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Metadetails
Alfio has taught in PHY1104 (Physics Concepts), PHY3302 (Advanced Topics in Physics) and one quarter of the lectures in NSC1500 (Biophysical Sciences in Nursing).
PHY1104 is a first-year course for students from a wide range of disciplines, including engineering, biomedical science and wine science. There are 50-80 students – about half on campus and half off campus.
PHY3302 is a third-year course offered off campus and NSC1500 is a service course for first year nursing students.
1. Learning/teaching activity
Alfio was concerned that off campus or external students were not able to participate sufficiently in experimental work. In order to undertake experiments, students had to travel to the Residential School, and this was inconvenient, expensive, inflexible and limiting for them. So, he put together an ‘experiment kit' for his first year students. This is a box containing the apparatus for the experiments such as resistors, a multimeter, lights, batteries etc, and student enquiry-guided instructions for a series of experiments. The kit is designed to be inexpensive – it sells for approximately $40 through the bookshop and is available for both on campus and off campus students – and to fit into an ordinary sized mailing box.
For the third-year course, Alfio has also managed to provide students with access to specialised equipment. The equipment was initially purchased from a research grant. As the equipment was already there, Alfio opened up the data to his students. The equipment is located on the roof of G Block and measures solar UV intensity. The website at the end shows real-time recorded data that forms the basis of one of the practicals in this experiment kit. The equipment has been set up to record the experimental data automatically every five minutes. This data is available and automatically updated for the students on the website.
In order to inspire and motivate students through increasing their awareness of the value of research, Alfio has co-authored a monograph employed as a text. He was first author on the monograph with an estimated contribution of 44% and the book is employed as a prescribed text in a third year USQ course. The monograph was published by Kluwer Academic Publishers in 2004. The monograph topic is in a specialised niche area of the authors' research, providing the students in this third year course with the content from the latest research breakthroughs. This approach is intended to inspire and motivate the students.
Alfio has also developed a series of 20 video clips of demonstrations to be used for a first year service teaching course and in a first year physics course as part of a series of highly-portable lecture demonstrations for both on-campus and external students. Alfio says that the provision of visual demonstrations to illustrate the lecture concepts is an important component of teaching to enhance student learning. The video clips of the demonstrations are available for both on-campus and off-campus students. The recording of the demonstrations provides a virtual extension to a classroom, allowing viewing by the external students and students at another campus.
2. Context
The first-year course provides students with an understanding of basic physics principles and ways of using these for problem solving and for exercises based on real-life applications. The third-year course provides students with an in-depth study of selected topics in physics focusing on UV radiation physics and cloud physics – topics of interest to physicists, mathematicians, climatologists and engineers. Each experiment in the kit and the objectives of each experiment has been specifically designed to enhance understanding of concepts in the lectures.
The video clips are made available to the students on a web server so that they can replay the videos in their own time to aid their revision for the course. Alfio integrates the video clips with student learning by showing them during the lecture at the point when the concepts in the video are being taught – the visual demonstration is employed to reinforce the student learning.
3. Learning goals/objectives
Laboratory work is an essential component of learning in science disciplines, but it is a challenge for distance education students and for on-campus students required to attend labs scheduled at fixed times. The experiment kits overcome this inflexibility and provide a more responsive environment offering a choice of modes of educational delivery that accommodate the diverse needs of students. At the same time they create greater equity and equal learning experiences for on-campus and distance education students.
4. Approach
Student learning is enhanced through hands-on experiments and exercises. Alfio's approach to teaching is about giving students the tools to learn. Such experience increases skills and provides students with opportunities for lifelong learning. The aims of the hands-on and interactive practicals are to develops students' curiosity and independence in learning by teaching students to be active investigators through undertaking a series of practicals, which range from the investigation and verification of fundamental laws of science through to employing real-time measurements of the solar UV to determine the length of time to produce barely perceptible sunburn in human skin. For the experiment kits, the self-paced character of the methodology enables and enhances the self-directed learning that is an essential part of teaching students to be independent learners.
5. Feedback
Students are always welcome to email Alfio – he answers within one working day – or they can telephone him if they prefer. This is particularly important for external students who do not have opportunities to ask questions in a lecture. Alfio regards feedback as an ongoing process and he continually works to improve the students' experience.
6. Roles
The experiment kit for PHY1104 was developed with the help of a USQ learning and teaching grant to employ a research assistant who helped develop and test the experiments and write the instructions. Another research assistant also helped by checking the contents and instructions for usefulness and clarity. Alfio also makes good use of Media Services to provide students with film clips of examples of the lecture concepts and he has found the staff at Media Services to be very helpful.
7. Results
Alfio has had many positive comments from students and he is very happy that the experiment kits and video clips are providing an enhanced learning environment for students.
8. Problems and advice
Experiment kits may be useful in other courses with experimental components – however, it may be difficult in 2nd and 3rd level courses due to the more complex equipment required. Nevertheless, Alfio says these challenges could possibly be overcome in the future with further developments.
9. General recommendations
Alfio recommends Media Services as a wonderful resource to help in improving teaching materials.
10. Additional comments
The website provides real-time recorded data that is automatically updated every five minutes with data recorded by instruments at USQ. The students from any location worldwide can access this data periodically in order to undertake their practical work according to their enquiry guided instructions.
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