Teaching and the Internet: The Application of Web Apps, Networking, and Online Tech for Chemistry Education 9780841232723, 0841232725, 9780841232716

Table of contents :
Content: Preface 1. Facebook: An Avenue to Reflective Discussions through Case Studies 2. Role of iOS and Android Mobile Apps in Teaching and Learning Chemistry 3. Application of Social Media in Chemistry Education: Incorporating Instagram and Snapchat in Laboratory Teaching 4. Using Desktop Streaming To Bring Review Sessions Online 5. Using Technology To Flip and Structure General Chemistry Courses at a Large Public University: Our Approach, Experience, and Outcomes 6. What Worked for Me: Latest Trends in Technology-Enabled Blended Learning Experience (TEBLE) 7. Establishing an Instructor YouTube Channel as an Open EducationalResource (OER) Supplementing General and Organic Chemistry Courses 8. Online Tools for Teaching Large Laboratory Courses: How the GENI Website Facilitates Authentic Research 9. The Application of Drones in Chemical Education for Analytical Environmental Chemistry 10. Back to Basics: Principles of Teaching That Will Never Expire Editors' Biographies Indexes

Citation preview

Teaching and the Internet: The Application of Web Apps, Networking, and Online Tech for Chemistry Education

ACS SYMPOSIUM SERIES 1270

Teaching and the Internet: The Application of Web Apps, Networking, and Online Tech for Chemistry Education Michael A. Christiansen, Editor Utah State University, Uintah Basin Campus Vernal, Utah

John M. Weber, Editor Utah State University Eastern Price, Utah

Sponsored by the ACS Division of Chemical Education

American Chemical Society, Washington, DC Distributed in print by Oxford University Press

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Christiansen, Michael A. (Michael Andrew), 1979- editor. | Weber, John M., editor. | American Chemical Society. Division of Chemical Education. Title: Teaching and the Internet : the application of web apps, networking, and online tech for chemistry education / Michael A. Christiansen, editor (Utah State University, Uintah Basin Campus, Vernal, Utah), John M. Weber, editor (Utah State University Eastern, Price, Utah) ; sponsored by the ACS Division of Chemical Education. Description: Washington, DC : American Chemical Society, [2017] | Series: ACS symposium series ; 1270 | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2017052432 (print) | LCCN 2017053272 (ebook) | ISBN 9780841232716 (ebook) | ISBN 9780841232723 Subjects: LCSH: Chemistry--Computer-assisted instruction. | Chemistry--Study and teaching. | Web-based instruction. Classification: LCC QD40 (ebook) | LCC QD40 .T41955 2017 (print) | DDC 540.71--dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017052432

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48n1984. Copyright © 2017 American Chemical Society Distributed in print by Oxford University Press All Rights Reserved. Reprographic copying beyond that permitted by Sections 107 or 108 of the U.S. Copyright Act is allowed for internal use only, provided that a per-chapter fee of $40.25 plus $0.75 per page is paid to the Copyright Clearance Center, Inc., 222 Rosewood Drive, Danvers, MA 01923, USA. Republication or reproduction for sale of pages in this book is permitted only under license from ACS. Direct these and other permission requests to ACS Copyright Office, Publications Division, 1155 16th Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20036. The citation of trade names and/or names of manufacturers in this publication is not to be construed as an endorsement or as approval by ACS of the commercial products or services referenced herein; nor should the mere reference herein to any drawing, specification, chemical process, or other data be regarded as a license or as a conveyance of any right or permission to the holder, reader, or any other person or corporation, to manufacture, reproduce, use, or sell any patented invention or copyrighted work that may in any way be related thereto. Registered names, trademarks, etc., used in this publication, even without specific indication thereof, are not to be considered unprotected by law. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Foreword The ACS Symposium Series was first published in 1974 to provide a mechanism for publishing symposia quickly in book form. The purpose of the series is to publish timely, comprehensive books developed from the ACS sponsored symposia based on current scientific research. Occasionally, books are developed from symposia sponsored by other organizations when the topic is of keen interest to the chemistry audience. Before agreeing to publish a book, the proposed table of contents is reviewed for appropriate and comprehensive coverage and for interest to the audience. Some papers may be excluded to better focus the book; others may be added to provide comprehensiveness. When appropriate, overview or introductory chapters are added. Drafts of chapters are peer-reviewed prior to final acceptance or rejection, and manuscripts are prepared in camera-ready format. As a rule, only original research papers and original review papers are included in the volumes. Verbatim reproductions of previous published papers are not accepted.

ACS Books Department

Contents Preface .............................................................................................................................. ix 1.

Facebook: An Avenue to Reflective Discussions through Case Studies .............. 1 Andrea M. Geyer

2.

Role of iOS and Android Mobile Apps in Teaching and Learning Chemistry ................................................................................................................ 19 Ganesh H. Naik

3.

Application of Social Media in Chemistry Education: Incorporating Instagram and Snapchat in Laboratory Teaching .............................................. 37 Rachel Rui Xia Lim, Alina Sihui Ang, and Fun Man Fung

4.

Using Desktop Streaming To Bring Review Sessions Online ............................. 55 M. K. Mann

5.

Using Technology To Flip and Structure General Chemistry Courses at a Large Public University: Our Approach, Experience, and Outcomes ............. 75 Melissa A. Deri, Donna McGregor, and Pamela Mills

6.

What Worked for Me: Latest Trends in Technology-Enabled Blended Learning Experience (TEBLE) ............................................................................. 99 Fun Man Fung and Aaron Rosario Jeyaraj

7.

Establishing an Instructor YouTube Channel as an Open Educational Resource (OER) Supplementing General and Organic Chemistry Courses .................................................................................................................. 115 Douglas M. Jackson

8.

Online Tools for Teaching Large Laboratory Courses: How the GENI Website Facilitates Authentic Research ............................................................. 137 Benjamin J. McFarland

9.

The Application of Drones in Chemical Education for Analytical Environmental Chemistry ................................................................................... 155 Fun Man Fung and Simon Watts

10. Back to Basics: Principles of Teaching That Will Never Expire ..................... 171 Michael A. Christiansen Editors’ Biographies .................................................................................................... 187

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Indexes Author Index ................................................................................................................ 191 Subject Index ................................................................................................................ 193

viii

Preface

The central premise of Christensen and Eyring’s 2011 book, The Innovative University, might have seemed like a jarring thunderclap to unprepared administrators or faculty. In it, the authors point out that online education and its accompanying digital technologies represent a heretofore-nonexistent form of disruptive innovation. They also predict that these new technologies will dramatically alter how we teach and may even imperil some postsecondary institutions that resist adjusting and integrating these new tools to their full advantage. Questions accordingly arise for us educators, such as: should I adapt and better incorporate online or other digital technologies into my teaching? If so, which ones should I use, and how can I best do that? If not, why not? And more forebodingly, is it possible, in an increasingly competitive global market of online educators, that those who resist new teaching tools may one day be replaced by those who do not? Sensitive to the possible future educational revolution that new online tools may portend, we organized a one-session symposium at the 252nd American Chemical Society (ACS) National Meeting in Philadelphia, held on August 25, 2016. The session’s title was “Present & Future Impact of the Internet, Web Apps & High-Speed Networking Technology on Local & Global Chemistry Education.” Our symposium’s purpose was to share ways in which new technologies, such as collaborative web apps, podcasting, online videos, and social networking sites, are currently being used in the university classroom. There were additional discussions centered on questions like, “How are such technologies impacting our students and the global community?” And, “What will the future of chemistry education look like; as such tools become increasingly common?” The session featured talks by eight university educators with diverse expertise in employing online and other digital resources in their chemistry classrooms. The topic’s timeliness and interest level apparently made it well-suited for an ACS symposium series volume, as we received an invitation to assemble the book before our session had even transpired.

ix

Pleasingly, six of the original eight speakers (Professors Geyer, Deri, Jackson, Naik, McFarland, and Christiansen) agreed to author chapters for this work. To this roster, we also added Professor Fun Man Fung, a groundbreaking educator from the National University of Singapore. Professor Fung and his coauthors responsively contributed three additional chapters to this volume, giving it a broad, international coverage of diverse, high-impact, technology-centered topics in chemistry education. Our purpose in assembling this book is to expose educators to a wide array of online digital teaching tools and to increase awareness of how these tools are currently being used. We anticipate that such exposure will help savvy instructors employ these tools to provide students with the best learning opportunities possible. Moreover, despite being authored solely by postsecondary chemistry professors, we believe that this book addresses topics with broad enough applicability to extend far beyond chemistry, thus providing an effective starting point for interested teaching professionals in any discipline, at any institutional level. To this end, we organized this volume into four sections. Section 1 provides a broad and succinct introduction to social media, smartphone apps, and online review sessions. Section 2 covers internet videos and other methods in flipped and blended classrooms. Section 3 features highly-innovative means of enhancing students’ research experience in laboratory courses through two fascinating modern tools: the online Guiding Education through Novel Investigation (GENI) platform and the use of unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, in teaching an analytical environmental chemistry lab. Lastly, Section 4 covers timeless teaching principles. This latter theme, authored by one of the book’s coeditors, may seem a strange addition to a volume about modern tech in education. However, its purpose is to bring to fore timeless teaching principles that transcend technology, with its main contention being that in the end, high-tech bells and whistles cannot compensate for poor teaching methods. In addressing such current and mercurial topics, we realize that some of the tools discussed in this book may be outdated shortly after release. This notwithstanding, we hope that at least one common theme will become apparent throughout this work: our authors’ dedication to and passion for seeking out and implementing the most effective means of teaching. We do not use technology simply to be trendy or popular, but to leverage whatever means are needed to afford our students the best educations we can. We accordingly hope that you will sense the authors’ commitment as you read this book, replete with our experiences in striving to pioneer new teaching methods that may one day become as common as the textbooks and blackboards of the past.

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We conclude by expressing our gratitude to our authors for their amazing contributions, as well as to the numerous peer-reviewers, whose scrutiny and feedback immeasurably enhanced the final quality of this book. We further acknowledge the extensive help, guidance, and support of the ACS Books editorial staff, which include Zac Stelling, Elizabeth Hernandez, Tracey Glazener, and Bob Hauserman. Thank you, everyone. We could not have done this without you!

Dr. Michael A. Christiansen Associate Professor Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry Utah State University, Uintah Basin Campus 320 North Aggie Boulevard Vernal, Utah 84078, United States

Dr. John M. Weber Assistant Professor Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry Utah State University Eastern Campus 451 East 400 North Price, Utah 84501, United States

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Chapter 1

Facebook: An Avenue to Reflective Discussions through Case Studies Andrea M. Geyer* Department of Chemistry, Computer Science, and Mathematics, University of Saint Francis, 2701 Spring Street, Fort Wayne, Indian 46808, United States *E-mail: [email protected]

Students were introduced to using Facebook as a platform for communicating science through case studies in a general chemistry course. They explored biased headlines centered on unresolved problems in science as they role played different characters. They developed a realization of the need for a baseline scientific literacy in the general public as they honed their own skills of assessing scientific sources for bias, sound arguments, and accuracy. Through the use of Facebook, my students showed a 62% increase in the number of resources they used to formulate decisions and debate science during the case study discussion.

Capturing the Case Study in Action It’s two minutes before class. I look around the room, and almost everyone is on Facebook. There’s laughter; students are sharing their Facebook comments with one another on their phones. There are looks of determination, students flipping back and forth between their social media thread and a journal article. Others are seriously critiquing their classmates’ scientific arguments. As the start of lecture nears, my students beg for a moment to finish presenting their arguments. With this buzz of excitement lingering, I delve into acids and bases, providing the students with a basis for their next discussion comments on Facebook. My students thrive in this electric atmosphere, seeking deeper understanding of chemistry and its ramifications in other disciplines. The material we are covering is no different than other general chemistry courses. Yet, the level of © 2017 American Chemical Society

anticipation and desire for content in a course composed of merely 5% chemistry majors is much stronger than I’ve experienced previously. In this predominantly first year course, the introduction of case studies through social media brought profound change to the classroom dynamic.

Social Media and Science Simply put, social media is an online forum for communities to share a broad variety of information. Platforms include social networking, blogging, social bookmarking, and podcasting. Many chemists have turned to social media to engage their students and alumni outside of the classroom. For example, chemistry “thought problems” are processed between classes on Instagram (1). Alumni and student connections are built through networking in Facebook and LinkedIn (2). A foundation for identifying bias and scientific reliability is laid through social tagging (3) and collaborative editing on Wikipedia (4–6). Even office hours are conducted late into the evenings through Facebook and Twitter (7). Beyond academia, social media sites are beginning to serve as modes for scientists to communicate science to the general population. Unfortunately, scientists have been slow to embrace social media. Reasons for scientists’ reluctance vary. Some view that social media is an inappropriate mode of communication, while others perceive that it is difficult to use. Some scientists believe that there isn’t time to share out on social media (8). Despite this, in 2016 over 1,000 comments referring to one of the top 100 scientific journal articles were made on Twitter (9). In April 2017, posts and comments flooded Facebook as scientists sought to be heard and supported through the Marches for Science. As of July 2017, the Facebook group for the March for Science has just over 819,000 members and continues to have active discussions. Given that 48% of 18 to 29 year olds believe that Facebook is an important way to get news, this platform has the potential to serve as an excellent tool for sharing science with the younger generation (10). So, why use Facebook for implementing case studies? Facebook is used by 79% of online American adults and nearly 100% of my students. That is more than double the usage rate of all other social networking platforms (Table 1). With 3 out of 4 users engaging daily with Facebook, it only takes a quick review of my online course learning management system (LMS) statistics to realize that Facebook is the more frequented site by my students (11). This is consistent with Schroeder’s analysis of enhanced student engagement with Facebook relative to the LMS in his organic chemistry course (12). Ripe with opportunity, it became clear that I could exploit my students’ social networking habits, dare I say obsessions, to reach them more effectively in their class.

2

Table 1. Social Media Usage by Online American Adults (11) Social Media

% Online American Adults

Facebook

79

Instagram

32

LinkedIn

29

Pinterest

31

Twitter

24

Case Study Philosophy and Pedagogical Methods For many of us, the phrase “case study” is loaded with preconceptions. Depending on your movie genre, you may envision Joe Pesci, the “Harvard Bum,” countering Gore Vidal’s question on presidential power through explaining the genius of the American Constitution in the movie, “With Honors” (13). Maybe you see Bob Gunton demanding medical student responses as they travel from bedside to bedside discussing treatments with “objectivity” in order to avoid “emotional transference” in “Patch Adams” (14). Each movie shows a classical, narrow portrayal of case study methodologies in an intimidating Socratic lecture style. In truth, there is no one way to design or implement case studies in any discipline. This reveals the power that case studies hold, for they can be molded and transformed to meet the needs of the chemistry classroom. Despite being used for decades by business and medical disciplines, case study methods have really only been embraced by chemists over the past decade (15). This recent surge of case study pedagogy interest was highlighted by the ConfChem Conference on Case-Based Studies in Chemical Education in 2011 (16). Today you can find a library of case studies for STEM courses that are completely keyed with instructor guides through the National Center for Case Study Teaching in Science (17). Upon reviewing the case study library, you will notice a plethora of styles for implementing case study pedagogies (17). Students can explore scientific controversies in a public hearing or trial format, review recent journal articles as research teams in a discussion format, or use their phones to log their responses to questions posed within the context of a case study. These styles can be implemented at the individual level, in small groups, or even in large classes (18, 19). Each style requires commitment and preparation by the instructor in order for the case study methodology to be successful. Teaching science using case studies is an art that requires much practice, reflection, and adaptation (20). To assist with this process, annual workshops on using and developing case studies in the sciences are offered at the University at Buffalo (17).

3

Case Studies Overview I will discuss how to implement a case study through social media that allows students to explore unresolved scientific dilemmas that have received much attention in research journals. On the first day of class I present my students with a biased, controversial headline based on a journal review article that is framed to evoke an emotional response (21, 22). The headline opens an avenue that allows for not only scientific discussion, but also moral, ethical, and political discussions. In a class populated by a variety of disciplines this tactic has enhanced student engagement with the course content. Teaching at a Catholic, Franciscan university, with many pre-professional (pre-medical, pre-dental, pre-pharmaceutical, etc.) students and several students that are parents, I have used the following loaded headlines for my case studies: • •

“Oral contraceptive contamination of waters is playing a significant role in the recent increase in examples of intersex fish.” “Responses to ‘Toxic Toy Crisis’ have been reactive and piecemealinsufficient to ensure safety of toys and other children’s products.”

Like many faculty, I work with a synergy of case study methods, implementing an online appraisal-style interrupted case study method. An appraisal style focuses on analyzing an unresolved issue, often without a central character in the study (18). For instance, in my case study, each student is playing a different character that has vested interest in a specific headline. The interrupted method provides information in a piecewise fashion to the students. This allows course content to be scaffolded in a way that reduces the potential for overwhelming students, which is often a concern in a course primarily composed of first-year students (23). Traditionally, an interrupted case study is completed in one class session; however, I have chosen to conduct the case over several days as done in project-based learning curricula. This gives students time to develop their personas, fully process the case, and conduct additional research as the discussion unfolds on Facebook. If you are working with a topic that has the potential to stimulate student emotions, allowing the students time to fully process the case is helpful for creating a discussion that is driven by critical thinking and reflection (24).

Facebook Fundamentals In preparation for the case study, the instructor and students need to create a user account at www.facebook.com. Most students use their personal Facebook account, although some will create an account specifically for the study. Students who create a new account do this to either remain anonymous during the study, or to maintain personal profile privacy. The latter can be addressed with an existing Facebook account through the profile privacy settings, which indicate how much information is revealed and who has viewing privileges. With 60% of U.S. employers making hiring decisions using the professional social media site, LinkedIn, a class discussion on professional and personal social media presence 4

is warranted (25). This is relevant because young adult opinions vary widely on the topic and online adults with a college degree are four times as likely to carry a LinkedIn account relative to adults with no education beyond high school (26). The case study is readily facilitated as a Facebook Group. A secret, closed, or public group can be instituted, with each style having advantages and disadvantages. The group is managed by at least one administrator, which in my case is me, but students could also be administrators as well. A secret group has the most restricted awareness from the public. In general, only current and former members of the group can find information about the group. In both closed and secret groups the discussion is only viewable by the group members and all group members are approved by the group administrator. I prefer a closed or private group for my Facebook case studies because my students are playing characters that may not represent their personal stance on the topic. In contrast, an open group allows the general public to view and participate in the discussion, which could result in the students’ roles being misconstrued as their own personal opinion. An open group could be a great tool if you want your students to engage in a public Facebook discussion. At any time the privacy of a group can be increased, but not decreased. Thus, a group can be changed from public to closed to private, but not the reverse (27). Facebook Groups allow all conversations to be isolated to a single web page. This ensures that all comments are viewable by the students in the group and makes it easy for the instructor to track discussion threads. I track student comment count nightly during the 10 day online discussion using a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet that I share either as a viewable Google Document or through the course LMS. I work with a spreadsheet that lists only student IDs in order to maintain anonymity during the feedback process. Alternatively, I could have directly commented on Facebook about the weight of the student posting, but this would result in my feedback being common knowledge to all students in the course. After recording the comment feedback in the Excel sheet I select the “like” button below the comment in Facebook to indicate to myself and the student that I have assessed the comment. As the discussion occurs on Facebook, the most recent comments are shifted to the top of the web page and a line is drawn indicating where content previously viewed by the reader begins. This allows me to readily identify what threads need to be assessed. If you are considering a public Facebook Group you may want to use a Facebook Page rather than a group. The Facebook Page offers similar features to the public group while giving you the advantage of a tool for tracking activity and audience demographics known as “Insights” (28). Data is tracked broadly and collectively, so it won’t indicate how many comments each individual user has made. You also have the ability to review new threads before they are posted on the Facebook Page; however, you cannot review comments on existing threads prior to the comments being posted (29). As you are preparing to implement online pedagogies, especially through social networking, I would recommend that you review your university’s policies on social media use with students. A broad range of restrictions and university recommendations exist as guidelines to both protect and support the student and instructor relationship. 5

Case Study Learning Artifacts Although I previously emphasized the great potential that social media has for sharing science, it is also an avenue that is littered with inaccurate scientific claims (30). As tools like Facebook become primary news sources for our younger generations, it is becoming increasingly important to equip our students with a baseline scientific literacy that will allow them to separate informed scientific statements from biased or invalid claims (10). Each of the learning artifacts produced from this study are designed to reinforce the skill set needed to achieve science literacy. For me, science literacy includes the ability to identify, evaluate, interpret, and integrate scientific resources. This aligns with the definition given by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (31). After introducing the case studies through reading a biased news article in class, the students are provided with a brief description of potential characters they can play in the case study. The characters have a broad range of educational backgrounds and jobs, and each character has vested interest in the case study headline. Examples of characters from previous studies include: oral contraceptive CEO, Endocrine Society member, Planned Parenthood doctor, women’s rights activist, and a natural family planning supporter. Student proposals for characters, such as a conspiracy theorist, are also considered. Upon selecting a character identity, the students must: (1) Gather and synthesize data into a well-supported character statement. (2) Articulate a sound argument that aligns with their character during the online discussion. (3) Create a final statement on the headline, including recommendations for future scientific work that is independent of their character role. (4) Show evidence of the ability to assess resources and scientific statements through periodic tests and a final cumulative exam. A description of each learning artifact is provided below with additional details and example assignments available by Geyer (32).

Learning Artifact #1: Character Profile Research & Paper Creation The character profile essay is a persuasive presentation of the character’s perception of the news headline that uses a minimum of 5 resources that are appropriate to the character’s education level and area of expertise. The skills to complete the research and synthesize the material into a character profile essay are scaffolded into the first three weeks of class. The piece-wise introduction of materials serves two purposes: (1) to minimize overwhelming students by limiting the amount of content presented at one time; and (2) to continually engage students with case study materials so that they are less likely to procrastinate completing the learning artifacts. During this time, reference librarians introduce the students to tools they will need to create their character profile essays, including: library databases, search engines, library guides for citing in ACS 6

format, and the Chemical Abstract Services source index. This is often the students’ first introduction to using the interlibrary loan process, which is an essential service at a small university with a minimal number of scientific journals available. The students learn and practice how to read and begin to evaluate journal articles during their laboratory discussions. I evaluate the character profile essays based on character depth, argument support, citation appropriateness, and citation format. A minimum of a week is available between the students receiving feedback on the essay and the actual case study discussion in order to allow them time to complete any follow up research in response to the essay evaluation.

Learning Artifact #2: Facebook Case Study Discussion After establishing a foundational knowledge on the character’s headline stance through the character profile essay, the students are well-prepared for the 10-day discussion on the headline using Facebook. The students are required to make at least 10 comments, including citations. I assess the comments daily based on depth, accuracy, appropriateness for character role, whether they are initiating or responding to discussion thread, and originality. In order to ensure an interactive discussion, at least half of the comments must be in response to a post. I recommend limiting the case study size to 40 students and running case studies sequentially for larger courses. This allows enough time for me to evaluate a minimum of 400 comments, and for the students to track the discussion. I encourage the students to comment earlier in the study because it becomes increasingly difficult to avoid being redundant as the discussion progresses. Generally, those students that are redundant have not been following the entirety of the case study over the 10-day period and thus are unaware of the previous comments. In order to avoid this, I require the students to make at least half of their comments by the study midpoint.

Learning Artifact #3: Reflection Paper In their reflection paper, the students now move from playing a character to expressing their own personal perception of the headline. The students are required to suggest actions to help further research and potentially resolve some of the issues at hand. All presented arguments require appropriate references and ACS citing formats.

