RESEARCH OF THE WEEK:
Here’s why Anatomage is so effective
Anatomy is regarded as a cornerstone of health care education and is normally a pre-requisite for clinicians. Even though cadaver dissection and prosection have been perceived as the “gold standard” in recent years, their use appeared to be replaced by many innovative teaching technologies. The present study incorporated a three-dimensional (3D) virtual human cadaver—Anatomage Table (AT)—in teaching human anatomy to first-year nursing students in a quasi-experimental design. The results show that the class average in mid-term and final examinations and the overall Grade Point Average (GPA) were significantly higher in students taught with the AT than students taught without the AT. On a satisfaction survey, 84.0% of students reported a positive experience with the AT, and 85.4% indicated they would recommend this teaching tool to other students. For nursing programs without cadaveric dissection, the AT may serve as an effective teaching tool to increase the knowledge of anatomy and may enhance student’s long-term knowledge retention. Click here to learn more about how using a virtual human cadaver improves knowledge of human anatomy for medical students in the journal Science Direct: sciencedirect.com.
Anesthetists are responsible for developing expertise in neuraxial anesthesia. A thorough understanding of anatomy and physiology is essential in performing subarachnoid and epidural blocks. Although cadaveric dissection is considered the gold standard for learning anatomy, student use of cadavers can become limited due to supervisory, ethical, accessibility, and financial constraints (Periya and Moro, 2019). In recent years, the evolution of technology has produced a virtual option for cadaver dissection (Washmuth et al., 2020). The Anatomage virtual dissection table is a tool that could be used to increase knowledge of neuroanatomical structures and their spatial relationships in place of cadaveric dissection. Learning modules were developed utilizing the Anatomage table to learn and review anatomy pertinent to neuraxial anesthesia. Second-year anesthesia students at the host Nurse Anesthesia Program in their Fall 2022 semester participated in implementing these modules. Pre- and post-surveys analyzed with a Paired Two-sample t-test demonstrated significant improvement in the student’s knowledge and confidence when administering neuraxial anesthesia after completing the provided modules. Improving neuroanatomy knowledge leads to greater success and patient satisfaction when performing epidural or spinal anesthesia. Click here to read more about the research in the Southern Illinois Unversity journal, Spark: spark.siue.ed
Research of the Week: Why Padlet is so Popular
Using Padlet for collaborative learning: Research by Zhi and Su, 2015 — In recent years, teachers have recognized that Padlet is a useful tool to improve collaborative learning. Some of its advantages are it’s easy to use, offers instant collaboration (any student can see when anyone else is uploading something on the wall), multimedia (almost everything can be placed on the Padlet), and mobile (it can work on many different devices).
Padlet: The Multipurpose Web 2.0 Tool: Research by FWGU, 2020; Duke et al., 2013 — Connectivism is relatively new and underscores life-long learning. It is important to note that today, individuals seek to gain knowledge beyond formal education through skill acquisition, social and professional networks, and information access through technology explained that connectivism enhances student learning through knowledge and perception acquired through personal networks. Utilizing Padlet in the classroom allows faculty to expand their teaching practices beyond what is available in traditional online learning environments.
Online collaborative Padlet-mediated learning in health management studies: Research by Zheng et al., 2014; Malik et al., 2017; Park et al., 2019; Yadegaridehkordi et al., 2019 — Online collaborative learning (OCL) is a goal-oriented activity of a group of students committed to achieving a shared goal and creating new knowledge by learning interactively in a digital environment. This methodology has become widespread because of its many advantages. For example, studies show that encouragement of students’ engagement, high accessibility to the course material (Sukendro et al., 2020; Balouchi and Samad, 2021), extensive access to colleagues and instructors, and encouragement of interaction and collaboration among the students contribute to better learning outcomes (Ornellas and Muñoz Carril, 2014). OCL was found to add interest and to raise motivation to conduct research and study, and as such, to encourage the transition from passive to active learning and to encourage interaction and connection between the students through the sharing of the products of their study and new ideas, leading to greater social engagement and contributing to the development of higher-order intellectual skills.
Research of the Week: 3 ways to use ChatGPT to help students learn and not cheat
The Research Laboratory for Digital Learning at the Ohio State University strives to understand how students learn in technology-supported learning environments and how to design, develop and integrate innovative technology capable of promoting students’ motivation and engagement in digital learning to impact student success positively. Its research focuses on areas where technology is essential in supporting meaningful learning, including computer-supported collaborative learning, motivation and self-regulated learning, learning analytics and social network analysis, artificial intelligence in education, virtual world and educational games, digital learning design and development, and teacher technology professional development. We are particularly interested in multi-disciplinary collaborative projects where innovative learning technologies bring the potential to benefit students’ learning and achievement.
Since ChatGPT can engage in conversation and generate essays, computer codes, charts, and graphs that closely resemble those created by humans, educators worry students may use it to cheat. A growing number of school districts across the country have decided to block access to ChatGPT on computers and networks. As professors of educational psychology and educational technology, we’ve found that the main reason students cheat is their academic motivation. For example, sometimes students are just motivated to get a high grade, whereas other times, they are motivated to learn all that they can about a topic. The decision to cheat or not, therefore, often relates to how academic assignments and tests are constructed and assessed, not on the availability of technological shortcuts. When they have the opportunity to rewrite an essay or retake a test if they don’t do well initially, students are less likely to cheat. We believe teachers can use ChatGPT to increase their students’ motivation for learning and actually prevent cheating. Here are three strategies for doing that.
