Implementing a Multidisciplinary Program for Developing Learning

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Implementing a Multidisciplinary Program for Developing Learning, Communication, and Team-Working Skills in Second-Year Undergraduate Chemistry Students Niamh B. Mc Goldrick, Bartosz Marzec, P. Noelle Scully, and Sylvia M. Draper* School of Chemistry, University of Dublin, Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland S Supporting Information *

ABSTRACT: Since 2002, a multidisciplinary program has been used to encourage science students to build on their chemical knowledge and to appreciate how it applies to the world around them. The program is interactive and instills a new set of core learning skills that are often underrepresented in undergraduate curricula, namely, cooperative learning, communication and presentation skills, and resource mining. The second-year science cohort of 220 students is divided into small groups. Each group proposes a topic through which to explore the societal role played by chemistry. The program has two components: a report written by pairs of students and a short competitive group presentation. The multiple positive outcomes of the program have been assessed, including the less tangible benefit of a renewed connectivity between students and staff engaged in the pursuit of chemistry.

KEYWORDS: Second-Year Undergraduate, Curriculum, Interdisciplinary/Multidisciplinary, Collaborative/Cooperative Learning, Problem Solving/Decision Making, Inquiry Based/Discovery Learning, Communication/Writing Rather than focus effort on the overburdened final-year cycle, a program was introduced into the second-year undergraduate chemistry program (approximately 220 students). Several teaching methodologies were considered for this large class,4,5 including Web-based technologies and clickers;6 however, a 2002 external review of the School of Chemistry had identified a degree of disconnect between the undergraduate and postgraduate communities and a mechanism was sought by which the face-to-face integration of the student body could be improved. In addition, the formulation of this program came at a pivotal moment in the national government program to commit greater levels of research funding. This put greater onus on the chemistry research community to effectively communicate the societal benefit of chemical research,7 and to provide first-hand accurate information on the social roles and responsibilities of scientists. On the basis of these needs, it was decided that the newly designed program would span two semesters and have two formal assessment stages: a scientific report written by pairs of students and a group presentation. The multiple aims were to actively promote cooperative learning, information resourcing, analysis, and multilayer presentation and communication skills.8

T

eaching chemistry can descend to the dry delivery of chemical facts in the absence of meaningful student engagement. The prescribed, exam-oriented approach of high school chemistry classes is replaced by an intensive self-directed chemistry college program. A new undergraduate student is expected to make the transition quickly and to become accustomed to the formality of lectures, the size of the class, and the prerequisite material. For many students, the change is overwhelming and compounded by a reluctance to volunteer or to seek information in front of ones peers. In this institution, chemistry is one possible option in the first two years of a general science degree program. This should afford an opportunity to relate chemistry-based material to other scientific disciplines, but in reality, translational teaching methodologies are an uphill battle in a lecture-laden course where the audience is of mixed interest, ability, and scientific background. In 2002 the School of Chemistry decided to tackle these wide-ranging difficulties and to simultaneously introduce new elements of teaching practice (cooperative learning,1 information mining,2 and presentation skills) into the curriculum. Up to this point, the demonstration of communication and presentation skills had only occurred in the final-year of study via a formal presentation and viva defense of an individual research project. Given that the undergraduate curriculum was heavily weighted toward written evaluation, the students were often ill prepared for the late-onset introduction of an oral assessment and a bad experience was adversely affecting degree performance.3 © 2013 American Chemical Society and Division of Chemical Education, Inc.

Published: January 11, 2013 338

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Figure 1. The sequence of activities and student deliverables across the program.



Integration and Roles of Key Partners

IMPLEMENTATION

The coordinators provide a program of specialized tutorials on the required generic skills for completion of the program. These include report writing, appropriate referencing and citation, presentation techniques, time management, data mining of scientific resources, the evaluation and analysis of material in a report, and a latter presentation context (Figure 1). The teams are also assigned a staff mentor from the School of Chemistry with whom they are required to meet at several critical points during the exercise (see hexagons in Figure 1). The staff are allocated to offer relevant specialist knowledge and to provide a link with the students’ formal lecture material.

Format

The program uses an informal style of teaching to step away from a traditional hierarchical lecture format and to break down deep-seated barriers to effective learning and dialogue. The program activities are scheduled outside the lecture timetable and are given in a tutorial setting.9 Preassigned teams of 10−12 students are invited to propose a presentation topic in an interdisciplinary area of science that is relevant to, but not directly covered by, the chemistry lecture course.10 The topics are complementary to the second-year chemistry lecture program and act as a vehicle through which to strengthen the students’ appreciation for the subject (for examples of recent project topics, see the Supporting Information). The concept of broadening the students’ vision of chemistry and the provision of funding through a benefactor to the University meant that the program became known as “Broad Curriculum Chemistry”.