Learning Artifact #4: Exams Scaffolded learning is reinforced throughout the term. During the first exam the students are required to evaluate citations to determine what type of sources were used and their potential validity (Figure 1). During subsequent exams and the cumulative final exam, the students show mastery of these skills by evaluating citations and scientific statements for potential bias. 7

Figure 1. Example Exam Question

Case Study Results Overview Fourteen case studies have been administered in 7 classes of Principles of Chemistry II (275 students) at the University of Saint Francis between January 2011 and May 2016. Thirteen of the case studies were conducted and assessed by the same professor. The data reported herein is from subgroups of those case studies, indicated by the year that the case study was conducted. Successive offerings of the course have led to increased integration of the case study into the course by incorporating additional learning artifacts and discussion elements throughout the course term. Facebook Posting Analysis During these active discussions, the Facebook interface allows students to use a variety of resources to support their claims –such as videos, songs, and 8

images. Without this interface, these resources would be unavailable for in-class discussions. As one example, students conducted a poll, shown in Figure 2, to help others understand the magnitude of a situation.

Figure 2. Example Case Study Poll on Facebook Conducted in 2016

An additional benefit of using Facebook is that students can provide direct links to articles (Figure 2). The ease of reference access increases the likelihood that students will review the reference supporting the post. This has led to dynamic Facebook discussions on the misuse of references that result from taking a scientific claim out of its original context. In order to help students understand the ease with which this can be achieved, I’ve used clips from a personal interview that have been truncated to show that a message can be altered by removing small amounts of content. Students also highlight the presence of bias or lack of peer review in articles during the Facebook discussions, building a conversation about what is an appropriate resource. Even the headlines I originally presented to the students become a discussion thread as they outline how message framing in headlines can polarize an audience. The students’ abilities to identify appropriate resources based on bias, resource quality, and many other standards were further assessed through final exam questions with a B average score earned (32). The citations associated with each Facebook post were analyzed to determine if the students engaged with resources beyond those used to support their character profile essay. Each student post was classified as either (1) using a citation from their character profile essay or (2) using a citation not from their character profile essay. In a 2016 study of 64 students making a total of 753 comments, an average of 67% (±28) of the comments used a resource that the students did not cite in their character profile paper. Furthermore, over 95% of students consulted with at least one resource beyond those used for their character profile paper. Citations that were used from new resources still had to meet the requirements for a quality citation in order to earn credit for the case study. A summary of the distribution of new citations used during the Facebook case study is shown in Figure 3. 9

Figure 3. Distribution of Students Accessing New Resources during the Facebook Discussion in 2016

An analysis of the resource usage distribution tail groups, A and B, in Figure 3 reveals some shared characteristics of the students. In Group A, the students (1) used more than 5 resources to create their character profile essay, and/or (2) contributed to the discussion earlier in the 10 day study. Group B students demonstrated the following 4 characteristics: (1) (2) (3) (4)

didn’t complete the character profile essay, waited until the last minute to complete the study, commented well above the minimum 10 comments, presented data or arguments during the Facebook discussion that originally weren’t clearly part of their character profile.

Bullet number 4 is directly captured through a student’s realization of how selective exposure to content influences perception and judgment (33). “When I was researching my topic and writing the perspective paper all of the journal articles I found only talked about oral contraceptives being the cause so that is what I wrote about. Throughout the Facebook discussion I discovered other major sources of endocrine disruptors in the water.” – 2014 Reflection Paper In general, the well-prepared participants for the Facebook case study did not use one set range of citation habits. The less-prepared and later study participants used largely new resources during the discussion. For the later study participants, the discussion had moved much deeper than the student’s profile papers, so further research was required in order to make a substantial comment. Overall, the citation usage illustrates how an online case study allows students to readily explore additional resources (those beyond what they used to create their character profile essay) as they construct their responses to different Facebook postings. 10

Thus an online case study encourages students to continually research background materials as they work through the discussion. This helps students understand that research is an evolving process that requires examining more than a small set of articles to gain a full understanding of the situation.

Assessment of Character Profile Essays and Reflections In the final reflection, the students described their personal perspective on what should be done to work through the issues discussed during the case studies. In response, the students repeatedly emphasized the need for scientists to help the general public gain basic scientific literacy. One student’s comment captures the essence of many of the essays: “It is difficult to say what will happen in the future, but we know that we cannot just sit back and wait for the future to arrive. Our actions now, whether they are conscious and intentional or complacent and negligent will determine what future we will have.” – 2015 Reflection Paper In both the character profile essay and the final reflections, I evaluated the references for citation style accuracy and appropriateness to character. In the 2016 case study, over half of the students (52%) who originally made errors in their citations on the character profile essay improved their performance on the final reflection.

Connecting to University Mission, Values, and Other Disciplines The use of character roles helps to reveal the cross-over of content between disciplines during the case study. This is shown through students quoting other professors and classes during the case study and their reflection papers. The close relationship of many scientific disciplines is highlighted through one student’s realization: “I had heard of epigenetics in biology class, but I had no idea that it could be applied to the endocrine disruptor situation.” – 2015 Reflection Paper This helps students to find value in a class that is “just a requirement.” Furthermore, a connection to the University of Saint Francis core values of (1) (2) (3) (4) (5)

Respect creation Foster peace and justice Reverence the unique dignity of each person Encourage a trustful, prayerful community of learners; and Serve one another, society, and the Church.

can be seen through the following comment: 11

“Consider that we are made of the same atoms as everything else in the environment and because of that common make-up we have a common place within the community of life. Before these atoms made up this body that I have, they may have very well been in another organism and other organisms before that. We depend on the environment for everything that pertains to physical life and so does every other organism. The environment can’t tell us what it wants or doesn’t want us to do to it—it can only reflect what’s been done. Likewise, neither can the organisms advocate for themselves. It is the responsibility of the stronger to advocate for the weaker or those who can’t speak for themselves. Unfortunately, who gets to draw the line or who is responsible for drawing it seems to be economically or politically driven many times. To me, it doesn’t really matter who we say is responsible for drawing the line—our nation has given that to entities like the EPA, local governments, etc. I think being effective citizens—citizens in the old sense with an emphasis of fulfilling responsibilities and duties for the betterment of the city or state, rather than an emphasis on rights or a more selfish view—is a good way of looking at it because there is room for everyone to contribute at the place where they live with the knowledge of what economic means are available. A good book about this is: Leopold, Aldo, A Sand County Almanac, New York: Ballantine Books, 1949.” − 2015 Reflection Paper

Student Case Study Perception A survey of 53 students participating in the 2012 case study revealed that 74% preferred case studies occurring on a social network relative to a face-toface format. An analysis of student comfort in case study pedagogy found that an additional 24% of students were comfortable with conducting a case study on Facebook relative to face-to-face as highlighted in Figure 4. Add in that 88% of students indicated that these case studies using Facebook should be repeated in the future, and it becomes clear that the students, as expressed below, are connecting with case studies using Facebook (34). “It was great being able to talk and converse with other students my age about an ongoing problem in the world. It was awesome to be able to do some research on a subject, to see what other students thought about the subject, but the greatest thing was the role that each of us had to fulfill. I loved being given the constraint of having to view things from a primary healthcare physician… I really did enjoy this study. I think it is a fantastic idea and that you should keep doing it!” – 2015 Reflection Paper

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Figure 4. Class distribution of comfort (agreed or strongly agreed) in case study implementation. Adapted with permission from reference (32). Copyright 2014 ACS.

Conclusions and Future Work Facebook provided an avenue for me to connect with my students that stimulated excitement and interactions with an intensity that I hadn’t witnessed previously in my general chemistry course. In addition to being my students’ preferred format for a case study, Facebook greatly enhanced the number of resources that students read in order to support their stances in the scientific discussions. As reflected in the quote below, this created the realization that being prepared for a scientific discussion involves more than reading a handful of articles. It requires one to be able to analyze, articulate, reflect, and continually research materials from both sides of the situation in order to come out ahead. “I also found that you can’t just read one article and take it at face value, you really need to look into a multitude of aspects in order to try to understand what is really occurring.” – 2014 Reflection Paper Facebook has rapidly grown from an arena for updating friends and family on the latest life changes to a forum for communicating science to a multitude of audiences. Amid increased numbers of measles cases, the withdrawal of the US from the Paris Climate Agreement, and the growing prevalence of misinformed science, understanding the role that social media plays in communicating science is essential to the scientists of the future (34, 35). In response to this need, the California Institute of Technology has developed an entire course about using social media to engage scientists and the general public (36). These case studies are just one step in helping students to realize the need for scientists to excel at communicating in a broad range of forums (37, 38). Realizing that one semester will not allow students to fully understand and master the skills of communicating science through social media, I would like to integrate social media exposure throughout the chemistry curriculum. For instance, my 13

environmental chemistry students have already begun designing a project that will involve future renditions of the course looking at the interplay of politics and science through Wikipedia. In senior capstone, the seniors could participate in the general chemistry case studies by providing feedback to the general chemistry students. The provided feedback would then be assessed by the professor. Even the current case studies are likely to take on a new dimension in the future as a result of the changing landscape of the interface of science and politics in the United States. Previous student reflection papers frequently emphasized that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) needed to take a greater lead in resolving the situations highlighted in the case study headlines. Now, with decreases in EPA funding, the students are going to have to take their reflection papers much deeper into the realms of politics, which presently the students have covered by just saying “government action needs to take place” (39). Intentionally introducing students to the relationship that exists between science and government in their academic career is quickly becoming a necessity in the United States. Facebook case studies are one route to approaching this challenge.

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25. McDonnell, A. 60% of Employers are Peering into Candidates’ Social Media Profiles. CareerBuilder. 2016. https://www.careerbuilder.com/advice/60of-employers-are-peeking-into-candidates-social-media-profiles (accessed September 26, 2017). 26. Druin, M.; O’Connor, K. W.; Schmidt, G. B.; Miller, D. A. Facebook Fired: Legal Perspectives and Young Adults’ Opinions on the Use of Social Media in Hiring and Firing Decisions. Comput. Human Behav. 2015, 46, 123–128. 27. Facebook Help Center. What are the Privacy Settings for Groups? 2017. https://www.facebook.com/help/220336891328465 (accessed June 13, 2017). 28. Jaffar, A. A. Exploring the Use of a Facebook Page in Anatomy Education. Anat. Sci. Educ. 2014, 7, 199–208. 29. Facebook Help Center. How do I Control what Visitors can Post on my Page? 2017. https://www.facebook.com/help/356113237741414?helpref= faq_content (accessed June 13, 2017). 30. Southwell, B. Promoting Popular Understanding of Science and Health Through Social Networks. In The Oxford Handbook of the Science of Science Communication; Jamieson, K. H., Kahan, D., Scheufele, D. A., Eds.; Oxford University Press: New York, 2017; pp 223−231. 31. Hallman, W. K. What the Public Thinks and Knows About Science-and Why It Matters In The Oxford Handbook of the Science of Science Communication; Jamieson, K. H., Kahan, D., Scheufele, D. A., Eds.; Oxford University Press: New York, 2017; pp 61−72. 32. Geyer, A. M. Social Networking as a Platform for Role-Playing Scientific Case Studies. J. Chem. Educ. 2014, 91, 364–367. 33. Stroud, N. J. Understanding and Overcoming Selective Exposure and Judgment When Communicating About Science. In The Oxford Handbook of the Science of Science Communication; Jamieson, K. H., Kahan, D., Scheufele, D. A., Eds.; Oxford University Press: New York, 2017; pp 377−387. 34. Chan, M. S.; Jones, C.; Albarracin, D.; Countering False Beliefs: An Analysis of the Evidence and Recommendations of Best Practices for the Retraction and Correction of Scientific Misinformation. In The Oxford Handbook of the Science of Science Communication; Jamieson, K. H., Kahan, D., Scheufele, D. A., Eds.; Oxford University Press: New York, 2017; pp 341−349. 35. Li, N.; Stroud, N. J.; Jamieson, K. H. Overcoming False Causal Attribution: Debunking the MMR-Autism Association. In The Oxford Handbook of the Science of Science Communication; Jamieson, K. H., Kahan, D., Scheufele, D. A., Eds.; Oxford University Press: New York, 2017; pp 433−443. 36. Wilkins, O.; Davis, M. E.; Mojarad, S. Tweet for Science!: A Social Media Course for Scientists at Caltech Tackling Inreach and Outreach Online. Presented at the 253rd American Chemical Society National Meeting & Exposition, Apr 2−6, 2017; San Francico, CA, 2017. 37. Nisbet, M. C.; Scheufele, D. A. What’s Next for Science Communication? Promising Directions and Lingering Distractions. Am. J. Bot. 2009, 96, 1767–1778. 16

38. Yeo, S. K.; Brossar, D. The (Changing) Nature of Scientist-Media Interactions: A Cross-National Analysis. In The Oxford Handbook of the Science of Science Communication; Jamieson, K. H., Kahan, D., Scheufele, D. A., Eds.; Oxford University Press: New York, 2017; pp 261−272. 39. Mervis, J. Trump’s 2018 Budget Proposal ‘Devalues’ Science. Science 2017, 355, 1246–1247.

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Chapter 2

Role of iOS and Android Mobile Apps in Teaching and Learning Chemistry Ganesh H. Naik* Chemistry Department, College of Saint Mary, 7000 Mercy Road, Omaha, Nebraska 68106, United States *E-mail: [email protected]

Mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets are becoming increasingly common in the lives of students in the 21st century. If web-based technology is astutely integrated into the students’ course curriculum, it will help both students and educators meet course objectives and course learning outcomes more effectively. This chapter discusses the efficient use of iOS- and Android-based tablet/mobile device applications to enhance student learning in and out of the chemistry classroom. Subject areas covered include general and organic chemistry.

Introduction Chemistry education teaches us an understanding of the fundamental building blocks of the universe and everything in it. In my personal experience as an educator, I have observed that many students find it difficult to understand chemistry, as it has a vocabulary quite different from their everyday communication. To understand and apply the fundamental concepts of chemistry, it requires a greater amount of effort from students, both in and out of the classroom. There are 118 elements on the periodic table to study and understand. Chemical bonding is a theoretical concept and very abstract. Furthermore, students find it difficult to visualize the physiochemical properties of the molecules and the dynamics of chemical bonding and intermolecular forces. This requires not only scientific literacy, but also an imagination.

© 2017 American Chemical Society

As chemistry educators, it is important to recognize these difficulties and to utilize different teaching strategies to enhance the students’ learning experience in the classroom, as well as provide viable and relevant resources for self-study. One such strategy includes integrating mobile apps into the course curriculum and classroom instruction (1, 2). With the advent of the internet and the evolution of smartphones and tablets, students have instant access to a wealth of information (1). Of course, adopting and integrating technology-based instructional strategies has had a long history of challenges. Hew and Brush identified the general barriers typically faced when integrating technology into the curriculum for instructional purposes (3). A lack of resources and the knowledge and skills of how to best utilize these technologies are some of the primary barriers discussed. However, educators such as Pacansky-Brock have developed a great understanding of how to achieve success with these emerging technologies (2). Mobile devices such as iPads and iOS/Android-based smartphones are now an integral part of students’ lives. They are very portable and offer instant access to a library of information via the internet, the world’s greatest database (2, 4). This chapter discusses the strategies for adopting mobile app technology in Fundamentals, General and Organic chemistry course curricula, and the educational benefits of using iOS- and Android-based tablet/mobile device applications. Additionally, the term “apps” will encompass the statement “iOSand Android-based tablet/mobile device applications”. In the following chapter, if the operating system is specified in parenthesis after the mobile app name, this means the app is available only on that platform. For example, ESmol & NDKmol app (Android) means these apps are only available for Android users. If the operating system is not specified, it means the app is available for both iOS and Android device users. The mobile app pricing is not mentioned in the chapter, as it varies based on the promotional offers.

Mobile Apps in Classroom Instruction Historically, traditional classroom lecture presentations were typically done using ‘chalk talk’ or using projector slides. In the first decade of the 21st century, Microsoft Office became a ubiquitous technology, and most educators switched from projector slides to Microsoft PowerPoint. However, these methods of instruction continue to have limited interaction with the students, especially with large class sizes. There are many research studies, from many disciplines, that suggest that oral presentations to large groups of passive students contribute very little to real understanding; and student grades, by and large, do not correlate with the lecturing skills and/or experience of the instructor (5, 6). Despite the limitations of traditional lectures, many institutions are obliged to offer high-enrollment General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry courses. Many professors who teach these courses find lecturing to be the most viable option for covering all of the necessary subjects presented in the syllabus (7). However, traditional lecturing often increases boredom among students, causing a deficit to learning. A research study by Mann and Robinson found a positive relationship 20

between boredom and attentional problems, while a negative relationship existed between boredom and academic performance studies (8). There are several ways to help students make the transition from passive listeners to active participants in their own learning. One such strategy includes integrating mobile apps into the course curriculum and classroom instruction (9, 10). In a study by Rogers and Mize on first-year college students’ perceptions of integrating technology into the curriculum, student feedback confirmed the usefulness of technology in course design and how it contributes to student success (11). Given modern students’ familiarity and comfort with them, apps have become easy-to-use educational tools. Instructors can make lectures more interactive by projecting apps from their smartphone or tablet onto a projector screen, provided the classroom is equipped with it. The instructor may need a HDMI/VGA adapter and extension cable to connect to the projector, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. HDMI adapters and cables to display the mobile apps on the classroom projector screen.

Mobile app technology is an alternative method of course instruction that can be used in conjunction with traditional classroom PowerPoint and whiteboard presentations. By using apps, the instructor can demonstrate how to build an atom, display interactive periodic tables of elements, molecular bonding and 3-D images, and much more. Apps provide an inexpensive and mobile alternative to traditionally high-priced chemistry software that is restricted to the classroom (9, 10, 12, 13). Another benefit of apps is using polls in the classroom to engage all students concurrently. For example, an instructor may use a polling app after a new subject is covered to determine how many students are understanding the concept. This allows students to respond without the fear of being singled out or feeling embarrassed/uncomfortable raising their hands.

Mobile Apps for Learning General Chemistry Concepts Technology such as iOS and Android based mobile apps can be used as an interactive educational tool, which allows for a dynamic learning experience that directly benefits students (10, 12, 13). Figure 2 shows some of the mobile apps that can be used in a General Chemistry course to teach the subjects of atoms, elements, and the periodic table. Because these apps are interactive, they enhance student engagement and spark interest in learning these fundamental concepts. 21

Figure 2. Mobile apps for Atoms, Elements, and Periodic table.

iOS and Android apps offer educators an interactive teaching platform to engage students both inside and outside the classroom. For example, Figure 3 represents the periodic table, expressed through a mobile app developed by Theodore Gray, which goes far beyond what is possible on paper or in a simple digital image. Students can click on and experience beautiful images of each element (often in a variety of forms or states), as well as read engaging stories about the elements and detailed lists of their properties. Every image is a freely rotatable, live object that students can examine from all angles. In my personal experience as an educator, I have found that students often have difficulty making the transition between 2D molecular drawings and visualizing 3D molecular structures. This mobile app also allows for students to recognize these elements as real and individual objects, as opposed to just chemical symbols. Moreover, having all of this information on a single platform enables students to see relationships between properties (such as commonalities between freezing/boiling points of certain elemental groups) and thereby gain a deeper understanding of the elements and chemistry as a whole. In addition, Theodore Gray also developed the Elements in Actions app, which is a collection of 77 video demonstrations of wonderful chemical reactions of the elements. He also developed the Molecules app, with brilliant visuals, and The Elements Flash card app, which helps in learning element names, symbols, and atomic numbers quickly. Figure 4 lists the four mobile apps developed by Theodore Gray.

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Figure 3. Screenshot of Theodore Gray’s Periodic Table Application. Image courtesy of Theodore Gray/Touch Press.

Figure 4. Mobile apps suite developed by Theodore Gray. Icon images courtesy of Theodore Gray/Touch Press.

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There are many mobile apps available for studying the periodic table concept. However, the Quick Response-coded Audio Periodic Table of the Elements (QRAPTE) is a unique web-based tool. QR-APTE is particularly useful for blind and visually impaired students, as well as seeing students (14). It uses the QR code technology (a two-dimensional barcode that was originally developed in 1994 by Denso Wave, a Japanese automatic data-capture equipment company) to present the information about the elements in the periodic table. The QR-APTE poster was built up using the audio PTE “Chemistry in its Element” from the Royal Chemistry Society (RSC) website. The URLs of the RSC podcast audio files contain general information (history and applications) about the chemical elements. The poster of QR-APTE material is available online (15). After introducing the atoms, elements, molecules and periodic table apps, students can learn basic electronic configuration, shapes of atomic orbitals and coulumbic interactions between ions using the apps shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5. Mobile apps for electronic configuration and chemical bonding. In an introductory chemistry class, many students find learning about chemical bonding to be challenging, as the level of abstraction is high. Furthermore, students need to understand the different chemical bonding theories (Lewis dot structures, VSEPR, Hybridization, molecular orbital theories.) Each theory uses different postulates to explain the bonding in molecules. Mobile apps aid the learning process by making it more interactive and fun. Figure 6 represents the different apps that can be used for learning chemical bonding in molecules. The Chem101 app (by 101 Edu Inc) features a custom-built tool that allows users to draw and understand Lewis structures. Additionally, it has over 200 questions related to Lewis structures, resonance, molecular geometries, VSEPR, hybridization, sigma and pi bonding, and molecular polarity. The ChemEd: Bonding & Structures app (Android, by Advanced Mobile Apps for Science & Education) allows users to visualize bonding in a molecule using Molecular Orbital theory. The students can also explore concepts such as electrostatic potential surface and polarity, orbital hybridization, etc. The 3D Molecules Edit 24

& Test app (iOS, by Virtual Space OOO) has a tool to build molecules with single, double and triple bonds, as well as cyclic compounds. The molecules can be visualized in 3-D using a stick, ball and stick, and space-filling (CPK) models.

Figure 6. Mobile apps for chemical bonding theories.

In addition to bonding in molecules, the molecular viewing apps shown in Figure 7 and 8 such as Atomdroid (Android, by CCB Goettingen), Molecules (iOS, by Sunset Lake Software), ESmol & NDKmol (Android, both by Biochem_fan), Molecules (Android, by ZKM Karlsruhe), Mo-cubed (Android, by Advanced Mobile Apps for Science & Education), iSpartan (by Wave function) and Quiztallography (Android, by Lluís Casas Educational), allow students to create and interact with 3-D molecular structures (4, 10, 16, 17). For simple molecules, students can create the 3-D structure on their devices using the available tools in the program and compare their virtual images with molecular model sets available in the classroom. For complex biomolecules, ESmol & NDKmol apps offer a greater advantage, as these apps are compatible with the downloadable protein files from the Protein Data Bank (18). The information from the downloaded files can be used to display the three-dimensional structures of proteins. In addition, it offers several interactive tools which can be used to change the representation of protein or ligand (nonprotein) molecules. The ESmol app is more compatible with older devices, but NDKmol, the newer version of the app, offers more features. Mo-cubed is an advanced molecular modeling app. In addition to the 3D viewing of molecules, it can search for chemical and spectral information (IR, proton and carbon-13 NMR, mass spectrum) available on public databases. Mo-cubed uses a semi-empirical molecular orbital method from the MOPAC2012 program to enable users to both assess chemical information in 3-D and perform quantum chemistry calculations. MOPAC (Molecular Orbital PACkage) is a semi-empirical quantum chemistry program based on Dewar and Thiel’s NDDO approximation. 25

Figure 7. Molecular viewing mobile apps.

Figure 8. Advanced molecular viewing apps.

The iSpartan app is also an advanced molecular modeling app, which has a database of over 5000 molecules. It allows 3-D visualization of molecules, IR, proton, and carbon-13 NMR spectral information, molecular orbitals, electrostatic potential maps, and molecular properties. In the IR spectrum of a given molecule, if a student selects a particular peak, the appropriate bonds in the displayed three-dimensional model vibrate to show the stretching or bending vibration responsible for the chosen peak. This interactive experience gives students a better understanding of bond vibration and the IR spectrum. Wavefunction, Inc. has developed several iOS-based apps for the 3-D visualization of molecules and ionic solids as a part of the ODYSSEY suite. Quiztallography, a quiz game app, contains over 1000 questions on crystallography and symmetry concepts. Using this app, students can improve their skills on different symmetry operations in a molecule (17). 26

Mobile Apps for Learning Organic Chemistry Concepts Students in sophomore organic chemistry classes use flashcards to memorize the functional groups and chemical reactions. The apps shown in Figure 9 can essentially replace the traditional flashcards and make the learning process more interesting and interactive (4, 19, 20). These include Chemistry By Design (by The University of Arizona), Awesome Organic Chemistry Flashcards (iOS, by Jacob Kearns), Organic Reactions (by Turvy education), Reagents (iOS, by Metamolecular), Organic Chemistry Practice (not pictured, by Varsity Tutors) and ReactionFlash (by RELX Intellectual Properties SA).