How to help high school seniors cope with milestones missed due to coronavirus
By Associate Professor of Psychology and Clinical Director, Regional Assessment & Resource Centre, Queen’s University, Ontario
Change is stressful for all of us. It is, therefore, no surprise to find that, in general, people are finding it difficult to cope with the COVID-19 restrictions. None of us knows exactly how to cope with the fallout from this unprecedented situation. While adults find this forced confinement difficult, young adults who were about to embark on a new chapter in their lives are finding the disruption in normal life events particularly stressful. Not only are they missing things such as proms or a graduation ceremony, but they’re also missing other potentially life-altering events: the track and field championship for which they’d worked hard all year just so they could compete; the Royal Conservatory exam to evaluate just how much they’d improved their musical skills; the summer job that would help them earn money and build a resume for future employment.
Click here to read more in TheConversation.com.
Intersectionality Visualized: An Analysis of Global Feminisms
Abstract: This paper is a detailed analysis of the Global Feminisms exhibition held at the Brooklyn Museum in 2007. Seeking to understand the ways in which women curators have challenged the traditional male artistic canon through their practice, this paper engages in a close reading of the exhibition’s design and the feminist artworks within it. The paper argues that the Global Feminisms exhibition visualizes intersectionality, bringing together the artistic voices of women of diverse backgrounds whose works explore colonialism, sexuality, self identity, motherhood, nationality, and other themes to form a rich tapestry that is not contained within the frame of the European canon. This paper illuminates an important movement toward feminist curatorial activism in the spaces of museums globally.
Click here to download the paper.
Research shows some distance-learning lessons deepen student engagement
As many public K–12 schools reopen this week to a period of distance learning, a new UTSA study identifying what makes online education engaging and effective is providing a framework for local school districts’ fall planning. The UTSA Urban Education Institute, directed by Mike Villarreal, spent the summer surveying almost 2,000 public school students, parents and teachers across eight school systems in San Antonio to find out what worked and what didn’t during early pandemic schooling to engage students and advance their learning.
“For this report, we really wanted to take a deep dive into understanding the types of distance-learning techniques and approaches that benefitted students most,” Villarreal said. “We found multiple solutions for motivating online learners. And we identified school systems that have emerged as early leaders in engaging students remotely.”
While 64% of students and parents said less learning took place during the spring—compared to “normal,” prepandemic schooling—a majority also said they were understanding of the extreme circumstances teachers faced when the virus outbreak forced campuses to suddenly close. Of those parents and students surveyed, 57% said teachers could not have done anything more to improve upon postpandemic spring learning.
New Study Highlights Impact of Remote Learning and Offers Insights for Targeting Recovery Efforts: Findings on learning loss point to next steps for district spending to address academic recovery
In the most comprehensive study of the impact of remote instruction during the pandemic, researchers examined testing data from 2.1 million students, between third and eighth grade, in nearly ten thousand schools in 49 states and the District of Columbia. School districts that remained remote for much of 2020-21 experienced the largest declines and will need to pivot quickly to avoid permanent losses in student achievement. The paper showed that high-poverty schools not only spent more weeks in remote instruction during 2020-21, but their students suffered larger losses in academic achievement when they did so.
Researchers from the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard University (CEPR), CALDER Center at the American Institutes for Research, NWEA, and Dartmouth College found that within school districts that were remote for most of 2020-21, high-poverty schools lost a half-year of achievement growth, roughly twice as much as low-poverty schools in the same districts. “When districts shifted to remote instruction, students in high-poverty schools were most negatively impacted,” said Thomas J. Kane, CEPR faculty director. “School districts urgently need to reassess their plans and ensure that the scale of their catch-up efforts matches the magnitude of their students’ losses. If they don’t, we will see the largest widening in educational inequity in a generation.”
Since the beginning of the pandemic, school districts received $190 billion in federal aid to cope with COVID-19 issues. Such aid may be sufficient in districts which remained in-person during 2020-21. However, high-poverty districts that remained in remote instruction for much of 2020-21 would need to spend nearly all their ARP funding just to address academic recovery. The American Rescue Plan, passed before the scale of the losses were clear, only requires districts to spend 20 percent on academic recovery.
The researchers used achievement data from NWEA, a not-for-profit, research and educational services provider serving K-12 students. They compared achievement growth during the pandemic, from autumn 2019 through autumn 2021, to achievement growth during the two years prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The research group is currently working with a number of public school districts around the country to measure the efficacy of COVID catch-up efforts, such as tutoring, summer school and extra periods of math and English instruction. The group of researchers will be sharing what they are learning in future reports.
“The findings in this paper show that how districts responded to the pandemic had a powerful impact on student achievement. What districts do going forward with the unprecedented federal resources they have will go a long way toward determining how successful we are as a nation at helping students recover from the dramatic effects of the pandemic,” said Dan Goldhaber, Director, CALDER at the American Institutes for Research.