BREAKDOWN OF ACTIVITIES The timetable for the student activities is dependent on the teams’ science degree subject choices. Team meetings with a coordinator provide a vehicle for individual group discussion on academic output and organizational progress. The coordinator uses the team meetings and the group secretary’s reports to monitor the distribution of effort within the team and the individual input of each student. Students are assessed by both coordinators and staff mentors (see staff supervisor form in the Supporting Information). There are two student deliverables in the program: the first, at the end of semester one, is the submission of a scientific report written by pairs of students generated within each team. The reports must contain well researched and scientifically sound material on an aspect of the group’s chosen research topic and an evaluation of work of the pair in the context of the

Delivery

Two graduate coordinators (selected from the chemistry postgraduate body and funded by the school) are appointed to provide support to the individual groups. Their role is to act as facilitators to the undergraduate student teams.11 They scaffold the learning process to channel the ideas of the teams into achievable goals within a prescribed time frame and to activate effective decision-making, for example, in establishing a mode of operation of each group to select a team leader and secretary. 339

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Table 1. The Weekly Activities and Learning Objectives

a

The symbols relate to the schematic sequence provided in Figure 1. 340

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topic as a whole (see report assessment form in the Supporting Information). The second deliverable, at the end of semester two, is a group presentation. Students are required to use their reports and additional linking knowledge to create a novel, entertaining, and informative scientific presentation (18 min in length). Marks are awarded for scientific content and the innovative delivery of the information (slides, scripts, props, costumes, demonstrations, creative design, and dramatic backdrop) (see adjudicators form in the Supporting Information).

Table 2. Breakdown of Assessment Marks

Learning Objectives

Writing essays or doing “extra-curricula” reports is similar to the project-based activities encountered at pre-university level education. What makes this experience different is that it is at university level and that it has a peer-learning element. University chemistry programs generally promote the success of the individual and pair learning is usually restricted to the laboratory environment where it is imposed as a cost-saving measure. In addition to the important academic skills of data resourcing, correctly citing and referencing, appropriately using figures, schemes, and tables, and writing with clarity of meaning and expression, the reports require each student to compare, evaluate, and defend their work within their pairing and within their group. The necessity to revisit the report (i) as an information resource for the group presentation and (ii) in terms of its potential value from a visual or entertainment perspective is unique. Each group establishes different criteria for the retention or exclusion of material and as a result the presentations are extremely varied in terms of their technical content and their chosen performance strategy.

Element

Marks

Meeting Attendance and Participation in Semester 1 Staff Mentor Assessment Form 1 Semester 1 Report Meeting Attendance and Participation in Semester 2 Staff Mentor Assessment Form 2 Semester 2 Presentation (Judges Mark)

10 5 35 10 5 35

Peer-Learning and Reflection

The program is implemented in year two of the undergraduate program where confidence among one’s peer-group provides a sense of shared purpose and often greatly enhances smaller group learning platforms.12 The program also spans the entire academic year to provide a continuum in the student learning experience. The program activities used across the 16-week period and the learning objectives are listed in Table 1. The activities are represented by symbols to relate to the schematic sequence provided in Figure 1. To assist the students in producing their reports, a series of tutorials are provided to explain how to access and present scientific information in a coherent way and to use standard reference format. The tutorials also cover plagiarism regulations and the use of chemical drawing software. These skills feed into later coursework in all science disciplines, for example, the introductory section of final year research projects. Transferrable Skills

The presentations require a different set of core skills as is reflected in the specialized tutorials provided in the second semester (Table 1). As well as acquiring technical skills, the groups need to identify the individual strengths and weaknesses of members of the team and to formulate the team’s overall objective. Some groups have a strong performance background and provide a dramatic backdrop (e.g., historical) to their talks. These presentations have a strong element of science theater.13,14 Others use a debate format15 using scientific argument or demonstrations to support the contention that chemistry has a positive role to play within their chosen topic. There is no prescribed performance style, and therefore, this is an open-ended investigation, steered by the coordinators in exploring how to present chemistry topics to a combined general and specialist audience. This question is pertinent to the defense of science as a scholarly pursuit.16

Competitive Element and Aspects of Science Theater

The students are given artistic license in the presentation of their chemistry topics. This performance element therefore offers a rare opportunity for science students to engage talents that are normally the reserve of drama, media, arts, or communication science degrees. It recognizes this talent and employs it in a scientific context that embraces student diversity, demystifies science, and challenges stereotypical opinion.19 The quality and innovation of the presentations is enhanced by healthy degree of competition between groups and having an audience that is made-up of peers and staff mentors. A list of presentation titles and the creative settings employed by the student teams is given in Table 3.