Figure 9. Mobile apps for learning organic chemistry reactions.

Chemistry by Design is an app that summarizes the total synthesis routes of 337 compounds and enables students to test their skills using known synthetic sequences. The quiz tool assesses the students’ knowledge of reactants, reagents, or products in each step of the synthesis reaction involving natural products or pharmaceutical drugs. The synthetic routes are also categorized by name, author, year, and drugs, which can be searched within the app. The Awesome Organic Chemistry Flashcards app presents a quiz interface to review introductory organic chemistry concepts. Topics covered include organic chemistry nomenclature, functional groups, and addition/substitution/elimination/ coupling reactions. Organic Reactions is an app that provides information on different functional group reactions and their mechanisms. It is organized to provide information on synthesis and protection reactions of each functional group. The Reagents app covers the structures and functions of over 90 reagents encountered in a typical introductory organic chemistry course. Reactions can be explored from three perspectives: reagents, reactants, and products. It also helps build an understanding of how different reactions can be carried out by the same reagent and highlights the influence of reagents on the products’ stereochemistry. 27

The Organic Chemistry Practice app covers many topics in organic chemistry. It has diagnostics tests, practice tests, and interactive flashcards. Students taking a diagnostic test receive a detailed report of their score, broken down by concept area. It also features a question of the day that students can subscribe to and receive a daily practice question in organic chemistry. The ReactionFlash app covers over 600 named chemistry reactions. The app can be used as flash cards, as each ‘card’ shows the reaction, its mechanism, and relevant references. It also has a quiz mode that students could use to practice the reaction. Aaron M. Hartel has developed many apps for the iOS platform, as shown in Figure 10. These apps allow students to practice organic chemistry nomenclature and reactions.

Figure 10. Organic Chemistry apps by Aaron M. Hartel. The Nomenclature apps cover step-by-step approaches to naming organic compounds, identifying the parent chain, substituents, and functional group priorities. They also include quizzes for each lesson with a fill-in-the-blank answer style. The Reaction Cards apps cover most of the functional groups and over 170 reactions encountered in a sophomore year, two-semester organic chemistry course. The format is similar to index cards. The home screen shows a menu of four options to be tested: named reactions, reactants, missing reagents, and missing products. Students can set up a virtual deck of flash cards to study for each of the above options. The app also provides information on stereoselectivity, regioselectivity and the limitations of the reactions.

Mobile Apps for Chemistry Labs iOS and Android based apps also extend the benefits of mobile devices to chemistry laboratory learning (21–23). Figure 11 shows some of the apps that can 28

be used in chemistry lab experiments. The following section discusses the many uses of these apps for enhancing laboratory learning.

Figure 11. Mobile apps for chemistry lab experiments.

Titration ColorCam (TCC) is an Android-based application which is used in volumetric titration to determine the end point of the titration. This app is very useful for color blind and visually impaired students (22). The app uses the camera function of a smartphone to capture and quantify the information involved in a color change during a titration experiment. The quantified data is converted into both audio (beep sounds) and tactile (device vibration) feedback for the determination of the end point. The TLC timer app (Android, by Chemovix) and TLC Chemistry tools app (iOS, by PoChu Hsu) are useful in Organic Chemistry Lab to run Thin-Layer Chromatography (TLC) experiments. They can be used for calculating the retention time in TLC as students can take a picture of the TLC plate using the apps. The programs in apps help to map the spots made by the analytes and calculate their Rf values. After the experiment, digital images can be copied, printed or stored for future reference. Agilent Technologies, Inc. developed several apps such as LC Calc., GC Calc., XF Dilution Calculator and ICP-MS Mobile for iOS devices (10). The LC and GC Calculator apps quickly calculate flowrate and back pressure under a variety of conditions and column dimensions, which allows students to explore “what if” scenarios during the experiment. These apps are a beneficial tool for students as they are learning chromatographic separation techniques in any upperlevel chemistry courses. Shimadzu UV is a UV spectrophotometry app that provides basic information on solvent characteristics, which include the lower limit of usable wavelength, melting and boiling point values, etc. for each solvent. It also has a unit conversion tool (ex. wavelength to wavenumber). 29

The Insensitive app (iOS, by Klaus Boldt) simulates the quantum mechanical models that are used to describe nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) experiments. The app provides information on the vector model, density matrix and product operator concepts used in NMR. ChemCrafter (iOS, by Chemical Heritage Foundation) allows students to experiment with water, acids, and salts in a virtual lab environment. The app is designed for younger kids; however, students in an introductory chemistry class may find the app useful. For example, students can learn about the reactions of alkali and alkaline earth metals with water, and the exothermic and endothermic nature of reactions. This app uses a gamified approach to working through experiments. Students must complete each experiment successfully before moving on to the next one. This ensures proper sequencing to build on students’ understanding of the topics. ChemCrafter then provides a brief explanation of the reactions in each completed experiment.

Chemistry Dictionary and Reference Mobile Apps Traditionally used reference dictionaries, such as CRC handbooks or the Merck Index, are bulky and students find it impractical to carry these dictionaries everywhere. The use of mobile apps, shown in Figure 12, has made some of the information found in these reference sources accessible from anywhere. Although they are not comprehensive, they do provide enough information for students in undergraduate chemistry courses. In addition to web-based search engines, students can utilize the following apps to search for chemical information. Most of these apps provide tools to search for chemical information using IUPAC names, common names or chemical structures. W Chemistry Handbook (Android, by Dilithiumlabs) is a comprehensive reference app for the reviewing of basic concepts and techniques. The app organizes the information into six major categories with many subcategories. There are subsections for organic compounds, salts, inorganic acids, gases, and biomolecules. Chemical, physical, and other properties are also listed, as well as a solution calculator tool to practice quantitative skills. It also provides a handy reference for the commonly used constants in general and physical chemistry courses. ChemSpider (by Molecular Materials Informatics) is an app that allows students to search the ChemSpider chemical database provided by the Royal Society of Chemistry. Compounds can be searched by structure or by name. It also has Mobile Molecular Data Sheet information and tools to draw molecular structures. The CRC Physical Constants of Organic Compounds (iOS by Taylor & Francis Group) is an app that allows students to search the physical constants of organic compounds by compound name, CAS number, molecular weight or molecular formula.

30

Figure 12. Comprehensive chemistry reference apps.

Chemistry Toolbox (Android by Turvy education) is a good app for quick access to the periodic table, tools for solution preparation (dilution, molar mass, molar concentration and density), organic functional groups, pKa values for organic compounds, information about common organic solvents, buffers, standard reduction potentials and NMR data. The CAMEO Chemicals app (by NOAA ORR Tools) was developed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Office of Response and Restoration in partnership with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Office of Emergency Management. It provides hazardous chemical data sheets. Students can search the chemicals by name, CAS number, or UN/NA number to find information from a database of thousands of hazardous substances. The data sheets have information on health hazards, air and water hazards, recommendations for firefighting, first aid, and spill response, and regulatory information. This app could be usefully implemented into the chemistry lab course as a pre-lab assignment. Students must read and document the chemical safety data sheet information corresponding to the chemicals that will be used in the lab.

31

A few recently developed apps provide reference information with expanded capabilities. They include IR and NMR tables for organic functional groups, calculation and conversion tools for analytical and physical chemistry, solubility rules and reduction potentials for inorganic compounds. Some include periodic table and information about elements and their properties. Examples of these apps include ChemMobile (Android, by Qan) and Chemistry Helper (Android, by Adam Hogan). Students with an American Chemical Society (ACS) membership can use some of the apps developed by the ACS. The C&EN app provides information on recent advancement in chemistry, the latest chemistry job postings, and other professional development information. The InChemistry app covers special topics of concern to undergraduate students in the chemical sciences, including graduate school, careers, professional development, ACS student chapter activities, and ACS resources for undergraduates.

Assessing Student Learning Using Mobile Apps The intended outcome of integrating mobile apps into teaching and learning is to reinforce the discussion of difficult course concepts and to improve the students’ performance in course examinations. Developing an assessment plan of student learning using mobile app technology is very important, as it helps to determine if the learning goals of the course are being met. Assessment and feedback are crucial for advancing instructional strategies. Apps such as GoSoapBox, Poll Everywhere, and Socrative can be used in the classroom during lecturing for assessment as they allow both polling and open-ended question options. In addition, instructors can develop multiple-choice survey quizzes on a given topic and assess student learning outcomes in real time using these programs. Course management systems, such as Canvas or Blackboard, can also be used to assess student learning outcomes. During the semester, pre- and post-activity surveys and online quizzes can be posted in the course management systems. At the end of the semester, assessment data can be collected in the form of student reflections, course evaluations, and grades. The data collected and collated over the period of a few semesters can be analyzed to assess if student confidence regarding the chemistry concepts has increased significantly. For example, the data collected in my first- and second-year chemistry classes reflected a significant improvement in student performance and attitude towards learning chemistry (24). Figures 13-14 are excerpted from “Integrating Audio-Visual Materials and Mobile App Technologies into Chemistry Course Curriculum”, which demonstrates improvement in student performance following the curriculum update and integration of audio-visual and mobile app technology in the Fundamentals of Chemistry course (24). 32

Figure 13. Average student success rate before curriculum update (Letter Grade, %) in a Fundamentals of Chemistry class (n= 30) (24).

Figure 14. Average student success rate after curriculum update (Letter Grade, %) in a Fundamentals of Chemistry class (n=30) (24).

Conclusion iOS and Android based mobile apps are wonderful instructional tools for enhancing student engagement in chemistry courses. In the coming years, the increasing number of high-quality chemistry-related apps will continue to aid in the instruction process and transform the landscape of chemistry teaching and learning. The learning modules based on mobile apps help create opportunities for collaborative activities among students, leading to the development of teamwork and social skills. Another important benefit of mobile apps is that they require minimal expertise and technological proficiency. These tools can be gradually integrated into the coursework, beginning with a few apps in conjunction with the traditional lecturing method. These strategies will help educators develop a better understanding of how to achieve success with mobile app technologies to enhance their instructional methods. Changing existing instructional approaches is a decision that should be considered with deliberate thought, particularly when technology is involved. However, it is important to recognize these challenges 33

and develop appropriate strategies for continuously reaching and engaging our students.

Acknowledgments The author would like to thank Mary Ramirez, Ashley Reinert and Santosh Shetty for their invaluable assistance in writing this chapter.

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14. Bonifacio, V. D. QR-Coded Audio Periodic Table of the Elements: A MobileLearning Tool. J. Chem. Educ. 2012, 89, 552–554. 15. Bonifácio, V. D. B. QR-Coded Audio Periodic Table of the Elements: A Mobile-Learning Tool. J. Chem. Educ. 2012, 89, 552–554; see Supporting Information file http://pubs.acs.org/doi/suppl/10.1021/ ed200541e/suppl_file/ed200541e_si_001.pdf. 16. Jonas, F.; Ricardo, A. M.; Johannes, M. D. Atomdroid: A Computational Chemistry Tool for Mobile Platforms. J. Chem. Inf. Model. 2012, 52, 1072–1078. 17. Casas, L.; Estop, E. Virtual and Printed 3D Models for Teaching Crystal Symmetry and Point Groups. J. Chem. Educ. 2015, 92, 1338–1343. 18. Quinn, G. B.; Bi, C.; Christie, C. H.; Pang, K.; Prlić, A.; Nakane, T.; Zardecki, C.; Voigt, M.; Berman, H. M.; Bourne, P. E.; Rose, P. W. RCSB PDB Mobile: iOS and Android mobile apps to provide data access and visualization to the RCSB Protein Data Bank. Bioinformatics 2014, 31, 126–127. 19. Amick, A.; Cross, N. An Almost Paperless Organic Chemistry Course with the Use of iPads. J. Chem. Educ. 2014, 91, 753–756. 20. Pursell, D. P. Adapting to Student Learning Styles: Engaging Students with Cell Phone Technology in Organic Chemistry Instruction. J. Chem. Educ. 2009, 86, 1219–1222. 21. Wijtmans, M.; van Rens, L.; van Muijlwijk-Koezen, J. E. Activating Students’ Interest and Participation in Lectures and Practical Courses Using Their Electronic Devices. J. Chem. Educ. 2014, 91, 1830–1837. 22. Subhajit, B.; Balraj, B. R. The Sound and Feel of Titrations: A Smartphone Aid for Color-Blind and Visually Impaired Students. J. Chem. Educ. 2017, 94, 946–949. 23. Li, Q.; Chen, Z.; Yan, Z.; Wang, C.; Chen, Z. Touch NMR: An NMR Data Processing Application for the iPad. J. Chem. Educ. 2014, 91, 2002–2004. 24. Naik, G.; Ramirez, M. Integrating Audio-Visual Materials and Mobile App Technologies into Chemistry Course Curriculum. Selected papers from the 26th International Conference on College Teaching and Learning; issuu: 2015; pp 154−161.

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Chapter 3

Application of Social Media in Chemistry Education: Incorporating Instagram and Snapchat in Laboratory Teaching Rachel Rui Xia Lim,1 Alina Sihui Ang,1 and Fun Man Fung*,1,2 1Department

of Chemistry, National University of Singapore, 3 Science Drive 3, Singapore 117543 2Institute for Application of Learning Science and Educational Technology (ALSET), University Hall, Lee Kong Chian Wing UHL #05-01D, 21 Lower Kent Ridge Road, Singapore 119077 *E-mail: [email protected]

In the current era of generation Z, where technology is omnipresent in everyday life, university students check their social media applications (apps) every day. The pervasive usage of apps such as Instagram and Snapchat takes up a significant amount of the students’ time. Students often use them during classes, becoming distracted in the process. This challenge has thus motivated us to conduct a pilot project by making use of these two platforms for laboratory teaching purposes. We aim to integrate the element of urgency into the learning process and strengthen the concepts learned during the curriculum at any time where students can access course-related content at their convenience. We will also discuss the learning analytics of Instagram and Snapchat in this chapter.

Overview on Snapchat and Instagram Usage and Their Popularity According to a 2016 Taylor Nelson Sofres (TNS) study titled “Connected Life” (1) which surveyed more than 70,000 social media users across Asia Pacific, Instagram and Snapchat have surpassed Facebook. In Singapore, the use of © 2017 American Chemical Society

Instagram and Snapchat is increasingly popular, with 63% of social media users who use Instagram, and 37% who use Snapchat. The younger generation makes up most social media application (app) users, with 85% of users aged 16 to 24 years old using Instagram and 58% using Snapchat. This age group includes university undergraduates. It was further reported that university students view these apps as a fundamental part of their lives. As a result, they are more inclined to select courses with social media components (2). Even though Instagram and Snapchat have been trialed in some overseas academic institutions, such as Grand Valley State University for organic chemistry (3) and Drake University for mass communications assignments (4), both Instagram and Snapchat have yet to be reported on regarding their integration in chemistry laboratory teaching. Mobile phone usage is not prohibited in our laboratory due to the consideration of possible emergency situations and capturing of experimental observations. Even though the use of mobile phones is allowed, students are prohibited from using them while conducting the experiment, to prevent any accidents and contamination of phones by chemicals. During reaction waiting time, students are advised to remove their gloves before using their phones to view the uploaded laboratory content. However, the main challenge of implementing Instagram and Snapchat as supplementary teaching tools is the possibility of distraction. Since students are also connected with their friends via these apps, they may visit their friends’ Instagram profiles or send snaps to their friends, instead of viewing the lecturer’s laboratory teaching. Nevertheless, the laboratory lecturer introduced the idea of using Instagram and Snapchat in his sophomore chemistry laboratory module and has noted good responses from his students. This paper seeks to provide insights on how lecturers can harness social technology tools for pedagogy purposes and highlights the comparisons between the social technology tools used for review. The social technology tools in this research paper are Instagram and Snapchat. For this chapter, the focus will be directed to the Instagram feed and Snapchat Stories.

Challenges Faced by Learners and Facilitators in Laboratory Teaching In a typical chemistry laboratory setting at the National University of Singapore, there are approximately forty students, one lecturer-in-charge and three Teaching Assistants (TA) in each laboratory session. This ratio of instructors to students poses a challenge in allowing all students’ questions to be answered immediately, especially with individual compartmentalized fume hoods that minimize movement of students. This organic/inorganic synthesis laboratory setting contrasts with analytical/physical laboratories that have open laboratory benches to promote communal learning and collective discussion. It is common that questions and problems arise when the students conduct the experiments. However, if the lecturer and TA are preoccupied in attending to other students’ 38

problems, there could be no one attending to these students’ questions fast enough. As a result, the students might not wait to ask and may eventually forget about the questions they have during the laboratory session. In the end, they would lose the opportunity to learn. In addition, it was also observed that long reflux time was involved in some organic synthetic reactions. During this reaction waiting time, students often checked their mobile phones and used social media apps to access information unrelated to chemistry, most often online apparel shopping. Since the students are already actively using social media during the laboratory session, and they all perform the same experiment, why not encourage peer-learning through social media and let the students chat on the reactions? Therefore, this pedagogy research project aims to mitigate these issues raised above through the usage of Instagram Feed and Snapchat Stories.

Methodology This pilot project was carried out on a cohort of 104 sophomore Chemistry students, taking CM2191 Experiments in Chemistry 2: Experiments in Organic and Inorganic Syntheses. This is a college practical module for chemistry majors in their second year of studies. The module spans a 10-week period, where students should attend a six-hour laboratory session each week. Students are required to attend a weekly two-hour lecture on the background theory of the experiments and the various safety aspects. Each student is assigned a fume hood to work individually on their synthetic experiments. There are usually about three graduate TAs present to assist the instructor during the laboratory sessions. These TAs help to guide the students as they proceed with their experiments, as well as ensure that the safety protocols are adhered to by the students. In this module, there are four organic experiments that the students must carry out. The experiments are “Synthesis of Pear Fragrance”, “Grignard Reaction: Reaction with Carbon Dioxide”, “Stereoselective Reduction of 4-tert-butylcyclohexanone”, and “Reaction between p-methoxyacetophenone and p-chlorobenzaldehyde”. Both Instagram and Snapchat were only incorporated into the organic synthesis experiments, which were done during the first half of the semester. The apps were not used during inorganic synthesis experiments, to find out if the absence of these apps would affect the students’ experiences and learning outcomes during the laboratory sessions. Based on our preliminary survey, it was discovered that 80 students were Instagram users and 61 students were Snapchat users. Since Instagram and Snapchat are auxiliary materials that we planned to utilize to aid learning, it was made known to the students at the beginning that joining these online platforms was entirely voluntary. There were 13 students who did not use either of these apps and only viewed lectures uploaded to the course website. However, these students did not miss out on learning, because all the images and videos that were uploaded onto Instagram and Snapchat were compiled into videos which 39

were shown during the CM2191 lecture as the lecturer, Mr. Fung Fun Man, went through the video content. During the laboratory sessions, the lecturer, who is the corresponding author in this paper, recorded laboratory content as he made his way around the fume hoods to check on the students’ progress. On the occasions when the lecturer demonstrated the use of lab instruments, a TA recorded the laboratory content instead. Most of the laboratory content recorded were demonstrations of correct laboratory techniques and setup improvisations. An example of a correct laboratory technique captured was a student using a plastic spatula to transfer the compounds onto weighing paper via a solid funnel into a round bottom flask instead of using a thermometer or even using gloved hands. Another example of a setup improvisation was noted when a student used a Keck clip to secure a dropping funnel for a moisture-sensitive experiment. The purpose of highlighting correct laboratory techniques and setup improvisations was to commend the students and motivate them to continue giving their best for the experiments, as well as to encourage their peers to follow their good examples. Other content included safety reminders and warnings of potential risks that could lead to accidents or cause bodily harm or health hazards to the students. An example captured focused on the height of the sash across various students’ fume hoods. A sash level that was too high would not have prevented chemical fumes from being inhaled by the student, thereby causing possible eye and respiratory tract irritations. This captured content helped to remind students to be aware of these risks to ensure a safe learning environment in the laboratory. In this pilot project, images and videos were taken using the iPhone 6. A public account, “chemfunman”, was also created for both Instagram and Snapchat to facilitate the sharing of the real-time content with the students. Different images and videos of the week’s experiment are captured and uploaded onto Snapchat first. To capture an image or video, the instructor first opens the Snapchat app. Once the content is captured, the instructor adds a caption to explain the main takeaway in the snap, or pose a question for the students to think about. If an image has been captured, the user then chooses how long the image will be shown to the viewers. For this project, the timer was always set at the maximum time limit of 10 seconds to allow sufficient time for the students to read the caption and look at the image clearly. Next, the instructor clicks on the blue “Send To” button, followed by checking the “My Story” option to publish the image or video onto Snapchat Stories. Alternatively, the “Story” icon can be directly selected as well. An icon of the successfully uploaded image/video will appear on the Snapchat storyboard. A flowchart that summarizes the steps involved to upload the content onto Snapchat is shown in Figure 1. Since mobile phone usage is not prohibited in the laboratory, students are able to view the stories during the laboratory session, as well as after their sessions. Students are also reminded of the safety and distraction issues of mobile phone usage while conducting experiments. Since viewers of the stories are not able to save the stories, or view the stories after 24 hours, students will be motivated to view the stories before they disappear. This 24-hour restriction encourages students to view the stories again after each laboratory session, as a form of review and reflection on the lab events. 40

Figure 1. Flowchart of the steps taken to upload a Snapchat story

At the end of the laboratory sessions for that week, all images and videos that were uploaded onto Snapchat Stories were compiled into short video segments that lasted a maximum of one minute each. These video segments were then uploaded onto the Instagram feed at the end of the week, as a conclusion to the particular experiment. To upload a video onto the Instagram feed, click the “+” icon (found at the bottom of the Instagram screen interface) and select a video from the camera roll. Captions for laboratory content can be written before clicking “Share” and posting onto the profile feed. Upon successful upload of the selected video, the number of views and likes, as well as usernames of those who have liked the video, can be tracked. A flowchart that summarizes the steps involved to upload content onto Instagram is shown in Figure 2. Hashtags like #FUNgCHEMinCM2191, #FunManPosits, and #infunguencer were included in the captions for uploaded content. This allowed easier viewing for the students reviewing content, as well as tracking of the posts when the relevant hashtags were clicked. Also, images uploaded to Instagram were used to answer the questions previously raised in Snapchat Stories. All the images and videos were captured using an iPhone 6. Whenever the instructor spotted something noteworthy, be it a mistake or improvisation made by the student, permission to film the student’s setup was first sought. Once the student agreed to being filmed, filming was done anonymously. Only up to the student’s hands were captured; there was strictly no filming of faces or fume hood numbers. If a student’s face was unintentionally captured in an image or video, the face was blurred out with a mosaic effect, or covered with an emoticon sticker. If the instructor had to perform a demonstration, a teaching assistant would conduct the filming instead. 41

Figure 2. Flowchart of the steps taken to upload content onto Instagram A total of 15 snaps for Snapchat Stories and a total of two compiled videos for Instagram were set as upload limits for that day. This limit was established so as not to overwhelm the students with too many images and videos when they accessed the apps. It was also to cater to the shorter attention span of current youths (5). If the students were not able to check the content during laboratory sessions, they would have to do it afterwards. When they did so, the total viewing time would be a few minutes long. Having too many images and videos would have led to a much longer total viewing time, where students would likely have lost focus halfway through. The viewership data collection was recorded within 24 hours from the time the images and videos were posted for both Instagram and Snapchat, to keep the time factor constant.

