Face to Face

Every semester the Estrella librarians seek to engage and reach out to students who may not be familiar with the Estrella Library. Participating in student club activities is one method to reach students and promote the Library’s resources and services. Working with the Asian Pacific Islander Club (APIC), I coordinated a social educational event that utilized my educational background in Asian Pacific American Studies and research methods. I created an interactive presentation to engage students to think critically about the food they eat using a popular culture context (K-Wave).

During the Module on Sexual Expression, we sociologically analyze masturbation and society's impact on this natural behavior. Students may be uncomfortable with certain topics that we discuss and analyze. It is also a good opportunity to have a different type of activity. Statements on masturbation are printed on 11 X 17 paper. Each student has one statement in front of them. A timer is used for students to comment on the paper in writing with no discussion. It is a silent class period. Once the timer goes off the statement gets rotated to the next student.

Trying to visualize molecular processes for students can be very challenging.  Neil Raymond and I decided to try 3-D printed objects to use in the classroom to teach these concepts in Biology.  I used the database thingiverse to search for models, and Neil designed and printed his own working sarcomere through tinkercad.  After using the models in class, I discovered that they can be powerful tools to aid in conceptualizing and visualizing processes, especially at the molecular level.  The 3-D printing is a compliment to STEM curriculum and promotes problem solving skill

In our Introduction to Education course, one of our major topics is ethical behavior by teachers. Materials covered include some reading materials on ethical behavior, the National Education Association teacher ethics, and a voice-over Ppt covering the topic. The follow up assessment is a series of situations, all of which have occurred in local K-12 education settings, to which the students must describe the correct ethical pathway to take. Scores on this assignment averaged at 77%. This was disappointing, especially considering the serious nature of the topic.

A straight lecture on cell structures is torture for students. To remedy this, I designed a system of flashcards where each organelle is represented by 3 types of cards: a picture card, a structure card, and a characteristic card. Cards have alignment hints for the other two cards. Each group of 4 students is given one set of 36 cards. They work together to align the 3 cards for each organelle.  While groups are engaged in collaborative work to tease out details about each organelle, I can work more closely with each student as they learn to critically evaluate card content.

Instructors are tasked with having to prepare EMT students for work in pre-hospital, in-hospital and now more recently, mobile integrated healthcare settings.  The use of simulation in the classroom helps prepare students for the workplace by exposing them to a broad variety of situations they may encounter by allowing them to apply knowledge and skills without endangering a live patient.  During the simulation the students are placed in an environment set to a standardized patient scenario with a variety of sensory distractors such as props, smells, patient actors with moulage (m

Using National Library Week as a vehicle for outreach to students has been a continual goal for the Information Resources Department. The purpose of the promotion of this week is to engage students to connect and celebrate their library, in this case, Estrella’s library. Previous endeavors included free food and promotional giveaways, however, these activities did not really engage in a connection between the Library, research assistance, and services.

The problem:  Some students have been misinterpreting my instructions for class assignments with multiple steps.  With two multiple stepped assignments, on average 6 out of 31 students missed a concept. 

The process:  Peer groups consisted of 4 students.  After groups were given instructions for the assignment, peers repeated the instructions to their group. Afterwards, each group (8 tables) had to summarize and rewrite the instructions on a mini white board. 

*Not being one to explicitly tell students to place their electronic devices away, I wanted to see if I could not only do that (that is, have them put them away) but also assess their basal understanding of communication concepts within COM 225, public speaking.  

The EMT program was experiencing an issue with students not coming to class prepared and they were not completing their reading assignments prior to coming to class. Instructors noticed that students were not as engaged and lacked the ability to create an open dialogue during classroom discussions.

Two of my hybrid EDU classes this semester were challenging me to actively engage my students, especially when involved in group tasks or assignments. Collaborative groups expert Spencer Kagan recommends, among a variety of strategies, the use of Talking Tokens. Each student is given 3 tokens (I use paper clips from a box in the middle of each table). As they talk, ask a question, give a suggestion, etc., they put a token back in the box. When they are out of tokens, they cannot talk until everyone else in their group is also out. Then, the process begins again.

EMCC has recently instituted a "no late enrollment" policy, due to the understanding that "learning starts on Day One" and the idea that students who enroll after the first day of class generally are not as prepared, and therefore not as successful as their peers who were in the class from the beginning.  However, does this phenomenon reach back even further in time?  Do students who enroll early in a class do better than those that enroll at the last minute (even though they did enroll before the first day)?

experiencing ATP production

In this study, a modified CREATE methodology (www.teachcreate.org) was used to incorporate the reading, analysis and discussion of four primary research papers from the recent biological literature into BIO182.  Individual and group activities were used to integrate the papers into the course; some activities were graded, some were not.  Activities included concept mapping, cartooning of experimental design, paragraph summarizing, data transformation, and figure annotation.

 In 2015/16 EMCC hired a staff member and faculty member to create and manage the Service Learning program. Beginning in 2015/16 there were new initiatives to promote SL on campus: workshops, multiple presentations (i.e.Day-of-Learning), in-class presentations and one-on-one faculty meetings in order to increase faculty and student participation.