OUTCOMES

Qualitative Indicators

ASSESSMENT The program, which is compulsory for all second-year undergraduates, has been running for 10 years and has undergone iterative improvement over this period. Each student mark is generated as indicated in Table 2 and contributes a total of 5% to the student’s overall end-of-year grade (the rest being made up of laboratory continual assessment and end of year exam marks).

Undergraduate participation has increased across all formats and science disciplines. The cooperative learning element of the program has instigated a sense of joint purpose and camaraderie between the graduate and undergraduate student body.12 As students have been instructed to competently resource and present information via this program, the School of Chemistry was able (2010 onward) to reduce the duration of the final-year research project from 16 to 12 weeks without loss of project quality. More students are majoring in chemistry despite the smaller number of students studying chemistry at both pre- and post-university level.20 The student quotas for chemistry-related majors are now being filled. Membership of the longstanding Student Chemical Society has similarly increased. It is not possible to relate these positive outcomes directly to the introduction of this particular program, but student feedback would indicate that it is contributing to them.



INNOVATIVE ASPECTS The authors have presented this program as a learning innovation at national teaching conferences17 and have provided a breakdown of it on request to institutions in the United Kingdom.18 Through this engagement, the authors believe aspects of the Broad Curriculum program to be novel additions to a university science degree program. 341

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Student Perceptions

“Ready Steady Chemistry”

“I’m a Celebrity Scientist-Get Me Out of Here”

“Alice in Nanoland”

The Chemistry of Cooking

The Chemistry of the Rainforest

Nanochemistry

Layout- mimicked that of “Big Brother” (music, voice-over, day count, and housemate tasks) to reinact life in a mine. Days were numbers as chemical constants such as π and h (Planck’s constant). Topics covered- (i) Effect of natural life deprivation on skin, teeth, eyes, and the onset of brittle bones and gum disease and (ii) Copper mining, extraction, and refinement processing. Layout- based on a complete menu for a celebrity chef cook-off incorporating many aspects of cooking, i.e., baking bread, spices in a curry, demonstration of “liquid nitrogen ice-cream”, and changing the enthalpy of coffee. Audience participation achieved by sampling the final dishes. Topics covered- (i) Structure of starches and baking techniques, (ii) Functional groups in spices, (iii) Changes of state-liquids to solids, (iv) Enthalpy and Gibbs free energy, and (v) Thermochemistry-cooking meat through the Maillard reaction. Layout- based on a TV series “I’m a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here” (music, layout, opening credits, presenters, and bush tucker trials) as a medium for communicating the Chemistry of a Rainforest. Contestants include Albert Einstein, Richard Willstatter, and Marie Curie. Presentation slides were laid out as a rainforest survival manual. Audience participation achieved by “voting off” unfavorable contestants. Topics covered- (i) Synthesis of cocaine in a rainforest, (ii) Gas cycles and environmental chemistry, and (iii) The use of plants and poisons in food, cosmetics and medicine. Layout- replicated Alice’s journey through Wonderland using “Nanoland”-Characters and costumes were based on the book. Links made included the demonstration of the self-assembly of molecules via the stacking of a human deck of cards and the Cheshire cat perching on a graphene tree. Topics covered- (i) The history of nanochemistry, (ii) Nanomaterials-graphene nanotubes, (iii) Surface mechanisms, (iv) Instrumentation (AFM, SEM), and (v) Going down the rabbit hole-femtochemistry? “Dig Brother”Life in a Copper Mine The Chemistry of the Chilean Miners

Concept Title

Table 3. Recent Project Titles and the Adopted Performance Strategy

Construction of Presentation

Journal of Chemical Education

Students are apprehensive at the beginning of this program because it is outside the norm of their undergraduate learning experience; however, students are recognizing the educational value of the program. In the words of one undergraduate, Broad Curriculum [the program] rapidly brought all involved students the confidence and resources necessary to reach an advanced level of presentational, organizational, and research skills. Broad Curriculum is a really enjoyable experience, which afforded me the opportunity to research an interesting topic and work as part of a team; and I have also made some really great friends! Student appreciation for the newly attained and transferable skills is not always immediate and generally grows with student maturity (i.e., along with the final-year project, it is the most cited activity for undertaking a research degree given by our inhouse graduates). Although this late realization is not negative in itself, we proposed to counter it next year by asking the second-year cohort via questionnaire to identify the core skills relevant to careers involving chemistry and to reiterate the importance of these skills throughout the program activities.21 Staff Buy-In