Rationale Behind the Integration of Social Media Apps in Teaching Educational institutions are increasingly recognizing the potential of using short videos to break up classroom lectures into smaller parts, like mini-lectures. Working in a similar fashion, social media apps like Instagram and Snapchat allow users to post short videos – up to 10 seconds for Snapchat Stories, and up to 60 seconds for Instagram. This may seem too short to fully deliver content effectively 42

across the screen. However, this could be a way to deal with the shorter attention span that current students possess, including university students. Researchers found that, in the year 2015, humans could only focus on a task for about eight seconds, as compared to twelve seconds in the year 2000 (5), which was before the start of the “mobile revolution”. Therefore, the short duration of content uploaded onto Instagram and Snapchat is ideal to increase student focus during learning. Moreover, these short videos can condense large chunks of information into small digestible parts for easier student comprehension. Some challenges faced by facilitators and learners in laboratory teaching can be mitigated through the use of social media tools like Instagram and Snapchat. Both social media apps can facilitate communities of independent learning among the students. A possible use for uploaded content can be to emphasize the correct execution of a certain procedural step that has been done incorrectly by previous groups of students, so that other students can learn and not commit the same mistakes. Through the instant sharing of images and videos on Instagram and Snapchat platforms, information can be disseminated to the students much more quickly, especially when the instructors or TAs are not able to attend to every student’s question at the same time. Furthermore, both Instagram and Snapchat can enhance the students’ learning experiences through uploaded images and videos that are relevant to the target subject. This can promote active learning, which makes the learning process more enjoyable and less mundane for the students (6).

Similarities in Approach of Instagram and Snapchat The use of both Instagram and Snapchat allowed one-to-one (instructor to individual student) engagement when the instructor observed laboratory actions (good improvisations/mistakes by students) as the students were conducting their experiments. Without identifying the students, the instructor re-enacted the incorrect execution and/or correct demonstration that he observed, and he explained both through image or video uploads on Instagram and Snapchat platforms. Both apps will allow one-to-all (instructor to all students) engagement. Sometimes, different questions were raised by students, or different mistakes were made by students on different sessions. When the lecturer targeted these questions and mistakes and uploaded them onto Instagram and Snapchat, students from the same lab session, and even across different lab sessions, were able to view the uploaded digital content and pick up lessons learned by others. As a result, similar experimental mistakes can be reduced from appearing in the subsequent experiments through the peer learning encouraged by Instagram and Snapchat. In the class of 104 students, it was found out in the pre-semester survey (given out prior to the apps usage) that out of 93 students who responded to the survey (response rate: 89%), 74 students indicated that they learn best by seeing and visualizing. Therefore, apps like Instagram and Snapchat, which emphasize visuals, will be especially useful for visual learners. Because of the vividness of images and videos on Instagram and Snapchat, students will be more attracted to the content presented, which will lead to ideas being conveyed more effectively and retained more deeply in the students’ minds. 43

Differences in Approach of Instagram and Snapchat Snapchat Stories are available for viewing for 24 hours before they disappear. This urgent timeline would mean that the snaps cannot be saved and students cannot wait until the end of the week or just before exams to access these videos. However, this seemingly short 24-hour window would motivate students to view the content of the stories on the same day before the snaps disappear. As a result, the information contained in these stories would remain fresh and vivid in their memories, and thus would consequently make a deeper impression in the students’ minds. Students can also make use of this opportunity of viewing the stories on the same day as a review of the laboratory techniques and concepts highlighted earlier during the class. Therefore, the 24-hour viewing duration of Snapchat Stories further reinforces proper laboratory techniques, as well as important takeaways from each experiment. In contrast to the 24-hour viewing period for content on Snapchat, the pictures and videos uploaded onto the Instagram feed remain permanently, unless intentionally removed. In the module CM2191 where this pilot project was trialed, students were assessed by their performance in laboratory reports (40%), quizzes on laboratory techniques in viva vocé (10%), written test (20%) and practical examination (30%). Therefore, the content on Instagram feed would make review easier for the students, as they could go through all the collated images and videos across all the experiments covered before their practical exam and written test, or whenever they are reviewing the experiments for oral viva vocé tests. Instagram has an additional feature that is absent in Snapchat–hashtags. When other students click on these hashtags (#FUNgCHEMinCM2191, #FunManPosits and #infunguencer), they can view all the tagged posts under them and revisit the techniques and experiences of the laboratory sessions. This feature enables the experimental content—such as the color of the products, the reaction setups, and so on—to be more clearly lodged in their memories. The use of such lexical tagging applies the folksonomy pedagogy, where digital contents are organized, to make it easier for users to track different types of content and access the information they need. On the other hand, Snapchat has a unique feature that is not found in Instagram, which contributes to its popularity among its users. This unique feature is its variety of animated filters where new filters replace the old ones regularly. These Snapchat filters work by facial recognition, and allow one to perform light-hearted animations like exhaling a rainbow, metamorphosing into well-known avatars such as an angel and a knight, wearing floral headbands, and more. Such endearing filters were applied when the lecturer gave his briefing before the start of each laboratory session. Since these briefings are usually about mundane but vital information such as laboratory safety, the filters garner interest from the students and cause them to pay more attention to the snaps. Instagram has another distinctive feature not found in Snapchat- the boomerang function- which was also explored for this project. This boomerang function allows a burst of ten shots to be taken with only one tap, and these shots are then compiled into a mini-video that loops back-and-forth. The lecturer 44

used this function for certain demonstrations to emphasize specific experimental instructions (e.g., the rotation of the glass joint during the insertion of the round-bottomed flask into the rotary adaptor), so that students will visualize the procedure more clearly and be more confident when conducting the experiment on their own. Students were also encouraged to make use of Boomerang during laboratory sessions, especially during reaction waiting time, to capture shots of their chemical reactions. The students were amused when observing the captured video that loops back-and-forth, which made the long, six-hour laboratory session more enjoyable. Since the boomerang function is a refreshing way to deliver laboratory content, the information captured through Boomerang will be retained more easily in the minds of students. Table 1 gives a brief overview about the differences mentioned above.

Table 1. Summary of the differences between Instagram and Snapchat mentioned Instagram

Snapchat

Contents uploaded on feed permanently

Contents uploaded on stories for 24 hours

Videos as long as one minute can be uploaded

Videos lasting only ten seconds can be uploaded

Hashtags are available for tracking of posts

No hashtags available

Boomerang function available

Boomerang function unavailable

Findings Anonymous feedback from the CM2191 cohort was also garnered to study the learning analytics from the usage of Instagram and Snapchat in the chemistry laboratory curriculum. The usage of the two apps invited positive feedback from the students, which demonstrated the merits of making use of such platforms for live teaching. Before the start of the Instagram and Snapchat trial, a preliminary survey was given out to the cohort of students, to find out how they felt about the upcoming incorporation of the apps into the module. As seen in Table 2, the responses were generally very positive, showing that there was anticipation for the use of both apps. Based on the students’ responses, they felt that the apps would increase their knowledge gained from visual learning. From the same preliminary survey, it was discovered that 74 students were visual learners. This could be the reason for the positive responses, since images and videos which are visually attractive would greatly benefit their learning. 45

Table 2. Students’ opinions of using Instagram and Snapchat for laboratory teaching before usage Survey Statements for Student Response

Responses by Score,a N 5

4

3

Combined Categories,b % 2

1

5+4

2+1

These applications: Q1

Will be effective for my lab learning.

17 43 28 3

2

65

5

Q2

Will increase my interest in the respective experiments.

16 42 29 4

2

62

7

Q3

Will help me to visualize and remember important experimental steps that I need to take note of.

30 38 19 3

3

73

7

Q4

Will help me to learn better during lab and improve my lab techniques.

25 32 30 4

2

61

7

a The scores from 5 to 1 represent the following agreement levels:

“strongly agree”, “agree”, “neutral”, “disagree”, and “strongly disagree”, respectively. The total number of responses for each level of agreement are tabulated. b The combined category “5 + 4” represents the percentage of students responding with “agree” and “strongly agree”; the category “2 + 1” represents the percentage of students responding with “disagree” and “strongly disagree”. N = 93.

After 24 hours, Snapchat stories garnered about 36 views on average, with the number of views ranging from 25 to 54 per digital content. This shows that not all images and videos were viewed by the students before the 24-hour period was up. Indeed, during the survey conducted, students expressed that they sometimes forgot to check the Snapchat account for the images and videos uploaded before they disappeared. It was thus emphasized by the instructor that students check the Snapchat account after each laboratory session. There were instances when students took screenshots of the Snapchat stories. This was usually done with uploaded images. The students probably did this for easy access to the content in their phone’s camera roll, for the purpose of reviewing materials at a later date. In comparison to Snapchat views, the video posted on the Instagram feed had an average of 43 views at the end of 24 hours, with about 36 to 55 views per video uploaded. Since the students could view the content uploaded onto the Instagram feed at any time, they should have been less motivated to watch videos within the same 24-hour window imposed on the Snapchat content. However, the average number of views collated for Instagram Feed was slightly higher than that of Snapchat. This could be due to more students choosing to use Instagram to view the lecturer’s teaching as compared to Snapchat. The reasons for the students’ choice were reflected in a survey. Out of 64 students who responded, 51 students (80%) cited their more frequent use of Instagram, and 32 students (50%) preferred Instagram due to its friendly user interface. This amounted to higher viewership for the digital content uploaded onto the Instagram feed as compared to Snapchat. 46

A mid-semester survey was conducted five weeks after Instagram and Snapchat were incorporated into the module. The purpose of this survey was to find out how students perceived the use of these apps after accessing them during some experiments. Based on the survey results collated from 75 students (response rate: 72%), the majority of the students felt that the applications were helpful to them in several ways. For example, as seen from Table 3, the images and videos uploaded helped the students to increase their retention of chemistry knowledge (88%), increased their understanding of both theoretical and practical aspects behind each experiment (80%), and allowed them to correct their mistakes (89%), to name a few. The feedback suggested that the content uploaded was indeed beneficial for the students’ lab learning.

Table 3. Students’ opinions on using Instagram and Snapchat for laboratory teaching after using these apps for experiments Survey Statements for Student Response The use of these applications

Responses by Score,a N 5

4

Combined Categories,b %

3

2

1

5+4

2+1

Q1

Helped to increase my retention of knowledge applied/used during the lab sessions.

29 37 9

0

0

88

0

Q2

Made it easier for me to make connections between the theory and practical aspects from laboratory teaching.

29 35 9

2

0

85

3

Q3

Helped me to recall the apparatus setup and hence made the setting up of my reactions easier.

40 28 7

0

0

91

0

Q4

Improved my ability to operate the lab instruments.

30 35 7

3

0

87

4

Q5

Helped me to remember important experimental steps that I need to take note of.

34 34 7

0

0

91

0

Q6

Increased my understanding of the theoretical and practical aspects behind the experiments.

23 37 14 1

0

80

1

Q7

Helped me to be clearer of the steps/procedure written inside the lab manual.

34 29 10 2

0

84

3

Q8

Highlighted to me the mistakes I made during the experiments, and allowed me to correct them immediately.

38 29 6

0

89

3

2

Continued on next page.

47

Table 3. (Continued). Students’ opinions on using Instagram and Snapchat for laboratory teaching after using these apps for experiments Survey Statements for Student Response The use of these applications

Responses by Score,a N 5

4

Combined Categories,b %

3

2

1

5+4

2+1

Q9

Pointed out the good lab techniques and improvisations demonstrated by my peers so that I can learn from them.

47 25 3

0

0

96

0

Q10

Allowed me to learn from my peers’ experiences (what they did well & not well).

40 30 5

0

0

93

0

Q11

Made the experiments seem less daunting because my peers are the ones carrying out the procedural steps.

35 26 12 2

0

81

3

Q12

Encouraged deeper thinking – many questions (that I may not have thought about) were posed, and I had time to think about them.

31 30 14 0

0

81

0

a The scores from 5 to 1 represent the following agreement levels:

“strongly agree”, “agree”, “neutral”, “disagree”, and “strongly disagree”, respectively. The total number of responses for each level of agreement are tabulated. b The combined category “5 + 4” represents the percentage of students responding with “agree” and “strongly agree”; the category “2 + 1” represents the percentage of students responding with “disagree” and “strongly disagree”. N = 75.

Furthermore, one respondent expressed that the posting of questions forced him/her to think harder and search for answers independently. He/she also explained that the instructor tried to make the students think more on their own about the lab procedures and content instead of spoon-feeding them, making him the first lecturer to successfully enable deeper thinking in students. This was also reflected in 81% of the students who agreed that the content posted on both apps encouraged deeper thinking, as they were motivated to carefully consider their responses before posting them. Other information was garnered from the students as well. For example, students were asked if they experienced any difficulties while using Instagram and/or Snapchat. Based on the survey comments from 88 students (response rate: 85%), 57% of the students had no difficulties using both social media platforms to access the images and videos uploaded. For Instagram, students only needed to search for the account “chemfunman”, or the hashtag (#FUNgCHEMinCM2191, #FunManPosits or #infunguencer) and all the uploaded content could be easily loaded and viewed. For Snapchat, students could just simply tap on the “chemfunman” icon before the 24-hour period was over and the content would automatically play for their viewing. However, it is imperative to note that a considerable number of students (43%) indicated that they experienced difficulties 48

while using the apps to view the lecturer’s lab teaching. Some of the challenges highlighted by the students were slow loading of the online content due to poor Wi-Fi signal, blurry resolution for some videos, and busy school schedules that caused them to occasionally miss seeing the amassed Snapchat stories before the 24-hour time limit. The students were also asked if they enjoyed watching the video compilations that were uploaded onto the Instagram feed. Out of the 88 students who responded in the mid-semester survey, most of the students (70%) had positive comments pertaining to the compilations. One student commented, “I appreciate that there are live demonstrations — both positive and negative demonstrations so we don’t need to imagine these practices but rather can view and learn from the demos.” Another student also expressed, “It was a good preamble before lecture and after lecture recap.” These comments showed that, despite the short limit of 10 seconds for Snapchat and one minute for Instagram, content was still able to be successfully delivered to the students via the apps. Nonetheless, there were also less positive comments (3%) regarding the use of these apps. One student gave the following comment, “1: boring, 10: exciting. ~3—5. Less focus in making it seem funny, more focus on actually delivering useful content.” This shows that although we did try to make the snaps more interesting by creating jocund captions to engage students and enhance their memory recall abilities, this edutainment approach might not be suitable for everyone. Hence, a balance between serious and light-hearted content had to be maintained to ensure that the majority of the students benefitted from the uploaded material. Both Instagram and Snapchat were incorporated into the organic synthesis experiments only, which were done during the first half of the semester. The apps were not used during the inorganic synthesis experiments, to find out if it affected the students’ experience during the laboratory session. Based on the positive results of the previous two surveys (preliminary and mid-semester), it was expected that the students would feel a greater impact during the absence of the apps. However, based on Table 4, this was not the case. Only half of the survey statements had the respondents’ agreement. For example, the statements “I encountered more difficulties in the setting up of my reactions” and “I was less confident in operating the lab instruments” received agreement from less than 40% of the respondents. However, this does not mean that the apps did not have any impact on the students. Both the organic and inorganic synthesis experiments required students to perform the same laboratory techniques, like rotary evaporation. The students might have already had enough practice in the first half of the semester during the organic synthesis experiments. They might not have felt a significant difference when the apps were not used during the latter half of the semester. Nevertheless, there were largely positive responses from the students. A large group of 69% of the respondents agreed that they had fewer communal learning opportunities from their peers. This was due to the individual compartmentalized fume hoods, where it was tough to observe the performance of peers. In addition, there was always a rush to complete the experiments during the laboratory sessions, so students did not have the time to go around the room to observe how their peers carried out procedures, or exchanged their laboratory 49

learning experiences. Thus, without Instagram and Snapchat, it was difficult to learn from other peers.

Table 4. Students’ opinions on using Instagram and Snapchat for laboratory teaching after not using these apps for experiments Survey Statements for Student Response These applications

Responses by Score,a N 5

4

3

Combined Categories,b % 2

1

5+4

2+1

Q1

I was less able to retain knowledge applied/used during the lab sessions.

12 26 33 9

6

44

18

Q2

It was more challenging and difficult for me to make connections in order to fully understand the theoretical and practical aspects behind the experiments.

9

34 32 7

4

50

13

Q3

I encountered more difficulties in the setting up of my reactions.

10 16 34 17 8

31

29

Q4

I was less confident in operating the lab instruments.

10 22 28 18 8

37

30

Q5

Some of the steps/procedure in the lab manual were unclear to me. It was also more difficult for me to visualize and remember important experimental steps that I needed to take note of.

11 33 28 9

5

51

16

Q6

There were fewer opportunities for me to learn from my peers’ experiences E.g. good lab techniques, improvisations from my peers.

15 44 17 5

5

69

12

Q7

The experiments seemed more daunting.

6

21 35 18 5

31

27

Q8

The practice of deeper thinking was not as frequent due to the absence of questions posed in snaps.

9

40 24 9

57

15

4

a The scores from 5 to 1 represent the following agreement levels:

“strongly agree”, “agree”, “neutral”, “disagree”, and “strongly disagree”, respectively. The total number of responses for each level of agreement are tabulated. b The combined category “5 + 4” represents the percentage of students responding with “agree” and “strongly agree”; the category “2 + 1” represents the percentage of students responding with “disagree” and “strongly disagree”. N = 86.

The same survey also aimed to garner the students’ overall opinions towards the incorporation of both apps into the laboratory module. Generally, the students had positive feelings towards the apps, since most of the respondents agreed with 50

the survey statements, as observed from Table 5. This was evident in the survey statement “The use of these applications was beneficial for my revision”, which had the agreement of 87% of the respondents. To quote a student, “His use of Instagram and snapchat to video our peers’ mistakes during lab session was really very useful and creative and it has enhanced my learning.” In addition, 86% of the respondents also wished for the apps to be used in future laboratory modules, which further proved the effectiveness of the apps in helping their learning during laboratory sessions.

Table 5. Students’ overall opinions on using Instagram and Snapchat for laboratory teaching after usage of both applications Survey Statements for Student Response These applications

Responses by Score,a N 5

4

3

Combined Categories,b % 2

1

5+4

2+1

Q1

The use of these applications was beneficial for my revision.

30 45 10 1

0

87

1

Q2

The use of these applications enhanced my learning during lab sessions.

31 39 14 2

0

81

2

Q3

The use of these applications increased my confidence in operating the lab instruments and setting up of reactions.

27 39 16 4

0

77

5

Q4

It was easy to use such applications and these applications did not divert my focus or hinder my progress when I was conducting the experiments.

27 41 14 4

0

79

5

Q5

The takeaway(s) from each video posted on the platform that I used to view the lecturer’s lab teaching was/were very clear.

26 44 13 3

0

81

4

Q6

I am comfortable with using such applications for educational purposes (e.g. lab teaching).

33 39 11 2

1

84

4

Q7

I hope that such applications will be used for lab teaching for future lab modules.

34 40 8

0

86

5

a The scores from 5 to 1 represent the following agreement levels:

4

“strongly agree”, “agree”, “neutral”, “disagree”, and “strongly disagree”, respectively. The total number of responses for each level of agreement are tabulated. b The combined category “5 + 4” represents the percentage of students responding with “agree” and “strongly agree”; the category “2 + 1” represents the percentage of students responding with “disagree” and “strongly disagree”. N = 86.

51

Limitations Because the Tuesday lab group was the first group to be filmed for the live teaching of the experiment, students in this group might have had less time to prepare and correct their mistakes than students in the Wednesday and Friday lab groups. Therefore, the students from the Tuesday lab group might have feel that the live teaching duration could have been a little short to assess the effectiveness of these apps on their learning experiences. However, it is imperative to note that students have uniquely different laboratory experiences. The students in the Tuesday lab group could also learn from their peers’ experiences on Wednesday and Friday, which was not necessarily reflected in their own laboratory session. The Instagram Feed images and videos were uploaded permanently for viewing. As a result, their number of likes and views continued to increase even after data collection (usually done within 24 hours of the images and videos being posted). In contrast, Snapchat Stories were only unavailable for 24 hours after uploading, so their numbers of likes and views did not increase after that time. Thus, to correctly compare viewership data between the two platforms, we standardized the 24-hour data collection window for each one. Otherwise, Instagram’s numbers would be inaccurately inflated, as its views increase in aggregate over time, while the ability to watch each Snapchat Story stops after 24 hours. Another limitation was the survey responses collected. Hardcopy surveys were physically given out to each of the students. However, as the surveys were voluntary, not every student submitted the completed survey. Therefore, some of the students’ opinions were not conveyed. Despite the limited responses, our total questionnaire response rate was ≥ 72%, which conveys a suitable representation, in general.

Future Work & Closing Remarks The overall opinion towards the incorporation of Instagram and Snapchat was extremely positive, since most students were visual learners. The learning content uploaded was hugely successful in enabling the students to observe mistakes and improvisations and seek a deeper understanding of the experiments. Another possible work in the future is the use of a 360-degree camera. A 360-degree camera will be able to capture a full experimental setup in an individual fume hood. Students can perhaps watch videos captured using a 360-degree camera before their laboratory sessions. Since watching such panoramic videos can enable students to picture themselves as though they are in the laboratory, they can better familiarize themselves with the experimental setup and procedure, which can lead to better performance during their actual laboratory sessions. In conclusion, advancements in technology have brought about many new social media apps and platforms that instructors and teachers can use for lesson delivery. This project has shown that Instagram and Snapchat have proven themselves to be effective laboratory pedagogical tools and can indeed be beneficial for students undertaking laboratory modules, as a form of review or preparation for laboratory sessions. We endeavor to share our work to promote 52

and inspire educators to employ such learning technologies to better engage students, which in turn will enhance the students’ learning productivity.

Acknowledgments The authors are grateful to the Dean’s Office at the NUS Faculty of Science, and the Department of Chemistry for funding the project and for their leadership towards Technology-Enabled Blended Learning Experience (TEBLE). The participation of the CM2191 students in this research project were greatly appreciated. The first author, Rachel, is thankful to Fung Fun Man, the supervisor for this project, for his guidance, teaching and encouragement throughout this research project. Rachel would also like to extend her appreciation to her co-author, Alina Ang Sihui for her help and inputs for this book chapter write-up. Alina is also thankful to Fun Man for his guidance and feedback throughout the course of this project. The corresponding author would like to register his gratitude to Chng Huang Hoon, Goh Say Song and Robert K. Kamei for their unwavering support and encouragement.

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6.

Lawrence, Z. Snapchat And Instagram Usage In Singapore Soars As People Migrate Onto Photo-sharing Platforms. http://www.tnsglobal.com/ intelligence-applied/snapchat-and-instagram-usage-singapore-soars-peoplemigrate-photo-sharing (accessed Jan. 2, 2017). McLoughlin, C.; Lee, M. Personalised And Self-Regulated Learning In The Web 2.0 Era: International Exemplars Of Innovative Pedagogy Using Social Software. Australas. J. Educ. Tech. 2010, 26, 28–43. Korich, A. Harnessing A Mobile Social Media App To Reinforce Course Content. J. Chem. Educ. 2016, 93, 1134–1136. Snider, C. Snapchat storytelling template via @chrissnider. https:// chrissniderdesign.com/blog/2015/04/06/snapchat-storytelling-template/ (accessed Jan. 3, 2017). Watson, L. Humans Have Shorter Attention Span Than Goldfish, Thanks To Smartphones. The Telegraph, United Kingdom, May 15, 2015. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/03/12/humans-have-shorterattention-span-than-goldfish-thanks-to-smart/ (accessed Jan. 2, 2017) Al-Bahrani, A.; Patel, D. Incorporating Twitter, Instagram, And Facebook In Economics Classrooms. J. Econ. Educ. 2015, 46, 56–67.

