by Julie Ullman, Molecular and Cell Biology
Precision in language is an unspoken tenet of scientific disciplines, and it is fair to have strict requirements for that in exams. Yet the question arose: How could I help to level the achievement gap between students who worked in science and had extensive, confident scientific lexicons and those who didn’t, while at the same time challenging everyone?
by Shanthi Nataraj, Agricultural & Resource Economics (Home Department: Economics)
I noticed that the students’ analyses of environmental issues in their problem sets improved. Most students still stated strong opinions about environmental issues – but now, they were able to back up their opinions with economic reasoning.
by Natalia Cecire, English
The project was designed to produce a scholarly community that would provide an intellectual context for research findings. Yet because the community was composed of students, all with similar experiences with nineteenth-century literature, the debates occurred in terms that were meaningful to the students at their particular stage of exposure to literary criticism, rather than in the remoter terms of my discipline.
by Jennifer Morazes, MSW, Social Welfare
One student exclaimed that the exercise showed him that “social work is not just about services. It’s about relationships, and relationships are about life. Social work touches all aspects of life.”
by Sereeta Alexander, Education
Social loafing and diffusion of responsibility may permeate and ruin group work, to the dismay of the teacher and the students who do actively participate. … I have learned to design group activities that either inherently entice (or even incite!) participation or that are structured in a manner clearly requiring each student’s contribution.
by Sarah Macdonald, Sociology
While teaching Sociology 5: Evaluation of Evidence, I encountered a problem that is not unique: how, as GSIs, can we prepare our students for challenging final exams without teaching exclusively to the exam?
by Justin Underhill, History of Art
After 20 minutes of excited measurement and discussion, the groups disbanded and I led a very successful discussion about San Francesco della Vigna. Students challenged one another and made observations that I had not noticed. I always know I have succeeded when my students teach me how to look anew.
by James Ramey, Comparative Literature
I was dismayed to find that we had been located in a small, windowless basement room in Haas Pavilion. Claustrophobia heightened my awareness of the need for the students to get along, which led me to wonder how I might structure my course, not only as an intellectual opportunity but also as a social one.
by Alejandro Reyes Arias, Latin American Studies
I divided the class in small groups, each of which would represent a different historical character…The various characters had been kidnapped from their contexts and transported to Berkeley in 2004 to participate in a Conference on Latin America, to debate the future of the continent and to discuss issues of race, identity, gender, economy, sovereignty, nationhood,[and] culture.
by Kimberly Cassibry, History of Art
I wanted my students to recognize the urban impact of such monuments as the Colosseum and Trajan’s Column, and to do that, I had to help them imagine the way Rome looked before these structures existed.