The staff are invited annually to submit their comments on the program. Several times since its conception, due to resource constraints, the continuance of Broad Curriculum program has been dependent on staff votes. It continues to be part of the second-year curriculum and staff members consistently describe it in positive terms: “A great way of getting students to gain a greater understanding of fundamental chemistry concepts through their application in everyday life”, “It is the most rewarding teaching I get to do all year”. Whether directly linked to this program, among the eight schools in the Faculty of Science, Engineering and Maths, students rank the chemistry staff as among the most caring and the School as one of the most organized.22 Dissemination

To showcase the talent demonstrated by the students, five group presentations are put forward to the School’s annual Broad Curriculum Grand Finale (see the two images in the Supporting Information). The winning team is awarded a perpetual silver trophy, before an audience of lecturers, fellow students, research graduates, and the general public. The evening is charged with an invigorated interest and appreciation for chemistry. The esteemed panel of judges at the finale, many of whom express an interest in returning the following year, has included “celebrity faces” from the scientific media such as Jonathan McCrea (radio presenter for Spin 103.8 and Newstalk), Mary Mulvihill (science journalist for RTÉ, Ireland’s national television, and radio broadcaster), and Dick Ahlström (scientific editor of The Irish Times, a national newspaper). The finale has become a public dissemination activity for the School and in this context an invitation to high schools in the region has been made this year.23



EVALUATION AND FEEDBACK To determine student opinion on the program, an online survey of 356 (second, third, and fourth year) science undergraduates, including those not going on to specialize in chemistry was carried out (62% or 221 replied).24 Ten questions were asked to provide an evaluation of the program as a whole and the students’ perceived benefit from it. An 342

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The second-year undergraduates were asked whether the program would influence their science degree choice. A majority, 88%, felt that their aptitude for chemistry had improved as a result of the program and that they could now consider it a possible major degree option. This confidence in their chemistry ability is reflected in a measurable improvement in the grades, for example, the percentage of students obtaining a mark of 60% or higher in the report element of the exercise has increased from 35% to 42% over the last 2 years. Nonchemistry-based students identified the program as beneficial in the areas of group organization, resourcing, and scientific referencing. Many students emphasized the new found sense of confidence that they had in their abilities, and as a consequence, an increased number had applied for summer internships. Overall, this feedback would suggest that the program is highly transferable to other disciplines. In relation to the support network available, students agreed that they had benefited from both the staff mentor and postgraduate coordinator meetings; however, the survey indicated a need for joint staff−coordinator meetings to be incorporated into the program. Recommendations were also made by the students to add content to the tutorials. These included more advanced aspects of chemical drawing and alternative software for presentations, both of which will be integrated into the tutorials for the coming year.

overview of the results obtained and the suggestions made by the students for possible improvement are presented in Figures 2 and 3, respectively. The bar charts indicate the percentage of respondents who acknowledge the improvement of their skills through the Broad Curriculum program.

Figure 2. Survey response indicating the percentage of students by year who found Broad Curriculum program to be a more beneficial learning environment than traditional undergraduate learning environments for developing the listed skills.

The survey asked the students to compare the Broad Curriculum learning environment with other undergraduate learning environments they had experienced (lectures, tutorials, problem-based learning, and laboratory demonstrations). Across all years, the students singled out the Broad Curriculum program as the most effective in developing interdisciplinary research and decision-making (Figure 2). In particular, the third- and fourth-year cohort felt that the program also improved information resourcing (86%) and teamwork (66%) more than any other learning environment and that through it they had gained proficiency in organization and time management. The survey asked the students to rate how the two individual components of the program, the report and the presentation, had affected their transferable skills (see Figure 3A and 3B). Interestingly, the benefits of the presentation element of the program were not recognized strongly until later years (Figure 3B). For example, the improvement in their ability to analyze and evaluate scientific data increased from 60% (second year) to 79% and 76% in third and fourth years.