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Chapter 4

Using Desktop Streaming To Bring Review Sessions Online M. K. Mann* Department of Chemistry, Austin Peay State University, 601 College St., Clarksville, Tennessee 37044, United States *E-mail: [email protected]

As constant connection to the digital world has reached near-ubiquity in the United States, the landscape of collegiate education has changed to incorporate many new internet-based technologies. In addition to email, online courses, and social media, online videos have helped students outside of the traditional classroom setting supplement their education. This chapter functions primarily as a tutorial and covers the logistics of one way to utilize online videos: holding live, interactive, online review sessions for students taking courses in chemistry. This is possible with two free services: Open Broadcaster Software Studio, a free and open-source encoding software, and YouTube live streaming, a free online platform that broadcasts live videos in real-time. This method helped facilitate student-student interactions and student-instructor interactions in a way that was highly accessible, with convenient scheduling, and was easy to use for students due to platform familiarity. These factors are likely responsible for the increased productivity and session attendance in comparison to on-ground review sessions and online review sessions using web conferencing software.

On the Nature of Online Learning University faculty have always been on the frontlines of innovation; they are often the leaders in developing and utilizing new technologies to help students learn. In fact, the very first computer-assisted instruction system was developed in © 2017 American Chemical Society

1960, years before the internet existed, at the University of Illinois at UrbanaChampaign. Programmed Logic for Automatic Teaching Operations (PLATO) was an intranet-based system that allowed students to listen to recorded lectures and chat with other students in ways very similar to what we use in contemporary online courses (1). By the 1990s, better technology allowed for the development of modern online courses. This provided the flexibility that helped extend college to students who would have found a traditional campus experience impossible due to medical issues, military service, or obligations to family or work. The drive for pushing the limits of academic flexibility has split nearly every aspect of collegiate learning into an electronic version and a physical version. Instructors often mix and match resources in a way that works best for their teaching style, their students’ needs, and their department’s expectations. The basics of learning have not changed; students still use books, take notes, do homework, and take exams. The change has been in the delivery method for these basics. Students may use e-books instead of physical books, email questions to their instructors instead of waiting in a line outside an office, and do the bulk of their learning at home through virtual classrooms on learning management systems instead of sitting in a physical classroom. You may have noticed that students are also increasingly utilizing online materials not affiliated with their courses to supplement their education. A prime example is Khan Academy: an educational website that has thousands of videos in dozens of disciplines including general and organic chemistry. Unsurprisingly, a recent study reported over 20% of professional learners are familiar with Khan Academy videos (2). Another popular resource is the video delivery site YouTube. Many chemists post lecture content, tutorials, and demonstration videos on YouTube. For example, at the time of this writing, a search on YouTube for “stereochemistry” results in 20,700 different video results. The first two results alone, both tutorial-style videos, have a combined view count of nearly 150,000 at the time of this writing. Considering the prevalence and popularity of these video resources, it is clear that many students, perhaps most, are comfortable using online videos to help them navigate the content in a course. This chapter focuses on the development of one specific application of online videos that has been largely left unexplored: conducting live, interactive video review sessions on YouTube. This is possible through the use of specialized encoding software that allows viewers to observe your computer’s desktop in a way completely dictated by the video-maker. This is called desktop streaming (Figure 1). While not all professors hold review sessions, those who do hold them know that the time a session takes place often determines if it will be well-attended. Doing it in class takes away precious lecture time. During the day, an open classroom must be found, and a compromise made between the instructor’s and students’ schedules. Neither are trivial tasks. By bringing review sessions online in the evening, the timing issue becomes less problematic, as students can participate, regardless of location, as long as they have internet access, and instructors can keep their valuable lecture time in class reserved for new content. As the review sessions are recorded and can be viewed at a later time, students who were not able to attend the live version are still able to watch the review session, and the videos can be watched later in the term for review. Online review 56

sessions are, quite simply, one more way to increase instructor accessibility and academic flexibility in order to help our students succeed.

Figure 1. Example of a live review session including webcam footage of the instructor, ACD/ChemSketch, YouTube Live Chat, and a background image (3).

Project History: The Need for Accessibility The work presented here was done at Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, TN. Austin Peay is a primarily undergraduate institution with approximately 10,000 students, of whom 40% are nontraditional. Class sizes for the work in this chapter ranged from between 15-25. Many students at the university are affiliated with the adjacent Ft. Campbell Army Base. The large number of nontraditional students and those with demanding military obligations has been the driving force for increasing course flexibility and instructor accessibility in my courses. This, in turn, has led to developing novel ways of fostering student-instructor interactions online. Between email, social media, and messaging services, there are many ways we can interact with our students online. Unfortunately, most of them are not conducive to drawing graphs, equations, and structures without uploading separate images, and they are not great for large groups of people communicating at the same time. This makes them not particularly useful for hosting a large-audience review session, though they have been used successfully in doing small-scale office hours (4). Web conferencing software, used extensively by online courses, has circumvented these issues through class-wide chat rooms and digital white boards. Seemingly ideal for online review sessions, the web conferencing software Wimba-Pronto was the original platform explored for hosting my online review sessions. Unfortunately, several significant issues were encountered: the software was cumbersome; the student had to download it and join and login into sessions; and it is not as easy to navigate as the major websites students tend to 57

frequent. When multiple students participated and were using their computer’s microphone, it become chaotic and confusing. Further research showed this was typical for web conferencing software. To find a better alternative, several criteria were established that would improve on the shortcomings of web conferencing while maintaining the key attributes that make it useful as an online teaching tool. An ideal system for review sessions would combine the accessibility of common social networking applications with the utility of a web conferencing platform. It would need to 1) be user-friendly and widely accessible through common web apps; 2) facilitate student-student interactions as well as student-instructor interactions; 3) have the ability to be viewed by students at any time; and 4) have the ability to draw structures, graphs, and equations. When looking at the three most trafficked websites in the United States, Google, YouTube, and Facebook are at the top of the list (5). Until recently, only YouTube had the ability to meet all four criteria and was the model chosen for this project (Facebook has added desktop streaming capabilities for users as of March, 2017 and could now be used in the same manner as YouTube) (6). Regarding criterion (1), it has been estimated that over 80% of 18-29 year olds use YouTube, and it has widespread access through all internet-connected devices including smartphones, tablets, and computers (7). It also has a chat feature connected with every video so users can interact with each other and the instructor, which helps it fulfill criterion (2). For (3), YouTube saves all live streaming videos to your account, so students can watch your videos later if they missed a session, or would like to review. To meet criterion (4), the coupling of YouTube to desktop streaming software would be necessary so students could see webcam footage of their instructor, drawing programs like ACD/ChemSketch, and any other software an instructor would want included in the review session (see Figure 1 for an example screenshot). A free, open-source platform for this is Open Broadcaster Software Studio (OBS). The combination of YouTube and OBS allows an instructor to post live video footage from their webcam, specific websites, programs on their computer, any fixed images they want, and the chat dialog, all at the same time, and all part of the same video. Note: While it is likely many professors have never seen this type of technology used, it is common for college-aged students. It is used extensively in streaming video games for others to watch. There are video streaming websites dedicated to this exclusively, Twitch being the most notable with over 10,000,000 unique daily users (8)! The following sections serve as a guide for setting up a computer for live desktop streaming. At the end of this chapter you can find a URL link for an in-depth tutorial video that accompanies this manuscript as well as the videos streamed to date for my classes (9). The computer used for this work had a 64-bit Windows 10 operating system and 8 GB of RAM. The computer also was equipped with a touchscreen display, a standard webcam and microphone. Of course, as this document ages, changes will be made to the YouTube and OBS systems that may render some of these instructions obsolete. Fortunately, OBS and YouTube are very user-friendly and the system is relatively easy to navigate to find what you need; this hopefully will stay the case in future iterations of YouTube and OBS.

58

Current Academic Uses for Live Streaming At the time of this writing, there are no references in the literature regarding live streaming chemistry review sessions other than a small section in my previously written chapter (4). A cursory view of YouTube, however, will show many instructors posting review sessions online for their students in many disciplines. These seem to fall into a few categories of presentation: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Video of an instructor answering questions in class on a whiteboard. Feed from a document camera or other writing device. Video feed of a PowerPoint presentation. Video of an electronic writing tablet (eWriter) Computer desktop footage presenting a review session.

These videos differ from those presented in this chapter in that they lack the live, interactive component. The videos are generally put on YouTube after the video has been filmed, rather than during the recording, and unless students are there during the time of the recording (like in (1) or (2) above), they have no input regarding the direction and content of the video.

YouTube Video Basics: Setting Up a YouTube Live Account If you have never made a video on YouTube, you will be amazed at how simple it can be. As YouTube is a subsidiary of Google, those with a Google account already have a YouTube account. For those that do not, it is free and easy to sign up by going to either the YouTube or Google websites. A video can be as simple as a person talking into a camera. Indeed, if you wanted to record yourself lecturing in front of a white board, all you would need is a video camera on a cell phone and an internet connection to upload the video. Live desktop streaming videos are a little more complicated and require the use of encoding software that can convert the raw video information from your computer’s desktop into a form that can be streamed quickly to YouTube for live viewing. To set up your YouTube channel for live videos, you must go to the “Creator Studio”, which can be found in several ways on the YouTube homepage (Figure 2). The easiest way is by clicking the round subscriber icon at the top right-hand corner of the homepage. This icon can be customized by you, so it can show whatever image you want your students to see. Alternatively, by clicking the “My Channel” link on the homepage sidebar, this will take you to a page that shows a “Video Manager” tab in the upper middle portion of the screen. The Video Manager tab will then direct you to the Creator Studio. Lastly, the URL www.youtube.com/ dashboard will take you to your Creator Studio if you are signed into your YouTube account.

59

Figure 2. Three ways for finding the Creator Studio in YouTube. The Creator Studio contains everything you need to start posting videos. The options on the Creator Studio tab are straightforward: Video Manager takes you to a page with all your uploaded videos, where you can change settings. Live Streaming is the base of operations for when you are streaming live videos. Once you click on the Live Streaming tab, you will see a page broken into several boxes of information (Figure 3). Of particular importance: 1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Video box: This is where your video can be viewed in real time (Figure 3a). You can put an image in this box that will show when the live stream is not active. It can be added, deleted, or changed at any time by clicking the “change thumbnail” box. This could be a picture, clipart, or a screen background. Basic info: This is the basic information about your videos (Figure 3b). Students can see this information when they watch a specific video, and the title in the box will be the title of your video. This can be changed later after the videos have been posted. You can set privacy here if you only want your students seeing your content. Shareable link: The link to your channel is found at the bottom of the Live Streaming page (Figure 3c). If your video privacy is set to public, the link will be a generic one for your channel that you can put on your syllabi. If you decide to set the privacy as unlisted, the link will be different for each new video. Sharing this link with your students via email is an easy way to ensure only your students see your videos. Encoder setup: The URL for the YouTube server and the Stream Key for your channel are found in the encoder setup box (Figure 3d). The Stream Key is necessary to set up OBS for streaming. The key is specific to your channel and should be kept private. Chat box: This is where students can ask you questions and interact with each other during your video (Figure 3e). This box can be removed 60

from the page and viewed independently in its own window by using the “popout chat” setting in the chat box. To find the popout option, click the . vertical ellipsis symbol (..) in the corner of the box. This will be useful when setting up your display scenes if you want your display to include the chat log for your video.

Figure 3. Setting up your YouTube Live Page. a) Video box where a thumbnail can be added. b) Box for title, description of video, category of video, and privacy setting. c) Sharable link box. d) Stream key for setting up the OBS encoder. e) Live chat box for student communication. Once you have added a thumbnail image to your video box (optional), entered in basic information for the title and description of your videos, and made note of your shareable link, you need to “reveal” the Stream Name/Key and copy that code. This will be needed when setting up the encoding software, OBS. At this point, everything is in place on your YouTube channel for setting up the encoding software and streaming live videos.

OBS Basics: Linking OBS to Your YouTube Live Account Open Broadcaster Software is a free encoding program that you download from https://obsproject.com. There are downloads available for Windows, Linux, and Apple operating systems, and while there is no formal help available, there is a very active community of experienced users (that are willing to help newcomers), 61

which can be accessed through the OBS “community chat” webpage (10). Once OBS is downloaded, you can open the program by choosing the 32-bit or the 64-bit settings. This is dependent on your operating system and can be found in the “about” section of your computer’s settings if you are unsure. The first step in working with OBS is to put in the YouTube streaming key (Figure 3d). On the OBS screen there is a box of options in the lower left-hand corner. Click on “Settings”, which will open a new window of OBS settings. Click on “Stream”. Make sure your settings say Streaming Services for “Stream Type”, and YouTube/YouTube Gaming for “Service”. Enter in the stream key from YouTube (Figure 4). After this step, your OBS is linked to your YouTube channel and is set to encode your desktop videos directly to your channel.

Figure 4. Entering in your YouTube Stream Key into OBS.

OBS Scenes: Choosing What Your Students Can See When you have the OBS software running, you will first only see a black box with no content, a menu bar at the top of the page, and a navigation/settings bar at the bottom. The black box is where you can place whatever you want your students to see. The system works by layering images and windows on top of each other in a way similar to PowerPoint. You can have different groupings of “sources” (windows, images, applications, and programs) on a page at any given time; these are called “scenes”. For example, Scene 1 could contain three sources: ACD/ChemSketch, video feed from your webcam, and the chat box from YouTube. Scene 2 could be just your webcam with a whiteboard behind you. You can have multiple scenes and can switch freely between them during a streaming session. From here it is largely the instructors’ preference on what 62

they want the students to see. Following are a few different options for creating a customized display that includes your webcam, internet sources, and programs on your computer. I generally switch between two different scenes; 1) YouTube chat, ACD/ChemSketch, and my webcam feed, and 2) YouTube chat, Microsoft Paint, and my webcam feed. While the ACD/ChemSketch is great for drawing structures, it can be time-intensive to draw mechanisms; I have found Microsoft Paint works well when combined with a touch-screen to draw structures and mechanisms very quickly. When I need to use mathematical equations, I use either Microsoft Equation Editor 3.0 (found as a separate window in ACD/ChemSketch by selecting “Edit” and “Insert”) or Microsoft Paint.

Designing Your Scene: Adding a Background Image A background image can be laid down first to make your plain black slide have a little chemistry character (Figure 5). An easy way to find a good image for this purpose is by searching for “chemistry wallpaper” in a search engine, or you could make your own. Most of these will be open-source images that are free for non-commercial use and are sized appropriately for this purpose. Once you find one you like, download it to your computer. In OBS, click the add sign (+) under “sources” to add this image. A menu bar will pop up, asking what type of source you want to add. Select “image” and then follow the prompts to add your wallpaper by selecting the downloaded file on your computer. It is useful to name your sources with something logical like “wallpaper” so you can change or add them in the future to other scenes without any issue. This process can be followed for any static image you would like displayed on a scene.

Designing Your Scene: Adding in Feed from a Webcam If you feel strange talking to your students without them being able to see you, adding video feed from your webcam will be useful (Figure 6). This helps foster a more personal interaction and allows you to use hand gestures, model kits, or white boards for your explanations like what your students are used to seeing in class. Most laptop computers have a webcam integrated into the computer, but an external webcam works as well. Click the add sign (+) again under “sources” to add your webcam feed. Select “video capture device” and then follow the prompts to add and name your webcam. A screen appears that allows you to choose your webcam settings. Generally, the default setting works well, but under “Resolution”, if there are no numbers, you need to select “Resolution/FPS Type” as “Custom” and put in the resolution you want for your video. The higher resolution the better the video, but if it slows down your computer significantly, using a lower resolution for the webcam may be necessary. You can change the size and location of your webcam box by clicking and dragging one of the corners and moving it to where you need it. 63

Figure 5. Adding a background image to a scene.

Figure 6. Adding webcam footage to a scene.

Designing Your Scene: Adding a Source from an Open Window OBS can add a source from most windows you have open on your computer (Figure 7). Notable exceptions seem to be Microsoft Office programs and Internet Explorer, but ACD/ChemSketch, ChemDraw, Microsoft Equation Editor 3.0 (found in ACD/ChemSketch), Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Paint, the YouTube chat (once it has been popped out into its own window) and 64

Graphical Analysis all work well. OBS only recognizes windows if they are currently open and not minimized on your computer. I recommend opening all programs you would like to use in a scene. You need to position each window on your screen the same way you intend to use it during your video. If you change the size of a window during your broadcast it will change the layout of that source in your scene while you are streaming. As with the previous sources, click on (+) to add a source, choose “Window Capture”, and name the program you want to add. A dropdown box will have the various open windows on your computer for you to choose. The “cursor capture” option allows your users to either see your cursor working on those sources or not.

Figure 7. Adding a new window to a scene.

Designing More than One Scene If you are making more than one scene for your broadcasts, adding the same sources becomes much simpler if you have named your current sources in a way that is easy to recognize. You can add (+) the window capture, video capture device, or images that are already in one scene by clicking on “add existing” in the create/select source box. For example, if you have a background image, a chat box, and ACD/ChemSketch, but in another scene you want to replace ACD/ ChemSketch with Graphical Analysis, you can choose “Add Existing” for the image and the chat box, reducing the number of new sources you need to add. 65

Once Your Scene Is Ready Once you have your scene(s) ready, your broadcast is as simple as clicking the “Start Streaming” button on OBS. You should not have to do anything to YouTube, but you may want to keep it open to check and make sure your video is streaming. Realize that sending data across the internet is not instantaneous, so you will have a 10-20 second delay between when you say something and when it is delivered to your students on YouTube. It is important for you to turn off the volume on your computer during your broadcast if you intend to use your microphone to communicate. Otherwise the microphone will pick up everything coming from your speakers while you are talking and create a repeated loop of feedback. If you would like to use this system for videos that are NOT live streaming, you can click the “Start Recording” button and then upload the video to a platform of your choosing later. All streaming parameters and scenes in OBS will be in place after you close the program and come back to it later, so putting together your scenes does not need to be done every time you need to make a new video. If at some point during streaming you need to change from one scene to the other, simply click on the scene you need. It will transition by either cutting or fading, depending on the settings you have chosen on the OBS navigation bar. If you need to mute one of the sources during your broadcast, you can click on the eye next to the source, and it will turn it off from the scene display.

Troubleshooting Issues with OBS and YouTube While OBS studio is very useful, it is not always easy to use. Different issues can creep up that might stifle your videos’ functionality. Adding too many sources can be an issue if your computer is not very powerful. If your computer is updated, your OBS is in the current version, and your drivers are up-to-date, you can look for answers here. This section, while not including a complete list of issues you may encounter, should serve as a starting point for troubleshooting these problems. Sources Need To Be Cropped or Margins Changed If your image is not sized properly, you can click and drag the image to the appropriate size similar to PowerPoint. If you need to change one of the margins of your source, click on “Edit” followed by “Transform” and “Edit Transform” to crop the margins of the image, or right-click on the image and click “Transform” and “Edit Transform”. Sometimes certain sources will give an additional black border around the active screen, and this can also be cropped off in this manner. Adding Web Sources Gives a Blank Box This seems to be a dilemma with Google Chrome and Internet Explorer. If you have another browser such as Mozilla Firefox, that will likely solve the issue. If you prefer to use Chrome, you will need to go to “Settings” in Chrome and scroll down to “Advanced” at the bottom of the page. Scroll down to the “System” box and turn off the “Use hardware acceleration when available” function followed by 66

“Relaunch”. This should only need to be done once and will be saved for future streaming unless you physically turn it back on. Unfortunately, I was unable to find a fix for Internet Explorer or Microsoft Office programs. A thorough search of the OBS chat community indicated that there are no current solutions for these platforms. Adding the Webcam Is Not Working Unlike other windows, which need to be open to be seen in OBS, the webcam needs to be turned off. If it is turned on, OBS will not be able to use it because another program (the webcam itself) is using it. Close out your webcam and try adding it again. Webcam Resolution Is Not Good The resolution can be changed in the webcam settings by double clicking on the webcam source and changing the settings under “resolution” to a higher number. In some cases, you can experiment with the webcam parameters to get it to work. The Feed Is Choppy or Does Not Stream Well This can be an issue with either your computer or with your internet service. If your computer does not have enough RAM to process the multiple open programs, webcam, and video feed, you will get a choppy video that will eventually stop broadcasting. The system that I have used successfully is a Windows 10 computer with 8 GB of RAM and a 64-bit operating system. If your system is normally fine with streaming, but is suddenly having issues, it is likely that your internet connection is not working well. A Source Disappears from the Scene or Changes Shape When Broadcasting You may notice that if you minimize a source when broadcasting, it may disappear from your scene (this issue seems largely corrected in the newest OBS version). Also, if you change the size of your source windows from the time you add it to your scene to when you broadcast, it will change the shape in the scene. To prevent these issues, set up your sources to be the same size and position that you intend to use when broadcasting. Click the icons open in your taskbar when you need to change one of your sources instead of minimizing your windows. For Other Issues Due to the nature of open-source software like OBS, there is no formal online support help. However, there is a wonderful community of users that participate in the online Chat Forum (found on the OBS homepage) if you have additional issues. I have personally found this group to be wonderful for answering questions I have had about issues in the system. Of particular importance is the log files for 67

your broadcasts. The users of the chat forum will need your log file to provide troubleshooting help for your issue (Figure 8). This is found by clicking “Help” on the OBS toolbar, “Log Files”, and then choosing to upload your current or last log file.

Figure 8. Finding the log files for your online troubleshooting.

Personal Experiences, Observations, and Shortcomings New technologies are always interesting to experiment with in the classroom, but as my experience with web conferencing review sessions has shown, not all technologies yield fruitful results when it comes to reaching students. I have now used YouTube Live with OBS for a full academic year (Fall 2016-Summer 2017) for three different organic chemistry courses (Brief Organic, Organic I, and Organic II). Class sizes ranged from about 15-25. The following is a list of anecdotal observations, system shortcomings, and experiences from the previous year that a new user may find helpful.

Scheduling Review sessions were streamed the night before an exam for roughly 45-90 minutes between 5:00-8:00 pm. This seemed to be a good compromise between the time after a student has studied enough to get questions, but before they have finished studying for the evening. The beginning time was always chosen through a class discussion/vote of what time worked best for students, and that seemed to be dictated by factors including day of the week, major campus events, and other scheduled exams.

Time Commitment The majority of the time commitment for these sessions is the initial scene setup OBS. By following the tutorial outlined here, a basic scene like those in this 68

manuscript would take about one hour or less to complete. Once the scenes are in place, however, they are there permanently every time you open the program. That means getting a review session started with existing scenes would take less than 5 minutes (essentially the amount of time it takes to open the programs you will be using).

Students Unable To “Attend” the Live Sessions Review sessions are not mandatory, and while the class votes on a time that works best for most, there is generally a student with soccer practice, work, or childcare duties that is unable to participate when the video is live. When students are unavailable to watch the live session, they send an email (or Facebook message) of any questions ahead of time so they can be answered during the session. Those students can then watch the video later when their schedule permits, as the videos can be watched at any time after the live stream. I have generally received one or two questions in this manner per semester.

