and after the students work it out, I will have student either verbally give the answer or write it on the board. Then I will ask class, if they agree with the answer. I will say on the count of three, give thumbs up if you got the same answer, give thumbs down if you got a different answer, and give thumb sidewise if you got stuck and did not finish the problem.

I first make sure that I number each table from 1 to 8.

I will give the students a practice problem and tell them to work it out first themselves and then check their answers with the other members at the table. They all must come to agreement on the answers. (This is the first check level)

Students struggle with using direction fields to solve a given problem.  In the 1st two semesters, lecture was primarily used with handouts and group work being utlized more in the last 3 semesters.  Students have continually received a C grade on the direction field exam question and a C/B average on homework questions.  In Fall 2014, the handout was modified, and students worked in groups with no guidance from the instructor.  Technology as incorporated as well (MATLAB) to graph the direction fields.

Minicases provided to students contain info about the bacterium from the patient and the patient signs/symptoms. The objective for the students is to correctly ID which organism causes the infection and explain why to support their answer. Minicases provide info concerning both of the areas(bacteria & patient) in 2-4 sentences. I wanted to see if students could id these two areas cold turkey - no lecture from me, just reading the minicase. The majority of students just identified bacteria info as important - 70%. Only 25% identified both disease info and bacterial info.