CONCLUSION Broad Curriculum Chemistry program has exceeded original expectations and has become a fundamental cornerstone of the undergraduate chemistry curriculum over the last 10 years. The program successfully maps onto the hierarchy of order thinking described in Bloom’s revised taxonomy25 by developing the lower-order thinking skills of remembering and understanding, and stretching each individual to attain higher-level thinking skills. It requires the students to apply and to analyze data and to evaluate what makes an informative and effective presentation or drama by creating one of their own. Through pair and team work, it also delivers a strong element of peerlearning.26 The flexibility of the format means that it can be adapted to cater for both large and small class sizes. The multidisciplinary nature of the program provides participants with a highly transferable set of scientific, writing, communication, and presentation skills.

Figure 3. Survey response showing student evaluation of the improvement of their key skills following (A) the report writing element and (B) the presentation element of Broad Curriculum program. 343

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(13) For examples see: (a) Shepherd-Barr, K. Science on Stage; Princeton University Press: Princeton, NJ, 2006. (b) Rossiter, K.; Kontos, P.; Colantonio, A.; Gilbert., J.; Gray, J.; Keightley, M. Staging Data: Theatre as a Tool for Analysis and Knowledge Transfer in Health Research. Soc. Sci. Med. 2008, 66 (1), 160−146. (14) (a) Hoffman, R.; Dejerassi, C. Oxygen. J. Chem. Educ. 2001, 3, 283. (b) Kovac, J. Review of Oxygen: University Theater Production of the Play. J. Chem. Educ. 2011, 10, 1354. (15) Yurgelun, N. Encouraging Balanced Scientific Research through Formal Debate. Sci. Scope 2007, 30 (7), 52−57. (16) Martin, B. Behind the Scenes of Scientific Debating. Soc. Epistemol. 2000, 14 (2/3), 201−209. (17) Work has been presented at Engaging Minds: Active Learning, Participation and Collaboration in Higher Education, NAIRTL 5th Annual Conference and Galway Symposium on Higher Education, 2011, National University of Ireland, Galway, and the Irish Science Teachers Association 50th Annual Conference 2012, Trinity College Dublin Ireland. (18) Details of the Broad Curriculum program format have been supplied to the School of Chemistry, University of Nottingham, UK. (19) (a) Newton, L. D.; Newton, D. P. Primary Children’s Conceptions of Science and the Scientist: Is the Impact of a National Curriculum Breaking Down the Stereotype? Int. J. Sci. Educ. 2012, 20 (9), 1998. (b) Childs, P. E. The Problem with Science Education, Proceedings of Science and Mathematics Education Conference, Dublin 2006. Available online at http://main.spd.dcu.ie/main/academic/ mathematics/smec2006proceedings.html (accessed Dec 2012). (20) Article available online at http://www.oireachtas.ie/parliament/ media/housesoftheoireachtas/libraryresearch/Science_and_Maths_ Education_in_Ireland.pdf (accessed Dec 2012). (21) Garatt, J. Laboratory Work Provides Only One of Many Skills Needed by the Experimental Scientist. Univ. Chem. Educ. 2002, 6 (2), 58−64. (22) CAPSL survey based on a comparison of questionnaires across disciplines in the Faculty of Engineering, Mathematics and Science in Trinity College Dublin. (23) Tuah, J.; Harrison, T. G.; Shallcross, D. E. Acta Dicdact. Napocensia 2009, 2 (3), 31. Available online at http://adn.teaching.ro/ (accessed Dec 2012). (24) The online survey was carried out between April 1, and April 14, 2012 using surveymonkey.com. The survey comprised 10 questions that covered the program in general, as well as the individual components, e.g., the report, the coordinators, resources available in the university, etc. The most relevant results are discussed here. (25) Anderson, L. W.; Krathwohl, D. R., Eds. A Taxonomy for Learning and Assessing; David Mc Kay Company, Inc.: New York, 2001. (26) Guillford, W. H. Teaching Peer Review and the Process of Scientific Writing. Adv. Physiol. Educ. 2001, 25 (3), 167.

ASSOCIATED CONTENT

S Supporting Information *

Recent topic list; staff supervisor form; report assessment form; adjudicator form; and group performance graphics. This material is available via the Internet at http://pubs.acs.org.



AUTHOR INFORMATION

Corresponding Author

*E-mail: [email protected]. Notes

The authors declare no competing financial interest.



ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The authors wish to thank the staff of the School of Chemistry, Trinity College Dublin for their ongoing contribution to the program and the postgraduate coordinators who have supported the program since its inception. In particular, they thank the Trinity Trust and Association and the School of Chemistry for financial support and Nuala Harding (Athlone Institute of Technology, Ireland) for helpful discussion and advice.



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