Comparing YouTube Live to Standard Web Conferencing YouTube Live attracted much more attention from my students than the web conferencing software Wimba-Pronto. The videos on my YouTube channel have been watched dozens of times, sometimes quadruple the number of students in my classes. I have had 25% or more of my class, sometimes more, participate in the review sessions when they are live. This is easy to determine, as the YouTube Live dashboard indicates how many people are watching your video at any given time, and the chat includes the screen names of who is participating. By comparison, Wimba-Pronto attracted less than 10% of my students per session. While the video count numbers on YouTube can be inflated from YouTube users not in my class watching these videos, I am still having much more active class participation than with web conferencing. As I was the only person with microphone access, it also kept students from talking over each other and experiencing confusion during the sessions. Over the 2016-2017 academic year (including the 2017 Summer term) there was a total of 11 videos made between 4 courses. There were several times that software updates caused technical difficulties, and in those cases a video was not made for the review session of that exam. Those technical difficulties have been addressed in this chapter, and should prove less problematic for new users reading this manuscript, as well as future streaming sessions for the author. The view count of each video and the corresponding number of students in the class at the time can be found in Table 1. All videos can be found on the YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/user/professormann. 69

Table 1. Summary of Review Session Participation for Fall 2016 View Count

Video Name

Students in Class

Brief Organic Exam 1 Review, Fall 2016

73

24

Brief Organic Exam 2 Review, Fall 2016

84

24

Brief Organic Exam 3 Review, Fall 2016

28

24

Organic 2 Exam 1 Review, Fall 2016

39

22

Organic 2 Exam 3 Review, Fall 2016

56

22

Organic 1 Exam 1 Review, Spring 2017

31

23

Organic 1 Exam 2 Review, Spring 2017

25

23

Organic 1 Exam 3 Review, Spring 2017

13

23

Organic 1 Exam 1 Review, Summer 2017

51

18

Organic 1 Exam 2 Review, Summer 2017

23

18

Perceived Shortcomings in Communication One shortcoming of YouTube Live in comparison to web conferencing is that students are relegated to the role of asking questions in a chat box rather than being able to draw on a digital board and talk into a microphone. While this system works great for the instructor in communicating chemistry, it can be harder for participating students, as they are restricted to their keyboards. This has not been a problem for most questions in my experience, but in the event that students have a specific issue they need help with that is not conducive to an alphanumeric keyboard, I use the methods previously published (taking cellphone photographs and emailing me the picture, or sending the picture through social media through Facebook or Google Hangouts) (3). While this may seem cumbersome, modern students are very adept at communicating through electronic pictures, combined with text, as they do this with social media every day (11). While initially a cause for concern, restricting student communication to the chat box (or emailed pictures when necessary) was unproblematic and actually prevented students from talking over each other like in web conferencing. YouTube Audience While my videos are accessible to anyone with an internet connection via public settings, you can choose to change your privacy settings to fit your needs. If you are interested in sharing your videos with your class, but not sharing your videos with the world, you can set your videos to “private” and then “share” your videos with the email addresses of your students. Alternatively, they can be set to “unlisted”, and your students can be given the direct link. These settings can be changed at any time for your videos, so while I have kept my videos public even after the semester is over, an instructor could choose to hide them from public view after the semester has ended. If you want to keep it off YouTube entirely, you 70

could still record videos (rather than live streaming) of your desktop using OBS and send it to your students (the video is saved to your computer as an MP4 file). As mentioned above, the first two stereochemistry video results on YouTube had 150,000 views, and students everywhere are using resources online to supplement their learning. Some of my own view count may be students at other universities looking for help in their classes. It is entirely likely that you will have an audience that exceeds the boundaries of your class roster if you do not set your videos to private. The best part about YouTube is its wide accessibility, but if you prefer a smaller audience, YouTube makes that possible. Making Mistakes The live streaming has no room for corrections or editing during filming, though you can crop out pieces of video after it has been made (though it may not be seamless). Generally, streaming relies on a large level of coordination between multiple open windows. I personally keep open YouTube Live, YouTube Chat, Facebook, and email for incoming questions, ACD/ChemSketch, and Microsoft Paint; this tends to increase my number of errors. In times where I have spoken or drawn in error during my streaming, I will let my class know of the error’s existence and location in the video, and I will email them a copy of the correction, rather than edit the video after-the-fact. If you watch my videos, you will likely see this happen a few times, but I have never had a student raise a concern about it or express a misunderstanding of the material once a correction was made. YouTube Live vs. Facebook Live As mentioned above, Facebook’s video broadcasting service, Facebook Live, has very recently started allowing desktop streaming. OBS can be used with Facebook Live in the same manner as YouTube Live. While Facebook is also a widely popular website, the number of videos on Facebook Live is a fraction of a percent of the number of YouTube videos. Facebook is typically considered more of a social networking site, whereas YouTube is exclusively designed for the viewing of videos. At this point, it seems YouTube still serves as a better vehicle for streaming videos to a large audience, because our students are apparently more familiar with this platform. Other Planned Uses Because the content of these desktop streaming videos can be customized so heavily, there are many applications for the technology. One particularly useful application would be for periodic electronic lectures. In the event of a missed class due to a conference or other obligation, I plan on recording (not live streaming) lecture videos to reduce the amount of class time missed. Of course, most other classroom activities, such as problem-solving sessions, literature reviews, special topic lectures, or others that involve heavy instructor-student interaction, could also be done remotely with this technology. 71

Conclusion While the idea of a portable classroom was established decades ago with PLUTO, and expanded through learning management systems and modern online classes, there is still a lot of room for growth and development in using internetbased technologies inside and outside of the classroom. Common web applications that are designed to foster social interactions coupled with content delivery, such as YouTube, have expanded the concept of a portable classroom into an even more accessible place for our students and serve as a versatile tool to increase instructor accessibility and course flexibility. While many professors opt out of review sessions due to a feared decrease in lecture time and/or the difficulty of scheduling a session where most students can attend, live online review sessions solve these issues through high accessibility in a remote fashion. While it seems we are still quite far from a perfect online classroom, we have reached a point where there are multiple options available for nearly every academic need. As technology continues to improve we will likely find ourselves at the forefront of developing even better methods for fostering interactions with our students outside of the classroom.

References 1. 2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

Burns, P. K.; Bozeman, W. C. Computer-assisted instruction and mathematics achievement: Is there a relationship. Educ. Technol. 1981, 21, 32–39. Horrigan, J. B. Lifelong Learning and Technology. Pew Research Center Internet & Technology [online]. March 22, 2016. http://www. pewinternet.org/2016/03/22/lifelong-learning-and-technology/ (accessed July 14, 2017). Chemistry Wallpaper Image SDW 1351438. Adorable Wallpapers, Photos and Stocks website [online]. http://www.smartcc365.com/WDF1351438.html (accessed September 1, 2017). Mann, M. K. Approaches for Increasing Professor Accessibility in the Millennial Classroom. In Addressing the Millennial Student in Undergraduate Chemistry; Potts, G. E., Dockery, C. R., Eds.; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2013; Vol. 1180, pp 147−163. Gray, A. These are the World’s most Popular Websites. World Economic Forum [online]. April 10, 2017. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/04/ most-popular-websites-google-youtube-baidu/ (accessed July 14, 2017). Costine, J. Facebook Live adds PC Game and Desktop Live Streaming. Tech Crunch [online]. March 22, 2017. https://techcrunch.com/2017/03/22/ facebook-live-desktop/ (accessed July 16, 2017). Anderson, M. 5 Facts About Online Video, for YouTube’s 10th Birthday. Pew Research Center Fact Tank [online]. February 12, 2015. http:// www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/02/12/5-facts-about-online-video-foryoutubes-10th-birthday/ (accessed July 14, 2017). About Page. Twitch: Social Video for Gamers. [online]. http://www. twitch.tv/p/about/ (accessed July 14, 2017). 72

9.

Professor Mann’s Streaming Channel and OBS/YouTube Live Tutorial [online]. https://www.youtube.com/user/professormann (accessed August 31, 2017). 10. OBS Community Chat [online]. https://obsproject.com/chat (accessed September 5, 2017). 11. Global Digital Communication: Texting, Social Networking Popular Worldwide. Pew Research Center Global Attitudes & Trends [online]. February 29, 2012. http://www.pewglobal.org/2011/12/20/global-digitalcommunication-texting-social-networking-popular-worldwide/ (accessed September 5, 2017).

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Chapter 5

Using Technology To Flip and Structure General Chemistry Courses at a Large Public University: Our Approach, Experience, and Outcomes Melissa A. Deri,1,* Donna McGregor,1,2,* and Pamela Mills1,2 1Department

of Chemistry, Lehman College of the City University of New York, New York, New York 10468, United States 2Ph.D. Program in Chemistry, The Graduate Center of the City University of New York, New York, New York 10016, United States *E-mail: [email protected]; [email protected]

One major challenge when designing General Chemistry courses is how to cover all of the material in such a content-heavy class while simultaneously engaging students in such a way that they develop an interest in the subject. Within a large university these challenges are exacerbated by the need to offer courses for several hundred students at once. Furthermore, in an urban public university system the level of college preparation and study habits of the entering students span a large range, from students who have had no chemistry in high school to those who have excelled in Advanced Placement chemistry courses. In the face of these challenges, we designed a technology-driven flipped classroom model with a significant online component that includes a backbone of custom chemistry videos for content explication. The course design—including the detailed components, their justification, and the basis of our pedagogical learning theory—is presented herein. In addition, we include a brief discussion of the results from the first few years of running this new model with a specific focus on student and faculty perceptions.

© 2017 American Chemical Society

Introduction and Background (Why We Chose To Flip with Technology) The 21st century is ripe with new technology that has enabled educators to rethink how they structure their classrooms to enable student learning. This is particularly interesting in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) fields where the need to diversify and increase competence among students persists (1). The need for competence in the STEM workforce is a particularly important issue as it has been predicted that by 2018, 9 of the top 10 fastest growing jobs will require a bachelor’s degree in a STEM field (2). It is also widely-accepted that many more college freshman who exhibit an interest in science (or medicine) believe that they want to be Biology majors than believe that they want to be Chemistry majors and that student’s choice of college major is largely dependent on the experience they have in their introductory level college courses. For General Chemistry instructors then, the task is two-fold: teach students the specific chemistry content (to create competence) and create opportunities for them to become interested in the subject in general (to increase the number of majors). In a content-heavy course like General Chemistry, making time to both explicate and garner interest can be challenging. In a large, urban public university system the challenge is further compounded by the variability in preparation among the incoming study body, where students will vary from those who had no high school chemistry experience to those who have excelled in Advanced Placement chemistry courses. In addition, the ever-increasing class sizes that often arise (>100 students) mean that instructors must work harder to keep their students engaged and actively participating (3). One approach that has a proven record of both improving student outcomes and increasing student interest is the Flipped Classroom. In a flipped classroom content explication is moved out of the classroom and face-to face time is repurposed for more active learning practices. The literature contains countless examples of successful flipped classrooms (4–9) and a plethora of active learning strategies (10–16), many of which make use of videos for content explication (17–19) and some form of online learning platform (20–22). It has also been shown that the use of online homework leads to increased student performance (23–25) and that personal response devices (or clickers) result in increased passing rates, increased student satisfaction and more engaged classrooms, especially in large-enrollment courses (26–28). In fact, clickers have been found to play a particularly important role in the retention of students with lower grades because the use of the clickers increases their interest in the subject matter (29). Of utmost importance is not only the surge of technological advances, but the generation of students that has grown up within it. The current wave of millennial and centennial students is overwhelmingly technology-savvy and they are inundated with information constantly available at their fingertips. These students naturally approach learning in short bursts and have access to a plethora of open access educational software (30). Their expectations about learning do not involve reading a text to understand information. Rather, they are heavily driven by video and use the internet and smart devices as their primary mode of 76

information discovery. The widespread availability and awareness of popular educational resources on the internet means that students very quickly find alternatives to their course texts or notes to supplement their learning. In an attempt to capture and engage this technology-driven student body while also facilitating students’ transition into the rigor of science classes, we chose to combine a series of pedagogical strategies to build a new structured, flipped classroom model for our ultra large (600+ students) General Chemistry courses. We created a series of custom videos for initial content delivery that serve as the backbone for the flipped course and then supplemented them with carefully structured, scaffolded learning assignments to facilitate the development of soft skills as well as content knowledge. The impetus behind this redesign was ultimately to better fit the needs and preferences of our students. The use of technology complements their inherent tendencies toward looking to the internet for answers and the increased structure helps to level the playing field by supporting those students who come in with less college preparation through incorporating time management strategies. The video backbone was embedded in a commercial online platform and carefully linked to online homework problems, while class time was repurposed for small group workshops and a modified form of peer instruction using clickers. It was our hope that this combination of technology and pedagogy would help improve student performance, increase student interest in chemistry, and lower course withdrawal rates. In this chapter, we discuss the structured, flipped course and video backbone design, provide details about the in-class active learning components, and give anecdotal student commentary about the successes and challenges that they (and the instructors) faced when using this new model. Our student performance data are not discussed here as they have been published elsewhere (31).

Context (Who We Are) The City University of New York (CUNY) is the public university system of New York City and the largest urban university system in the US, consisting of a network of 11 senior colleges, 7 community colleges, and 5 graduate and professional schools. This project was initially conceived at Hunter College, which is one of the most selective of the CUNY Colleges and is located in Manhattan. In 2015, the authors moved to Lehman College, the only senior college in the Bronx and began implementing the new course design at the second campus. Due to the cooperative nature of the CUNY system, we have had the opportunity to study the same course sequence simultaneously in these two senior colleges and are currently working to expand to include Bronx Community College (one of the CUNY community colleges). The structured, flipped classroom design we will discuss has been implemented by multiple instructors for both General Chemistry I (Gen Chem I) and General Chemistry II (Gen Chem II) courses at both senior colleges. In 77

all instances of the course, instructors at the two institutions replaced traditional lecture instruction with a custom video backbone for content explication coupled to two forms of active learning classroom activities (a modified form of peer instruction and small group workshops). The implementation of the course at two senior colleges serves as a natural laboratory for study as the student demographics are different. Instructors at both institutions used identical course assignments and co-written exams in order to maintain consistent standards and draw valid conclusions.

Course Details (How We Design the Structured, Flipped Classroom) We realized very early on that in order to reach the students of the 21st century, flipping the classroom could not just mean giving the students something to watch or read before class. Rather, we had to rethink and redesign every aspect of the course. This redesign involved the re-sequencing of the material according to a custom learning logic (see Table 1 for new content flow), the inclusion of an expanded teaching team that consists of a course instructor combined with a team of teaching assistants and embedded tutors, and the integration of a variety of technologies both in and out of the classroom. Specifically, these technologies involve the use of a single online platform to house all course components, the custom video backbone, the linking of the videos to the online homework system and the inclusion of student response devices (clickers). Additionally, designing a course where students were responsible for more work outside of the classroom led us to develop a much more structured curriculum with frequent assignments and weekly (or even daily) deadlines. In 2014 Eddy and Hogan found that “increased course structure improves student achievement” (32). We believe that the inclusion of many short term assignments with specific due dates increases the course structure, specifically providing a built in study schedule and constant graded feedback so students can track their progress as they move through the course.

Online Components Course Website When we began this project, we decided to design a custom CUNY platform that conformed to our course specifications. CUNY built the platform and for 2 years we used it with huge success in the classroom, but as the course expanded to include more students and more institutions we made several important observations about the limitations of a custom platform and decided to switch to a commercial platform instead.

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Table 1. The topics covered are highlighted to present the flow of content in the flipped classroom courses. General Chemistry I and II Topic Coverage General Chemistry I

General Chemistry II

1

Matter, Models and Math

Chemical Equilibrium

2

Atoms and Orbitals

Predicting Chemical Change

3

Basic Bonding Principles

Acids and Bases

4

Introduction to Covalent Bonding

pH Calculations

5

The Chemical Equation

Polyprotic Acids

6

Energy Considerations

Buffers

7

Periodic Trends

Titration Curves

8

Atomic Spectroscopy

Heat and Work

9

The Electron

Enthalpy

10

Molecular Geometry

Entropy

11

Valence Bond Theory

Free Energy

12

Molecular Orbital Theory

Applications of Free Energy

13

The Mole

Redox Reactions

14

Stoichiometry Calculations

Batteries

15

Empirical and Molecular Formula

Chemical Kinetics

16

Phase Change and IMF

Arrhenius Theory

17

Gases

Nuclear Chemistry

18

Applications of Stoichiometry

Our foremost observation was that maintenance of the platform and providing technical support to all students was a difficult and time consuming task that we could not sustain without significant extra resources. Furthermore, our students were expressing an explicit desire to have a single log-on that would connect them to both the required course materials and their online homework as well as an accurate and up to date gradebook at all times. In year 3 of the project we thus decided to switch to a commercial platform and partnered with Sapling Learning (our online homework system) to design a custom course within their online learning environment. Our custom Sapling course contains all the required course components within a single online environment and can be further customized for each instructor and institution. Figure 1 shows the landing page of the Sapling custom course and indicates all the flipped classroom course components that are contained within the Sapling interface.

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Figure 1. A complete topic page from the course website illustrates all the course components for a given topic.

Self-Assessment of Learning Goals Before students begin a topic, we ask that they complete a self-assessment of their prior knowledge relating to the learning goals for that topic. This learning goal analysis (LGA) takes the form of a series of Likert-type questions touching on each learning goal. Students rate their familiarity with the concept or concepts in each learning goal with the clear understanding that they are not expected to know all the concepts when they begin each new topic. Students are encouraged to revisit the learning goals often while working through the topic and once more after completing all required assignments to ensure they have grasped each learning goal through their studies. The LGAs are graded for completion only (1.2% of 80

the course grade). It is our hope that this exercise will help clarify the expected content knowledge for each topic as well as increase our students’ metacognition and self-awareness as they develop their individual learning skills (33). Table 2 shows the learning goals for Topic 14: Stoichiometry as an example of the types of learning goals built into the course and presented in the LGAs.

Table 2. The 8 learning goals associated with Topic 14 are shown here as a representative example. Topic 14: Stoichiometry Calculations 1

Identify the limiting and excess reagents in a chemical reaction based on the given amounts of reactants

2

Use the chemical equation to compute the maximum amount (theoretical yield) of products produced

3

Use the chemical equation to compute the amount of reactants needed to produce a 100% yield

4

Use the chemical equation to predict all masses of all components after a reaction has run to 100% completion: i.e. amount of reactant reacted, amount of reactant unreacted (excess), amount of product produced

5

Recognize the actual yield in a chemical reaction based on the wording of a problem

6

Compute percent yields for any chemical reaction from actual yields and theoretical yields

7

Incorporate limiting reagent calculations into all stoichiometric calculations starting with given amounts of reactants or given amounts of products

8

For any given set of conditions, compute the amount of reactants and products in the reaction vessel (including mole, mass, % yield and or number of particles)

Custom Video Backbone The primary mode of content delivery was a series of short videos that were custom-made to match the desired topics and flow of the Gen Chem I and II curricula. The content was divided into 34 topics (18 for Gen Chem I and 16 for GenChem II) and these were subdivided into a series of 176 videos. Each topic includes between 4-8 videos, each between 2 and 10 minutes in length, that introduce and convey increasingly complex content knowledge for that topic. Each video was designed to build upon knowledge from the prior videos (within the topic or even from prior topics in the course) and students were instructed to watch these topic videos before coming to class. On average students watch about 50 minutes of video per week in Gen Chem I and 60-70 minutes of video per week in Gen Chem II. In order to help students learn to better organize and manage their time they are provided with a detailed Table of Contents (TOC) that outlines all the videos in a given topic along with the length of each video and the total amount 81

of footage for each topic. Table 3 shows an excerpt from the TOC for Topic 14: Stoichiometry as an example of how a topic is broken down into a series of videos.

Table 3. The 5 videos associated with Topic 14 are shown here as a representative example. 39 min 01 s

Topic 14: Stoichiometry Calculations Video A

Limiting Reagent

9 min 14 s

Video B

Mole Based Calculations

6 min 31 s

Video C

Mass Based Calculations

9 min 25 s

Video D

Percent Yield calculations

8 min 56 s

Video E

Advanced Stoichiometry Problems

4 min 55 s

Using videos as the vehicle for content delivery is beneficial to the students because they are given control over the amount of time they spend with the content explication. Students watch the videos on their own schedules, as many times as they need, while pausing or replaying for clarification. Additionally, online videos are a widespread and common source of information for 21st century students who use video for everything from gaining technical knowledge to watching tutorials and the news. The course videos were required viewing in our flipped course and, as incentive, students earned points for confirming that they had in fact started watching the videos and taking notes by a required deadline every week. Our course platform did not allow for monitoring of individual student’s viewing habits. Instead, students completed a Video Certification assignment each week to earn their points. Videos could be watched on any device with a working internet connection. When designing our videos, we opted to use voice-over PowerPoint presentations without a talking head; the only exception being a pair of small filmed sections in the very first video of the Gen Chem I course and in the very last video of the Gen Chem II course meant to bookend the experience. A concerted effort was made to make the videos feel dynamic with substantial animations and plenty of visuals instead of blocks of bulleted text. Particular care was taken to make the slides visually appealing by including custom graphics and detailed custom animations to more clearly convey certain course content (particularly to illustrate molecular level simulations). It was important to us that the videos had a consistent look and feel to ensure that the student experience with the content flow felt both sequential and coherent, so every video begins with the same slide layout and each topic is infused with a custom graphic that illustrates the topic content. Based on our initial observations with student video usage and in-class student polling we decided to make the pacing and cadence of the videos purposefully slow, with the voice speed being well below typical conversational speed. This 82

was an unexpected design, but students made it very clear that “normal speed” felt too fast and that they wanted to be able to take detailed notes while watching the videos. The videos include English subtitles to accommodate students with language or hearing difficulties. Additionally, to facilitate note taking and review, PDF documents of all the slides contained within a given topic were made available to the students for download through the course platform.

Guided (Let’s) Practice While required assignments are the norm in our structured, flipped classroom, we believe that some ungraded, low-stakes problem solving is important. To achieve this we included at least one “Let’s Practice” question in every video. The “Let’s Practice” problems are identified for students and intended to engage them in optional problem solving during the content delivery. These guided practice questions prompt the student to pause the video and try to solve a given problem independently. Upon resuming the video the solutions and explanations are presented. Typically, these problems rely on content that was presented in the video, but because chemistry content builds cumulatively students must often access additional content knowledge gleaned from prior videos. Let’s Practice problems are not graded nor checked for completion, but are meant to be used exclusively as a learning tool to move students toward independent problem solving. Students who choose to watch the solutions as examples before trying to solve the problem are never penalized. Figure 2 shows an example of a guided practice problem and its solution slide.

Online Homework To ensure that students were practicing the course content outside of class, we linked every course video to an online homework assignment inside the Sapling Learning platform. Sapling contains a database of chemistry questions, but also allows instructors to author their own questions if they so choose. To match our course curricula, we used a combination of Sapling database questions and our own authored problems. We estimate that we authored about 25% of the homework content. The online homework assignments were split into two distinct types: Skills Practice and Synthesis. Skills Practice assignments are each three questions long and correspond to a specific video, with questions usually focusing on a narrow topic or content area. These assignments are meant to be completed as students move through the material. Synthesis assignments are longer assignments of about 8-10 questions that pull together the content from all the videos in a given course topic. The synthesis assignments are meant to be the capstone to each topic and thus tend to contain more challenging questions. 83

Figure 2. A guided Let’s Practice problem from topic 14 is shown here with its detailed solution.

Homework questions were graded in real time to give the students instant feedback about correctness. One wonderful feature of the Sapling homework system is the inclusion of hints and the availability of tutorials when students submit incorrect answers. Our utilization of the system does not penalize students for multiple attempts after an incorrect response. Students can make a mistake and then use the hints or tutorials to come to the correct response, and still receive full credit for the problem (even after several incorrect response cycles). We chose this format because we believe that homework is an extension of the learning experience and not an assessment of student knowledge. We include some of our most difficult problems as part of the online Synthesis homework because these assignments are due after all class work has been completed and students can work these problems slowly while fully utilizing all of their resources to solve them. Figure 3 shows an example of an online homework problem and its worked solution.

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Figure 3. An example of an online homework problem and its explanation are shown here.

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Electronic Textbook An OpenStax electronic textbook was included in the online course platform but there were no required reading assignments. The book was made available as an additional resource for those students whose learning style preferences include reading a text, but it was not specifically referenced in the course. Ultimately, we found the number of students who chose to use this resource to be incredibly low (see Student Perceptions section below). The text does not necessarily match the order of the topics covered in the course, but the online homework platform does link the sapling database homework problems to relevant book sections for students to directly access when desired. In-Person Components Teaching Team To further support our students in their learning, the in-class components of the course were designed to rely on a teaching team that consists of a course instructor combined with a team of teaching assistants (TA’s) and embedded tutors. The TAs are typically chemistry graduate students who are interested in the education initiatives of the department or post-baccalaureate students who are hired as adjunct lecturers. The embedded tutors are typically upper level undergraduate students who have successfully completed the course and are paid per hour to work as part of the teaching team. It is well known that access to external tutoring services and learning support networks are an important resource for students and that helping students learn to use these resources effectively is an important part of the learning process. At Lehman, we have two Learning Centers that provide tutoring services to students in the sciences - the Lehman Science Learning Center that provides tutoring and organized study groups based upon the Peer Led Team Learning model (34, 35) and the Supplemental Instruction (SI) model (36, 37). Both models were initially developed to support traditional lecture-style classrooms and we have worked with the programs to begin developing a formal embedded tutors program for our structured, flipped classroom. The embedded tutors work closely with the course instructor, and are trained formally as either SI Leaders or as classroom facilitators.

