Teaching at Tufts

Chris Swan, Professor of engineering relates his experience with facilitating learning through service for engineering students. He describes the benefits for students and professors who engage in service projects that require interdisciplinary collaboration.

Colin Orians wanted students in his Bio 7 course to develop skills in science communication. So, he designed a digital storytelling assignment that required them to use knowledge gained via lectures, assigned readings and independent research to tell a story using images, narrative, and music. The goal was to get students to think deeply about how to use multi-media to present research that’s scientifically accurate, accessible, and engaging.

Francie Chew, Professor in the Biology department discusses the process of podcasting in Bio 13, a large lecture class of more than 300 students. She describes how students use it, the benefits to faculty, and some of the challenges she has encountered along the way.

Physics professor Hugh Gallagher uses video to help students practice presenting principals of thermal physics as part of an effort to improve communications skills for students in his discipline.

In this feature, Roger describes how he uses Interactive Lecture Demonstration (ILD) and peer instruction to engage students in his large introductory physics classes. "Whatever you do you have to get the students involved. This is hardly a secret in education anymore. Students learn and remember things that they do and not things that they hear. The trick is to figure out a way to do that on scale. It is pretty easy to do that if you are sitting with 3 or 5 students. You can have a very interactive conversation. How to do that in a class of 100 or 200 is much more of a challenge."