Retouching the Chewy Case:
Knowing from past experience, I understand how important it is for us take go back to the in-class exercise and explain what we were looking for. This gives the class an opportunity to fully understand what the main objective was for this exercise and how to perform better on the next exercise. I feel as if it is better to show the students how to apply the material from the actual source (i.e., the professor) because that way, the students can better understand the concepts taught in class.
Main Concerns the Class has:
As a student, I always enjoyed looking at the stats of my class and this is the reason why I love D2L so much is because of the little stats tab on each assignment; I love to see how well I am doing compared to the class. This may sound potentially selfish and bad but I feel like it is important to show students these types of progress checks so they can feel better about their progress and keep up doing good work, or they can see that they need to improve their homework strategies. Anyhow back to class: I really liked how we took the time to put up visuals of the class’ percentages of how they are doing/feeling because it is a great tool and an aid for the class. A lot of students will be able to know that they are not the only one feeling concerned about “showing up late for class,” (by the way, which the G-Team is doing a great job in policing this area) or “grades.” Even the reading of the silly card was a good example for it shows; 1.) The professor took time in reading through all of the cards and 2.) All the concerns were considered meaning, no question were deemed “stupid” or kicked out of the pile.
Study Tips from the TAs:
The class concerns was a nice opening for the Study tips from the TA’s, it all meshed nicely. Being asked to give tips on how to study to the class was kind of alerting for me because that meant two things. 1.) I would have to talk in front of class and give helpful tips and 2.) I had to compress everything that I would say on this topic into like 5 minutes tops. I could always go on and on talking about insignificant things but luckily, (this time) I stayed focus on giving information solely on the study tips. Hopefully the class will heed these tips.
Psych as a Science:
The current topics that were used as examples kept the class focused. The current, real world examples displayed the many fields of psych and how they are applied every day. These examples showed how today’s current concerns can be helped through the many branches of psychology. Of course with all of the claims made in everyday readings, this question has to come to mind: is this research or study legit? Rethinking and questioning the logic made in these research claims is an important skill for anyone person to have. The true of false segment was a great way to engage the class on topics of interest. All the research examples were a nice follow up on the Scientific Theory. The whole baseline behind Psych as a Science: Be a Social Scientist and ask, “Show me the data!” This was a good message to take home as a student; educate yourself and evaluate the data.
Observations:
My observation I had in class was that every time a student was called on or had a student’s name called, they would smile. I thought that this was very cool.
I know it is a good thing to have the class seem or better yet, be excited but can there be too much excitement? I know that we had a couple of students blurt out during class and the situation was controlled but is this going to be a distracting for the entire class? How do we control these outbursts? Do we need to? Lately it really hasn’t been the issue and I know that if these outbursts become an issue, it can be easily solved through a chat with the student and explaining the concerns with the outbursts. For now, I do believe it is under control.
Another issue I had is in regards to the walk-in visitors; should we close the second floor doors to discourage these visitors and lessen people leaving for the restroom?