Clicker Class Clicker class is the main in-class component of our structured, flipped classrooms and involves a modified form of the original Mazur Peer Instruction cycle (12, 38). Peer instruction modifies the traditional lecture classroom by dividing it into a series of short mini-lectures, each followed by a related question (originally conceived as a method to explore physics concepts and called a ConceptTest). Students are given a short amount of time (usually 1-2 minutes) to formulate individual responses to these questions and then submit their individual answers to their instructor. Students are then encouraged to discuss their answer 86

choices with the students who are sitting with them (usually 2-4 minutes) and then they submit a new round of individual responses. The instructor then explains the question and moves on to the next mini lecture. We have modified this cycle in 2 distinct ways: 1) we do not begin every cycle with a mini lecture and 2) we skip the initial individual response phase. Instead we encourage students to think about the question alone for about 1 minute before they begin discussing with their peers. In this modified form of peer instruction responses are only submitted after a round of class discussion. During a typical two-hour Clicker class the entire class of 100-1000 students (depending on the college and section) meets with the course instructor and (based on the class size) with several TAs and our undergraduate embedded tutors. The entire teaching team has seen the clicker questions before class and is made aware of any misconceptions or common student errors that might need to be addressed. The instructor presents a series of multiple choice questions using PowerPoint (Figure 4). The questions are designed to increase in difficulty and serve as the backbone for class instruction. Once a question is presented to the class the students are given a fixed amount of time, usually 1-5 minutes based on the difficulty of the question, to work through the problem in small groups using their notes before entering their answers using handheld personal response devices, in our case iClickers. Students are encouraged to work with their peers and use any available resources at all times. The instructor, embedded tutors, and TAs walk through the classroom and are available to answer questions and explain concepts during this problem-solving time. Once the allotted time has elapsed and the class has submitted their responses, the overall class results are displayed as a distribution. Based on this distribution and the difficulty of the question, the instructor walks through the solution in detailed steps and talks about both how to approach the problem and any particular errors or embedded concepts. In the case of particularly difficult problems or when the majority of the class doesn’t agree on the correct answer choice, the question is reopened and students are instructed to discuss the problem with the students around them to try and come to an agreement. Although students receive a grade for their performance in clicker class, the problem-solving exercise is not meant to feel like a quiz, but rather each question is viewed as a chance for students to apply knowledge from the course videos. Clicker class is an opportunity for students to engage in problem solving during class time, when they are surrounded by resources and people able to help them learn. Typically, students are not required to get every clicker question correct to earn full points for a session. For example, students need to accumulate 8-10 correct answers to earn full credit for the day, but there may be 10-14 questions covered in each class. The number of questions covered in a given class depends on the preparedness and performance of the students and how much explanation is provided by the instructor. When a high majority of the class answers a question correctly the instructor may briefly reinforce the concept and guide the class through the solution, but when more of the class is struggling the instructor may opt to spend more time discussing a question and going over the solution in more detail to stress the individual steps and thought processes. Furthermore, the 87

instructor’s explanations of clicker questions are linked to the larger framework of the course, emphasize problem solving techniques, and address common misconceptions.

Figure 4. An example of a clicker question and its explanation are shown here.

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The questions used in clicker class are carefully selected to include a variety of difficulties and cover as much of each topic as possible given the limited class time. Each individual question is explicitly identified by its level of difficulty and at least one learning goal that it covers. This helps the students keep track of their progress and explicitly link concepts back to the learning goals. Difficulty is ranked by level, from 1-4, with Level 1 questions being focused on foundational knowledge and single concepts (often recall of facts) and Level 4 questions presenting students with a novel question type that requires them to make connections beyond what they’ve seen in the videos or homework. Another important design feature of the clicker questions are the answer choices. When the instructor displays the students’ responses it is important that they can glean meaning from the results. This means that the incorrect choices have to be selected to match common mistakes in the solving of that problem. This could be the inclusion of common misconceptions in conceptual questions or frequently forgotten steps in calculations. The point is for the instructor to be able to identify the mistakes being made by the class in real time in order to address them as necessary.

Workshop The second in-person component of the flipped classrooms is what we call workshop. Workshop allows students to meet in a smaller class setting of about 20-45 people with more direct interaction with an instructor or TA (graduate or post-baccalaureate student). In these one-hour sessions, small groups of 3-5 students work together on hand-written problem sets which are handed in and graded for correctness. Workshop problems often involve more complex problems and require students to draw structures and write out their work while they grapple with conflicting or even opposing ideas. Workshop also provides students with an additional opportunity to interact with their peers and ask questions of the instructor or their TA. The TAs move between student groups to answer questions, provide guidance, and talk to students about how they approach problem solving. The problem sets used in workshop are typically a series of open-ended short answer questions that guide students through a concept by breaking it down into smaller steps. Workshop also includes more complex problems that require higher level thinking while the students have time and support to solve them. The problem sets are made available to students prior to their scheduled class meeting time through the course website and each workshop group is responsible for printing and bringing their own workshop assignment to class. Grading The structure of the flipped classroom offers students many ways to earn points throughout the semester. Points are assigned to all assignments with strict deadlines to incentivize students to keep on schedule and complete all the coursework. Table 4 shows the contribution of each course component to the 89

overall course grade. The attribution of points to the individual learning activities are meant to encourage and reward students for completing small tasks, but the bulk of the grade still comes from exam scores.

Table 4. The overall course grade distribution is highlighted here. Flipped Classroom Grade Breakdown 2%

Learning Goal Analysis

2%

Video Certification

8%

Clicker Class

8%

Workshop

10%

Online Homework

70%

Exams

Outcomes (What Happens When We Apply the Structured, Flipped Classroom) Student Perceptions Over the course of our normal clicker sessions we occasionally include ungraded, optional survey questions to probe student’s use and perceptions of the course materials and design. Below we outline two of the more interesting student perspectives found from these surveys. First, when asked about their primary source for course information, 76% of students cited the videos while only 3% cited the electronic textbook. Interestingly, 12% of respondents said they used the online homework as their primary source. Second, when asked about what course model they would prefer for the following semester, the vast majority (77%) of the students request the same flipped model with videos, clicker sessions, and workshops. Only 3% of the class voted for a return to normal lecture and 19% suggest a combination of standard lecture with video support and clicker integration. This speaks volumes about students’ feelings toward the new course model. Additionally, we encouraged students to complete the regular college mandated course evaluations at the end of every semester. As part of these standard evaluations students were asked to comment on “the best features of the course,” the “learning activities that most influenced your learning in this course,” and “specific ways this course could be improved” as well as questions about individual instructors. These evaluations provided a more detailed perspective on student perceptions. For the most part, the student comments supported the data from student surveys. The majority of the feedback consisted of positive comments on the benefits of the different course components and the model overall with the clicker sessions and videos specifically getting the most praise (Table 5). 90

Table 5. Excerpts from our course evaluations are highlighted below to give an overview of student feedback about the course. Student Feedback from Course Evaluations Students like the model overall.

“It was the first time I had ever taken a course in a "flipped classroom" setting and I love it! I was skeptical at first to whether or not it would work but it has!!!!! It is a great way to learn.” “I think the class is structured very well. It is challenging but not overwhelmingly so. … They allow us to put everything we know together and allow us to think for ourselves. We have to make the connections, and learn to use what we already know … And when we don’t know how to solve it, it lets us know that we are missing something foundational in our knowledge, or are unclear about something and therefore lets us know we have to go back and find out what it is, or ask for help so that we can understand.”

The structure of the course was helpful.

“I really appreciate how much structure there is in this course because it has been crucial for me in terms of staying on track. … For me it kept me accountable.” “[The course] websites greatly enhanced my learning ability. They allowed me to see exactly what I was supposed to know and allowed me to master the skills necessary to succeed in the course.”

The online components helped make the course more flexible.

“Being able to learn the concepts at home at whatever time we wanted to.” “The fact that I can go at my own pace and teach myself the topics is a huge plus.” “The ability to go back and review topics whenever I wanted to or whenever it was unclear.” “Being able to review the lecture since they were videos online. The multiple ways to connect for help and the resources available.”

They liked the videos.

“The best features of this course were the videos, although they were long, the majority were very thorough in teaching me the material.” “The topic videos were great. They are clear and allow you to visit them whenever you need to study for the exams.” “The video lectures were very concise and kept me engaged” “The videos were really helpful. Short and to the point.”

They preferred the videos over a textbook.

“I like that [the instructor] puts videos up and sapling questions because I think that makes it easier to learn than from learning from a textbook.” “I enjoy [the videos] so much more than reading a textbook.”

Workshop was helpful.

“The best feature was the workshop because I got to understand how to solve problems from workshop and working as a group helps you understand even more.” “Workshops was very helpful because you can ask classmates to explain things to you as well as asking [the instructor].” Continued on next page.

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Table 5. (Continued). Excerpts from our course evaluations are highlighted below to give an overview of student feedback about the course. Student Feedback from Course Evaluations Clicker class was helpful.

The homework was helpful.

“I really liked the iClicker sessions because they were presented in an enjoyable manner and it really helped my understanding of the topic which further reinstated my motivation to excel in this course” “[The best features of this course were the] I clicker sections even though I hate working under pressure during the iclicker sections.” “The clicker sessions, they got me very caught up on material I might have been previously confused on.” “I liked the clicker review questions because they helped me/us to better grasp the material learned.” “Sapling was great because after watching the videos I could try the questions to see if I understood what I watched. If not I’d watch the videos again.” “The homework problems really gave me a lot of problems to practice for the exam.” “The sapling learning assignments were great! It made learning the material fun rather than overwhelming.” “[The synthesis homework] really helped with putting all the concepts of the chapter together.”

Some of the most helpful comments came from students’ responses to what could be improved in the course (Table 6). These were a mix of time management struggles, technological issues, and the inherent discomfort due to trying something new. Typically, we have found that some students are uneasy about the model at the beginning of the semester but then embrace it as time goes on. Often the students who were the loudest about not liking the model at the beginning are some of its biggest advocates at the end. However, there remains a subset of students who never embrace the idea of the flipped classroom. While the idea of lecture as the ideal way to convey information has long been dismantled in the education literature, it is still prevalent in the university setting on both the faculty and student sides. Anecdotally, we’ve noticed that the students who are most averse to the loss of lecture are those who have had previous higher education experience and feel that if no one is giving them a lecture, then no one is teaching them. An advantage to starting this model in the introductory chemistry courses is that a larger cohort of the students are still figuring out what college is so they come in with fewer preconceived notions. Just as the recruitment of faculty to the importance and value of other methods of teaching and learning requires time and data, students need time and convincing to get on board as well.

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Table 6. Excerpts from our course evaluations are highlighted below to give an overview of student criticisms of the course. Student Criticisms from Course Evaluations Some students needed time to adjust to the model.

“Honestly.... the entire course was pretty cool after I adjusted to the heavy load of work I needed to do.” “I was skeptical about the flipped classroom model but having been through it twice now I absolutely love it!” “the flipped classroom takes time to get used to. This model is very annoying.”

A few students expressed a feeling of not being “taught” sufficiently.

“start by teaching instead of sending us home to do everything ourselves. Videos are fine for guidance but we need to be taught by our professor as well to actually retain the knowledge.” “I learn from lectures/standard teaching styles. I understand some may learn from this self teach model. I however do not and have suffered greatly this semester because of it.”

The course was very time intensive.

“Although the videos were informative and helped in my learning, the time necessary to really get through the videos was just too much.” “it required many hours to understand and deal with the work load. It’s very hard for someone like me who has to work full time.” “The flipped model uses up a lot of your time, so it is very hard to study for other classes.”

Workshop needs improvement.

“I believe the workshop was a waste of time since I felt like there wasn’t much to study during that short amount of time allotted for that section.” “I think workshop needs to be reconsidered… What generally happened with my group was that one person (namely me) would do the majority of the work” “I wish [workshop] would have just been dissolved and clicker session extended.”

Students wanted to be able to use mobile devices for online homework.

“hw should be do able on mobile devices for those who lack WiFi at home or due to unforeseen circumstances.” “My laptop was broken so I only had my iPad to work with or computer in the library and the homework can’t be done on an iPad so I would have to get the homework done outside of home”

Performance Outcomes A detailed evaluation of student performance outcomes in our flipped classroom compared with traditional historical data from both institutions has shown the model to be successful with improved student performance in both courses and at both institutions.31 One of the most notable outcomes is the significant increase in the passing rate at Lehman College where the passing rates in General Chemistry I and II went from about 35% passing in the traditional classrooms to about 80% passing in the structured, flipped classrooms. This is a truly impactful outcome and has opened the science bottleneck at our institution.

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Conclusion Overall, we feel that our technology infused and structured, flipped classroom has helped us both improve student competency and increase student interest in chemistry. We have been able to implement the course model at two different institutions with high fidelity despite differing student demographics and overall class sizes. The student commentary about the course is very positive and the number of chemistry majors at Lehman College has tripled since the implementation of the flipped model. We postulate that the success of the model is a consequence of the increase in course structure combined with the infusion of 21st century technology and a carefully designed video backbone that is linked to online homework and active learning activities. The peer instruction model encouraged in clicker class has helped to build a more cooperative, less competitive atmosphere in the classroom. The use of clickers to submit responses has kept students engaged during class and motivated students to come to class prepared. The constant grade feedback from the online platform has made students more self-aware of their performance and has helped instructors identify struggling students early on in the course and intervene while there was still enough time for students to change their behavior and recover their grades. This has led to increased student success and a generally more optimistic attitude in the class. The overall feeling of the class has been more engaged, more interactive, and more optimistic than in previous iterations of the same chemistry courses. There has been an open dialogue about the model between the teaching team and the class and the assertion that so much effort is being put into how to teach the class seems to provide the students with a sense of well-being. The teaching team has helped to foster a feeling of community and support within the courses. From an instructor perspective, the model has also been incredibly fun and interesting to teach. There has been more direct interaction with students during class and the positive student attitudes create a fun and wholesome learning experience. As of this report, our structured, flipped General Chemistry course has been taught by 14 different instructors, including both part-time and full-time faculty, all with different personal teaching styles, but all with positive results for both students and instructors. Perhaps most importantly, the success of the students has been catalyzing a culture change in our institution. Students less prepared for the traditional lecture hall can now succeed in chemistry and proceed through the STEM pipeline. Other instructors have been asking questions about how to apply the model (or pieces of the model) to their classrooms and their disciplines. As we align technology, video instruction, and active learning to create a modern STEM classroom we begin to reach more students and renew our sense of purpose as educators in the public urban setting.

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Acknowledgments The authors would like to thank Nadya Kobko and Gabriela Smeureanu for their time and energy as instructors for the flipped courses discussed. This research was supported by the National Science Foundation (DUE-1525032 and MSP-1102729).

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Chapter 6

What Worked for Me: Latest Trends in Technology-Enabled Blended Learning Experience (TEBLE) Fun Man Fung1,2,* and Aaron Rosario Jeyaraj 1Department

of Chemistry, National University of Singapore, 3 Science Drive 3, Singapore 117543 2Institute for Application of Learning Science and Educational Technology (ALSET) University Hall, Lee Kong Chian Wing UHL #05-01D, 21 Lower Kent Ridge Road, Singapore 119077 *E-mail: [email protected]

Video-assisted teaching has been around for several decades. Most recorded teaching videos lack spice due to the nature of third-person filming. In recent years, the invention of technological tools in GoPro cameras, smart headsets such as Google Glass, and the Lightboard presented a godsend method for educators to explore blended teaching. This book chapter will focus on some of my experiences using the latest teaching trends via the TEBLE pedagogy.

Introduction Chemistry educators in the early 2010s were faced with two difficult problems. The first was that the pace of teaching had to be calibrated to cater to the abilities of different students; some students were able to digest information and desired to learn further, where others struggled to learn new concepts and required more time to be devoted to creating a solid foundation. The other problem was that methods had to be found to make content delivered in lectures and tutorials more engaging, as students often felt disconnected from the subject matter. This was especially difficult for abstract chemical concepts, © 2017 American Chemical Society

which are typically not encountered in everyday life and, as a result, often require more time and resources to understand. Given the growing ubiquity of technology in society, blended learning was adopted in 2015 in an effort to solve these growing issues. Blended learning is essentially an educational program that attempts to make use of digital media to reinforce traditional classroom methods. As opposed to completely substituting classroom instruction, blended learning simply uses computer-mediated activities to help deliver content that is traditionally delivered in a classroom setting. There was a specific focus on the flipped classroom model, which uses classroom time to solve problem sets and what is traditionally termed as “homework”, while students use their own time outside the classroom to learn new content. In this case, this content was delivered through online media as mentioned earlier. In using these solutions, three objectives were set: • • •

Acquiring and understanding content delivered via short e-videos before attending the live lecture and recitation. Discovering the individual’s best learning practices and applying them in the same module. Comprehending the importance of self-directed learning, and cultivating a passion for learning, in the spirit of lifelong education.

Using the flipped classroom and blended learning models, the TechnologyEnabled Blended Learning Experience (TEBLE) program was created for lecture modules. This new system was found to be particularly effective at enabling learners to gain knowledge at their own preferred speed and at their own convenience. The key difference between this implementation of the flipped classroom was that the content delivered online included the instructor’s real-time facial images. This use of pre-recorded lectures allows students to see their lecturer’s instant facial expression and to establish eye contact (1), something that cannot be done in a class of over 600 students in a large lecture theatre (2, 3). It was found that this was especially effective in retaining some of the engagement that one might experience in a one-on-one setting. In fact, some students responded that they found themselves more engaged due to the individualized nature of the courses delivered online. Moreover, the instructor’s bona-fide facial expressions were captured, which contrasts with some educational videos that are narrated by a digitized voice reading prewritten text. This thereby served to prove that the presenter was real and not simply an intelligent robot repeating predetermined information from a script. This instant visualization of the lecturer’s organic presence will eliminate any cognitive dissonance caused by a virtual, non-living lecturer who teaches via the video proxy. There is no question that the lecturer is actually conducting the lesson as though they are teaching in real-time, rather than chanting leisurely from a couch. Attempts were also made to incorporate elements of fun into the flipped classroom by breaking the fourth wall (4), which consisted of pausing occasionally 100

and stating the lecturer’s propensity for certain scientific references, and linking lectures to life skills from which students could learn important lessons. During tutorial sessions, when the class gathers physically to perform difficult assessment tasks, students were encouraged to question the known knowns (truths) and interpret them beyond face value. The students were, with support, able to focus on higher forms of cognitive work without the apprehension of being punished. This resonates well with learners because they find joy in learning without fear (of losing marks), and are able to step out of their comfort zone and defend their approach of analysis. In one specific module (module title: Advanced Experiments in Organic Chemistry and Inorganic Chemistry [Module Code: CM3291]), quizzes were given before and after the online flipped classroom in order to ascertain knowledge gained. This allowed students to gauge their learning progress without incurring any penalty in their grading. This learning environment is conducive to understanding one’s best practice for picking up knowledge, cultivates leadership in learning, and encourages them to continue to apply such practices for life-long learning. During the live classes, several online IT platforms were utilized to galvanize discussion and the exchange of ideas among students. They can be broadly grouped into three categories: GoPro, Google Glass, and Lightboard.

Methods GoPro One of the biggest challenges faced when using a traditional lecture method was the disconnect that students felt toward the subject matter they were being taught. This was especially apparent in practical sessions, where many of them had trouble visualizing and engaging with the techniques that they were tasked to learn and undertake. A staple of laboratory instruction is not just delivering steps textually but also repeating them in a demonstration, to emphasize the importance of techniques throughout the experiment. It was found that students often paid the most attention during these periods, as they would later have to repeat that part of the lesson themselves. However, several problems made themselves known. More often than not, due to the positioning of equipment, lecturers would end up blocking their student’s views of the apparatus, preventing them from effectively making note of important techniques demonstrated by the lecturer. Even if students were able to get a good vantage point, they inevitably found themselves blocking the fields of view of other students positioned behind them. This was to be expected, as laboratory classes often had up to 35 students in a constrained laboratory space (5). There have been attempted solutions to these problems, chief among them the recording of experiments taken from the perspective of an on-looker (6–8). However, the person who records and edits the video is not likely to be chemistry101

trained and, as a result, might not mirror the lecturer’s emphasis on technique throughout the experiment. This results in a focus on apparatus or parts of the experiment that might not be as important. Furthermore, the videos are filmed from the third-person view, which means that students who witness the demonstrator from an orthogonal outlook may experience a completely different vista when they conduct the experiments individually. In order to address these problems, attempts were made to adopt a solution engineered by the gaming industry in the form of “first person shooters”, where gamers play from the perspective of a character in the game. Research has shown the benefits of this “reel vs real” experience, which are evident with first-person shooter (FPS) video games whose players have shown improvements in brain functions, such as cognitive abilities and learning skills (9, 10). In a 2006 study conducted by Green and Bavelier, nine nongamers played Medal of Honor: Allied Assault for one hour per day for 10 days, while eight nongamers played Tetris for the same span. By training with the military shooter for less than 2 weeks, the nongamers were able to improve their scores on three tests of visual attention, a skill that is vital for activities such as reading and driving (11). This approach was adapted to chemistry education through pioneering the use of Instructor’s Point Of View (IPOV) videos. Through these videos, learners could relate much better with the subject matter. They were also more aware of where to pay special attention during the practical set-up, and as they could see through the lens of the lecturer. Applying this reasoning, a trial video shoot was conducted using the GoPro camera for the module CM2191 Experiments in Chemistry 2, which encompasses experiments in organic and inorganic syntheses. The GoPro camera is an action camera that rose to fame due to its ability to deliver unorthodox angles of video recording. This was due in part to its diminutive size; GoPro devices measure in at a small 60 mm × 40 mm × 20 mm and weigh only 76 g. As a result, the camera can be positioned in many unique ways, such as on various body parts, to obtain a unique perspective for recording video (12–14). In its infancy, GoPro was patronised mostly by adventurists and sports enthusiasts who valued the devices for their robustness and sturdiness. While there are many sample videos on GoPro’s website, none are specifically targeted at chemistry laboratory education (5). While filming the IPOV videos, two GoPro cameras were used: one strapped on the lecturer’s forehead and the other on their chest (figure 1). In the proceeding paragraphs, the applications of GoPro cameras in relation to laboratory teaching will be explained. Because many learners in the CM2191 module still have only an introductory understanding of chemistry experimentation, the IPOV videos were used to orientate students with the laboratory environment. It was found that this helped to facilitate learning during chemistry practical lessons and minimized students’ apprehension when they were presented with new facilities or apparatus. The videos recorded were used to provide a very thorough orientation on the steps that should be undertaken during the setup of a new reaction. This included, but was not limited to, the positioning of specific glassware and the steps and sequences of fitting parts of apparatus. 102

Figure 1. The demonstrator having two GoPro cameras strapped on his forehead and chest (left); the instructor wore a GoPro camera on his chest during the filming of an IPOV video (right).