The full report is available at cepr.harvard.edu/road-to-covid-recovery. Its authors are Dan Goldhaber of the University of Washington, Thomas J. Kane and Tyler Patterson of the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard University, Andrew McEachin and Emily Morton of NWEA, and Douglas Staiger of Dartmouth College.
Saying that students embrace censorship on college campuses is incorrect – here’s how to discuss the issue more constructively
By Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences, Penn State
The claim that college students censor viewpoints with which they disagree is now common. Versions of this claim include the falsehoods that students “shut down” most invited speakers to campuses, reject challenging ideas and oppose conservative views. Such cynical distortions dominate discussions of higher education today, misinform the public and threaten both democracy and higher education. Indeed, politicians in states such as Florida, Texas and Ohio argue that a so-called “free speech crisis” on college campuses justifies stronger government control over what gets taught in universities.
Since 2020, numerous state legislatures have attempted to censor forms of speech on campuses by citing exaggerations about students and their studies. Passing laws to ban certain kinds of speech or ideas from college campuses is no way to promote true free speech and intellectual diversity. The most common targets of such censorship are programs that discuss race, gender, sexuality and other forms of multiculturalism. My concerns over public discourse about higher education extend from my bookon popular misinformation about universities and why it threatens democracy. In it, I show that many negative perceptions of students and universities rest on factual distortions and exaggerations.
Click here to read more in TheConversation.com.
Assessing Distance Learning for the Bureau of Indian Education: Understanding how best to reach and teach students who lack broadband service
Problem: The COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately impacted American Indian students. Historically, many American Indian students have struggled to access high-quality education. That disparity intensified during the COVID-19 pandemic when most American schools quickly pivoted to some form of remote education. That transition exposed and exacerbated the profound consequences of the digital divide. Tribal communities are four times more underserved by broadband than the general population, making distance education challenging, if not impossible, and putting them at risk of falling further behind their peers. To support distance learning in its 183 schools, the Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) needed more information about the challenges the schools faced and best practices to address them. BIE also needed support moving the schools to the ideal future state where they have better support and resources. BIE funded NORC and our partners Bowman Performance Consulting, Education Northwest, and SRI International, to oversee that work.
Solution: NORC assessed distance learning delivery and ways to improve remote instruction. This project had four main goals:
- First, NORC investigated the main Learning Management Systems that Native schools use to provide BIE with guidance in using these systems throughout the country.
- Second, the NORC team looked at the current state of distance education at all BIE and Tribally Controlled Schools (TCS) schools and colleges through school interviews and a family survey.
- Third, we defined best practices for distance learning implementation based on the strengths and challenges of these schools, colleges, and students.
- Finally, we developed plans to bridge the gap between the current and ideal states of distance learning at these schools and colleges for BIE to implement.
Historically, Tribal communities have experienced racist and colonialist approaches as research subjects. This has resulted in inconsistencies in how their lived experiences are represented and communicated to the broader public. Our research team took this issue seriously and worked to center Indigenous ways of knowing and learning throughout the project. By using Western and Indigenous evaluation methods together as a truly blended practice, the team sought to facilitate acceptance of the results and buy-in of the recommendations, thereby helping to ensure success.
A solution to America’s teacher shortage is hiding in plain sight. Enter Reach University.
Over 280,000 teachers left their jobs since the COVID-19 pandemic began, accelerating a teacher shortage that schools across the country have been grappling with for years. It turns out, however, that there’s been a solution hiding in plain sight.
That’s where Reach University comes in. The online nonprofit university is training paraprofessionals — teacher aides — to become teachers inside of the schools that already employed them.
“Over a million people want to become teachers and are working every day in classrooms as paraprofessionals,” says Dr. Mallory Dwinal-Palisch, founder and chancellor of Reach University. “They can’t become teachers because they cannot afford to earn their college degree.”
Reach University solves this problem by meeting paraprofessionals where they are, letting them earn their degree at an affordable price within a manageable schedule. Instead of offering traditional four-year degrees, the university is creating an apprenticeship pipeline for working professionals — and changing the education process for teachers.
Click here to read more on standtogether.org.
And learn more about why are teachers leaving: Click here to watch the video.
How can I make studying a daily habit?
By Professor of Education, University of Tennessee
Studying – you know you need to do it, but you just can’t seem to make it a habit. Maybe you forget, become distracted or just don’t want to do it. Understanding what a habit is, and how it forms, can help you figure out how to study on a daily basis.
The Habit Loop: A habit is a behavior you do regularly or routinely. As a professor who studies how to help students become better readers and writers, I can tell you that research shows habits have a loop: cue, routine, reward. Let’s say you have a habit of eating a snack after school. When school is about to end, you start to feel hungry. Dismissal is the cue to get your snack. Eating the snack is the routine. The reward is that it tastes good and your hunger goes away, which reinforces the habit – and makes you want to repeat the loop again the next day. Here are the things you need to make a studying loop:
- A set time to study every day.
- A cue to start studying.
- An environment that helps you stick to your studying routine.
- A reward for studying.