Teaching 100: The Theory and Science of Teaching
CELLBIO 306QC
Subject & Catalog Number
Course Information
Description
For many graduate students and medical educators, teaching will be part of their career, whether as mentoring, formal classroom teaching, or teaching in the hospital. In addition, the theory and research evidence accumulating in the disciplines of cognitive psychology, neuroscience, and from STEM classrooms, has turned the question of “How do we best teach science and medicine?” into its own scientific discipline. The Theory and Science of Teaching focuses on understanding why certain teaching methods are effective by examining the scientific research and theoretical frameworks that support these methods. We will read and discuss foundational educational and cognitive psychology texts and primary literature, and then develop course materials that allow us to put these ideas into practice.
Course Notes
Class will meet for 2 hours of synchronous discussion and learning activities each week. The remote section will meet Wednesdays from 8:00am-10:00 am over Zoom and is reserved for master’s students. The in-person section will meet Wednesdays from 2:00pm-4:00pm in Longwood and is intended for PhD students who must take their classes in-person. The content of the sections will be the same and both will share identical asynchronous learning components. This will include watching videos, reading a variety of materials, participating in discussion boards, creating sample materials, and writing learning reflections. The synchronous and asynchronous components combine to meet the course objectives and are equally important to students’ learning. Class begins September 2nd with the release of the first asynchronous module, which students will complete and discuss in short, individually scheduled small group meetings with the course instructor during the week of Sept. 7, in place of a synchronous class session that week. The first synchronous class meeting is September 16. The course concludes with the final synchronous class session on November 11 and the final capstone assignment due November 18.
Recommended Prep
Make It Stick, by Brown, Roediger and McDaniel is required pre-reading and should be completed before the first day of class on September 16. A required asynchronous ‘module 0’ will be released on Canvas on September 2.
Available for Harvard Cross Registration