While presenting what was expected of students through the IPOV, the lecturer was able to articulate a more cohesive understanding of the experiment, and helped students to process new practical knowledge. This potentially helped students to remember the procedure more clearly, as they fervently viewed the demonstration as if they themselves were carrying out the experiment. This newfound awareness was able to empower learners with an intimate knowledge of the experimental setup, but more importantly, with the confidence to perform new synthesis of chemicals. This added conviction also helped to mitigate any potential hiccups and incidents (15). Besides an added efficacy of instruction, there are other tangible benefits of using GoPro devices to capture FPS videos of experiments in the laboratory. For example, when recording an instructional video to guide students in the use of the Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectrometer, a three-pronged simultaneous view was adopted at a certain stage of the video. This meant that, while the conventional third-person camera angle was used to film the procedures at a distance from the demonstrator and the spectrometer, the demonstrator was also affixed with a camera strapped to the forehead and another strapped to the chest. Most modern scientific instruments tend to be expensive and fragile, and only allow space for one person at a time to load samples. As a result, when a third party is recording the procedure, there is the added complication of the demonstrator having inadequate space to conduct the experiment. It is of the utmost importance that the cameraman does not stand beside the demonstrator while the latter is making use of the machinery. If proper care is not taken and the machine is damaged, the replacement cost of defective parts would certainly 103

be immense. Through the alternative angles made possible by the GoPro device, viewers were able to know first-hand what they were expected to observe. Additionally, they could pay extra attention to the procedure, thereby minimizing faults and any potential malfunctioning of the equipment. During the first recording, both cameras were strapped on to the lecturer’s body while an experiment on the synthesis of a fragrance was performed. It was a unique experience and required practice to refrain from shaking or moving too quickly. It also required the lecturer to be physically aware of the above-the-eye camera, as the device itself is very light. As for the camera that was strapped to the chest, it felt like there was a compact and snug safety jacket on the lecturer’s body. Other than that, one’s physical movements were not restricted by the devices at all. During post-processing of the video files after the end of the experiment, two issues were noted with respect to the image capture. First, as the lecturer stood relatively tall at 6 ft, the forehead camera was only able to capture the upper part of the experimental setup. In other words, instead of capturing the view from the person’s entire head, the image produced was from the level of their nose and above. Second, the chest camera only managed to capture the desired part of the experimental setup when they were seated on a lab stool. The latter problem could be rectified, however, if a demonstrator were to stand in front of the fume hood and work on their setup. As for the former, the camera could simply be adjusted to a better angle based on the height of the demonstrator. In addition, the demonstrator is not necessarily always cognizant of the stray images that affect the captured video. For instance, if a demonstrator transfers solutions in a fume hood while bending down, the camera on their chest would end up filming their feet and shoes together with the lower cabinet of the fume hood. None of the pertinent steps from the procedure would be captured by this camera during these moments unless special care is taken to avoid the problem. In addition, if the demonstrator were to turn their head too quickly, videos recorded on the forehead-mounted camera could end up looking blurry due to the nature of recording video at lower frames per second. To capture clearer video images using the camera on one’s head, one must consciously slow down and minimize head movements (15). The new element where a student can observe a scientific experiment through the demonstrators’ eyes is both interesting and captivating. While there may be a loss in video resolution with this method, instructors and students who have participated in the GoPro FPS learning activity found this new technique to be a useful tool in enhancing their knowledge and understanding of scientific experiments. By incorporating a combination of all three types of camera modes (first-person, second-person, and third-person) as well as making full use of the FPS technique with GoPro devices, instructors are able to break out of their narrow field of vision and, in the process, makes the learning process in the laboratory more invigorating. However, the novelty of this method together with the problems that it presented meant that there was still a need to find a more effective method of recording IPOV videos. The new method needed to resolve the GoPro’s issues of poor angling of the pivot and the inability to observe a live preview of the recorded video. 104

Google Glass Google Glass and Livestream IPOV videos were the tools used to solve the problems associated with the GoPro IPOV videos. Google Glass is a unique pair of eyeglasses designed with a head mounted display and ultrahigh technology (14, 16, 17). It is also able to perform web searches using the Internet, as well as other internet-enabled queries, such as determining the directions to a desired destination (12, 16, 17). In addition, it is able to film live videos with a resolution of 720 p and capture photos with 5-megapixel resolution. This device weighs a mere 43 g, making at lighter than even the GoPro, which means that the wearer is unlikely to feel the presence of the Google Glass on their head. Its best-selling point would likely be the incorporation of voice command technology, which enables a user to record a video by speaking the command aloud without the need to press any buttons. This is especially useful in situations where a user’s arms might be otherwise preoccupied. Google Glass has been used in a variety of situations, such as the filming of live surgery for use in medical training (12, 17). As mentioned earlier, there were several ways to improve IPOV videos filmed with GoPro cameras. Making use of Google Glass ostensibly solves many of them. For example, one of the challenges experienced with the GoPro approach was an inability to correctly angle the cameras that were attached to the chest or the forehead (15). Using Google Glass would eliminate this problem because the camera lens is positioned next to the pupil of the right eye (figure 2). Livestream is an application (app) which enables a user with a smart phone or smart device, such as Google Glass, to broadcast their video in real time. The live video is then able to be viewed from anywhere with Internet access, with a 20 s delay (18). Using this app, live footage of various reaction changes observed by students was recorded. These IPOV videos were made available for students to revisit after the lab classes to see what other classmates had observed in the same experiment. The use of IPOV videos for lab teaching was conducted over two consecutive semesters for the same cohort of 158 students. There were 65 and 93 students in semesters 1 and 2, respectively. On top of viewing IPOV videos as preparatory work, the class of 93 students in semester 2 was asked to download the free Livestream app. During the onset of every lab session, they could choose to open the app and watch live IPOV videos recorded by the lecturer (18). The live footage available for viewing was either a demonstration of the setup of apparatus or a commentary on incorrect operations observed by the lecturer in the laboratory. The IPOV technical videos were delivered to students using the National University of Singapore’s learning management system, the Integrated Virtual Learning Environment (IVLE), for viewing prior to attending the laboratory session. The students were given at least one week to learn and explore the experimental techniques from the videos before the actual practical. A voluntary questionnaire pertaining to their opinions on the IPOV videos was conducted. In the class of 93 students (semester 2), 61 responded to an anonymous perception survey on IPOV videos (response rate: 66%). This voluntary survey was conducted at the end of the second semester (18). Because this module is 105

free of practical exams, students are assessed purely by their performance in laboratory work and quizzes on techniques in viva voce and on a written test. In the survey, 86.9% (strongly agree and agree) found that the use of Livestream, where they watch live views from IPOV videos, increased their confidence in conducting the experiments. Additionally, 90.2% (strongly agree and agree) of the respondents answered that they were more eager to try the experiments after watching the IPOV videos. More significantly, 88.5% (strongly agree and agree) of them affrmed that the IPOV videos improved their ability to operate the instruments and machines in the actual laboratory. Interestingly, only 67.2% of the respondents recommend live IPOV in laboratory teaching. This might be linked to the statement where 14.8% of the respondents felt that the use of Livestream affected their concentration in the lab. On further investigation, it was found that connectivity to the Internet using wifi was poor in the lab, and students might have eschewed using data from their own mobile plans to watch the videos. Yet the students were fully aware that a communal TV was installed to allow them to watch the IPOV videos freely.

Figure 2. The instructor wears the Google Glass in filming IPOV videos. The device has the camera lens positioned next to the pupil of his right eye.

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The findings from the questionnaire underscore that students indeed benefited from watching the IPOV mode videos in general. Based on data obtained from the IVLE, it was found that more than 80% of the students watched the same video on more than one occasion. In fact, the highest record of viewership of a single video was eight times. In the feedback gathered, there were a number of positive comments on the IPOV videos (18). Most of them centered on how the videos aided students in understanding content due to the ability to follow experiments at their own pace. Other comments praised the technical quality and resolution of the video recordings as well as the clarity of the accompanying audio; images were well-defined and non-pixelated. In addition, the chief shortcoming of the GoPro IPOV videos was overcome. The experiment was captured in its entirety and no parts of the instrumentation and glassware setup were missed. An added benefit was that the demonstrator did not have to manipulate the device by hand; they only needed to enunciate the commands aloud. The university-wide eLearning Week provided yet another example of how the online IPOV videos were beneficial to learning. Since laboratory sessions are traditionally cancelled during this week due to logistical difficulties, the IPOV videos enabled lecturers to continue practical instruction outside the laboratory. Using the technologically advanced eyewear, the instructor could record the live practical session, allowing students to see through the teacher’s lens (15, 18). In the process, they learned from the demonstrator’s live experiment and were thus able to write a report on any observations seen. Using Google Glass to conduct live lab demonstration in tandem with Livestream eliminates the aforementioned problems faced by lab instructors and students. One disadvantage of Google Glass is that the tiny lithium ion battery, housed on the right side of the device frame, heats up very quickly. As a result, the demonstrator can feel the extra warmth arising from the battery at his right temple. This heat can be felt within just half an hour of filming and cause discomfort. This limits the use of Google Glass indoors as the device’s exposure to the sun may cause the battery to heat up even faster. Another drawback to the use of Google Glass is that, due to poor internet connectivity, some students had to spend additional time rewatching footage. Lightboard Making IPOV videos using Google Glass and GoPro devices addressed a specific set of problems faced in aforementioned pedagogical efforts. However, there were still challenges that remained unsolved by the implementation of IPOV videos. The first problem faced was that large classes are accompanied by an increase in common classroom distractions and in-class questions, which disrupt the flow of the lectures, making it difficult for students to achieve learning outcomes (19, 20). Second, instructor-facilitated problem solving performed during class is the most effective way to learn organic chemistry, but is performed at the expense of content coverage (21–25). In view of these disadvantages of conventional lecture-based teaching, a suitable alternative was developed to ameliorate the flow of the class. 107

The Lightboard is a set of lecture recording tools that involve the production of high-quality videos, where the presenter both faces the audience and writes on a glass board as they would in a regular class (figure 3). It confers several advantages over typical flipped classroom videos and conventional classroom teaching.

Figure 3. Traditional method of recorded teaching on the whiteboard (top); alternative method of recording using the lightboard (bottom). One of the main advantages of Lightboard videos is that students gain an unobstructed view of the lecturer, who simultaneously faces the audience and presents on a glass board (26). This is particularly useful in the STEM fields, where lecturers can often benefit by complementing verbal explanations with accompanying equations or diagrams (1, 2, 27). This can be done without any of the interruptions that they might face in a conventional classroom (e.g., questions) or having to face away from the audience as they turn to draw on the whiteboard. 108

Furthermore, illustrations and diagrams can be digitally added by a computer over a Lightboard screen using post-processing. These features allow for a dynamic and engaging way to concisely convey information. Arguably, Lightboard videos are less logistically demanding than expected. The videos are recorded and disseminated immediately without the need for postprocessing or the ability to write backward. This is achieved using a simple setup comprising a glass board, lighting equipment, a video-recording device, and a mirror that laterally inverts the image. The choice was made to implement a system involving the delivery of Lightboard videos through online media in the course CM1401: Chemistry for Life Sciences. This is an introductory course covering basic organic chemistry at the National University of Singapore. The course material is based on the much-celebrated McMurry text and is largely aimed at biology majors in their first year of study. Flipped classroom video lectures for CM1401 were provided as PowerPoint voice-overs that lasted up to 40 minutes per video. Students found the videos to be useful for learning because they could be rewatched any time, as opposed to live lectures. However, the length of these videos might have exceeded the attention span of most students. General criticism of these lecture videos centered on their length and content. Many students perceived the videos to be too long, thought that the voice-overs were “reading words off the slides” rather than teaching, and felt that they could have learned the material without watching the videos. Additional feedback suggested that the students would prefer shorter and more succinct “Khan Academy”-style videos, which primarily feature drawings on an electronic blackboard (26, 28). Indeed, research findings from Guo, Kim, and Rubin show that shorter videos, Khan-style tablet drawings, and “talking head” videos showing the face of the lecturer make for more engaging video content (28). Efforts were subsequently made to enhance student engagement in the PowerPoint-based lectures by including an inset video of the lecturer speaking, and surprises like blanking out content from the student copy of the lecture material. Ultimately, these solutions were still based on the PowerPoint voice-over format and often required considerable amounts of postproduction. In view of the feedback given for previous lecture videos of CM1401, several Lightboard videos were prepared to supplement existing lecture videos. We found the Lightboard format easier to create than the existing PowerPoint voice-overs used in the module because the recordings were performed in the studio without the need for additional editing software. Furthermore, the final video footage featured elements that both students and lecturers wanted: primarily the Khan-style video format with eye contact from the lecturer. Despite the advantages of the Lightboard format, we faced two difficulties in the filming process. First, chirality cannot be explained without using physical model kits because of lateral inversion (26). Figure 4 shows the specific example of (S)-bromochloroiodomethane that we attempted to present in our Lightboard videos. There was an inversion of stereochemistry of the physical prop from S to R due in the final video. A simple workaround is to draw on the board rather than use physical model kits when stereochemistry is concerned because the image is laterally inverted twice, unlike the physical model. Second, the contents of the 109

lecture have to be planned meticulously because the entire video has to be recorded in one sitting to avoid jarring breaks and the need for postprocessing.

Figure 4. Illustration of limitations when presenting chirality on the Lightboard using a drawing (top) and a physical model (bottom) of (S)-bromochloroiodomethane. In the drawing, the image is laterally inverted twice. The S center is therefore correctly represented in the video footage. However, the physical model is only inverted through the mirror and thus appears as the R enantiomer in the video footage.

Discussion EdTech in Chemistry The methods discussed above are by no means an exhaustive list of the different ways in which emerging technologies can be applied to chemistry education. In fact, various organizations have been making use of technologies to do just that. One such example would be SchellGames, which has developed a virtual reality (VR) game called SuperChem VR that allows students to carry out chemical experiments using a virtual reality headset. Together with the United States Department of Education and the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program, SchellGames has created a virtual landscape which allows students to explore various chemical concepts without having to be in a physical laboratory (29). There are several benefits to this approach. The first would be the cost savings, as no capital has to be spent on the purchase of chemical reagents or the upkeep of apparatus. These savings can subsequently be transferred to other programs which 110

could benefit the education of budding chemists. The positive economic aspect is of pertinent salience to countries with more difficulties in purchasing chemicals due to international policies and inadequate transport infrastructures. The second would be the improvement of the safety of students in the laboratory. As students are not actually exposed to chemical reactions that could potentially produce toxic byproducts, they are able to experience a wider range of chemical experiments and can potentially be engaged to a greater extent in the concepts that they have been taught. During epidemics where there is an outbreak of deadly virus, schoolchildren would be quarantined and classes postponed. Flipped classroom and online tutorials would be able to replace some of the missing lectures, while VR games could overcome the issue of missing lab sessions. However, while such tools can be incredibly useful in the education of new, budding chemists in a high school setting, they may be less applicable in tertiary institutions. Indeed, it is important for students to be intimately familiar with the physical chemical apparatus of which they will be making extensive use, and it is currently unclear how well virtual reality is able to simulate real, physical conditions. Furthermore, the safety of the virtual world may encourage complacency with regards to the treatment of safety in the actual laboratory. This is because students may not fully transfer their understanding of safety risks to physical experiments and hence be more lackadaisical with regards to safety procedures. With no proper exposure to the potential risks of certain chemical reactions, students may also lack the incentive to assess risk accurately and practice proper lab safety techniques. New Applications There are new and exciting technologies that could potentially help to improve pedagogical efforts in the field of chemistry. The first would be the advent of machine learning algorithms that are versatile and can be applied to a wide variety of situations. For instance, it would be possible to create an online repository of different media used in chemistry education, examples being IPOV videos as well as chemistry games. Students could then be quizzed before and after they are exposed to different kinds of media, to test the students’ improvement in understanding across the various media platforms. The algorithm could then potentially identify which medium is the most effective in improving the student’s understanding of chemical concepts and subsequently direct them to similar kinds of virtual tools. This is similar to recommendation systems in online platforms like Amazon and Netflix, which refer users to recommended media based on the content they have already consumed. The second would be the increase in the number of unique wearables. While VR headsets are currently the topic of mainstream discussion, it is also joined by its marginally less renowned cousin, Augmented Reality (AR). Headsets such as Microsoft’s HoloLens and the Laforge Shima make use of head-mounted transparent displays that overlay information onto a user’s visual field of view. This could be used in a way similar to SuperChemVR’s use of virtual reality. Students carrying out chemical experiments could use the AR headsets to identify 111

potential safety risks, or the chemicals and apparatus that they require. This could help introduce students to new chemical equipment and reagents whilst at the same time offering the same kind of exposure to the physical conditions of the real world.

Future Work & Concluding Remarks In the preceding sections, I have documented my exploration journey experimenting as an EdTech chemistry educator in the past 5 years. I believe that the rapid advancement of higher technology will carry the future of education to greater heights in visualization and realistic IPOV teaching. The way forward could even be realized at present with the invention of 360 cameras, hardware in mixed reality, virtual reality, and augmented reality. This quantum leap in EdTech will be an exciting path for like-minded educators who are prescient in harnessing technology to educate students from our hearts.

Acknowledgments The authors are grateful to the Office of the Provost, Dean’s Office at the NUS Faculty of Science, and the Department of Chemistry for supporting the EdTech project and their leadership towards Technology-Enabled Blended Learning Experience (TEBLE).

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Chapter 7

Establishing an Instructor YouTube Channel as an Open Educational Resource (OER) Supplementing General and Organic Chemistry Courses Douglas M. Jackson* Department of Chemistry, University of Georgia, 140 Cedar Street, Athens, Georgia 30602, United States *E-mail: [email protected]

The motivations, technical challenges, best practices, and benefits to students are reported here for the implementation of a supplemental YouTube channel for general and organic chemistry courses at the University of Georgia. A course video library has the advantages of reinforcing lecture material and providing expert guidance through "video keys" of practice problem sets. By producing the videos in-house, the content is guaranteed accurate and reliable to both the instructor and students. A concisely targeted 5-15 min video can be published to the web needing only a simple tablet computing device, freely available video editing software, and a 30-minute block of time in a day’s schedule. YouTube offers a dynamic medium for the delivery and reinforcement of video educational content outside of the traditional classroom environment. Content is easily uploaded, organized, and universally accessible in all mobile and pc formats, with statistics of usage logged. Students at the University of Georgia praise the convenience and reliability and are also highly engaged in the medium, tallying over 100,000 views per year.

© 2017 American Chemical Society

How To Optimize Limited Student-Instructor Contact As chemistry instructors, often in large lecture environments, we have very limited interaction with our students. Assuming students can be coaxed into attending every lecture, we hope to have their undivided attention for at least 50 minutes, three times per week. Unfortunately, many students do not take full advantage of these contact hours, and the distractions of social media and constant downloaded content to mobile devices prove to sufficiently distract even the most loyal attendees. Office hours provide additional opportunity for interaction with students, but a small percentage of students take advantage on a consistent basis, if at all. In my personal experience, offering virtual office hours via a virtual whiteboard service does not increase engagement appreciably without making the interaction a participation-type grade. Mandatory office hours are manageable for smaller course loads but prove impossible for student totals rising into the many hundreds, as are common for freshman and sophomore chemistry courses at many universities. While teaching assistant (TA) breakout sessions are an option in some departments, many factors limit this approach including scheduling, credit hour limits, TA workload limits, and individual TA abilities. Ultimately, even with this approach the student is still interacting with an amateur resource and not an expert in the field. With such limits on live interaction, learning management systems (LMSs) provide a virtual means of communication and organization that directly link students to faculty communications and course materials. Most LMSs aggregate course links, files, grades, and announcements into a common location, facilitating student engagement through convenience. Commonly, it is also possible to integrate assignments, modules, and course videos, allowing automated grading and engagement statistics to be kept. The upload of course video lectures or modules is of interest in the last decade as the “flipped” chemistry classroom has gained popularity (1–5). In the flipped classroom, students receive “lecture” or content exposure outside of the classroom and before attending the class session where the content is to be first assessed. Students then work problems ranging from introductory to advanced in class where the instructor is available to provide expert feedback. While the number of hours of one-on-one contact remains the same, the quality of that interaction increases markedly. In flipping the chemistry classroom, course videos have played a major role in a few key ways. Flipping lecture has seen an evolution from video cameras “taping” live chalk-talk lectures, to document cameras recording the handwriting and voice of an instructor, to more modern computer enabled technologies, like screen capture of a tablet or 2-in-1 computer (6). A more involved but very personal method called “Lightboard” has been described, which allows the instructor to face students while writing on a digitally inverted clear board (7, 8). In addition to recording lecture content, video keys of exams or other assessments have also been well received by students (9). Rather than posting a static pdf file of a key to the LMS, students can watch and hear their instructor work through the problem at their pace and convenience. Others have also flipped the course laboratory component and more dangerous or complicated demonstrations to 116

course videos (10, 11). First person technologies such as “Google Glass” (12) and “Go Pro” (13) have been used to this effect as well. A major limitation to the effectiveness of flipped classroom content and especially course videos has been the student interface with these resources. Traditionally, posting the videos to the LMS is advantageous from an organizational standpoint; however, students are interfacing with the LMS less and less from traditional personal computers and are instead using mobile browsers. In many cases, LMSs do not have mobile optimized web pages, or at least the experience is browser dependent. Additionally, the necessary authentication process is often a hassle on a mobile device. An alternate approach is to design a mobile app or web-optimized course website to facilitate ease of use for the modern student. The current popularity of Android and iOS devices would require development of at least 2 independent apps as well as a webpage to caretake the few students not in possession of these devices. Design services for apps and websites have become much more affordable in recent years, but with yearly maintenance services, technology upgrade cycles, and increased costs of web security, academics and their departments often find custom solutions out of reach. Students also find these custom sites and apps fragmenting to their experience, with the class having the LMS and often a separate system for homework or ebook interface.

YouTube as a Platform for Delivery of Course Content Videos provided to the students through a course YouTube channel, as demonstrated in Figure 1, provide an integrated and streamlined experience for students in this era of mobile technology in chemistry education. Technology is always in flux, and we as instructors best meet the students in a format with which they are already familiar. YouTube currently has over 1 billion users, roughly 1/3 of all people on the internet. Currently, over 95% of all internet users are exposed to the platform (14). Under the ownership umbrella of technology giant Alphabet, Inc, parent company of Google, YouTube is kept current in all major mobile operating systems and web platforms. Students need merely bookmark or subscribe to the course channel to get instant updates and access. Accessibility is also enhanced as YouTube provides an easy-to-use, self-contained closed captioning platform that allows for type-as-you-listen captioning, as seen in Figure 2. It should be noted that while auto captioning is also supported, the current system struggles with discipline-specific jargon. The use of YouTube in chemical education has been documented in the chemical education literature in several applications. Early adopters have delivered targeted lessons in general chemistry for topics such as solubility rules (15) or lattice energy (16). Others promote the wonders of science, such as the now celebrity creators of Periodic Table Online Videos (17). Some more talented and creative chemistry instructors have a channel dedicated to teaching chemical concepts through interpretive dance (18)! In the past few years, several 117

publications have documented the use of YouTube (1, 2, 4, 8, 9, 19) and LMS videos in flipping the general and organic chemistry courses, though these were channels closed to public viewing. Other excellent educational synopses on using YouTube in the college classroom in general have been published as well (20–23).

Figure 1. The homepage of the “Dr Jackson UGA Chemistry” YouTube channel. The activity feed shows last posted videos and tabs allow navigation to course playlists or specific videos.

Figure 2. The “type-as-you-listen” closed captioning utility is straightforward and automatically syncs text to voice.

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YouTube as an Open Educational Resource In 2013, the University of Georgia began an initiative to encourage the production and use of open educational resources (OERs) (24–26) to both reduce course related costs to students, and to create a digital footprint for University of Georgia as a resource for OER materials. OERs, as defined by the University of Georgia Center for Teaching and Learning (CTL) (27), are “teaching, learning, and research resources that can be freely retained, reused, revised, remixed and redistributed”. According to internal CTL research, through use of OERs in place of traditional resources, students at the University of Georgia have saved an estimated $2.7 million as of summer semester 2017. One of the key steps for the adoption of existing OERs for a course is the vetting of available resources. A quick search on the YouTube homepage will reveal hundreds, if not thousands, of videos from amateur tutors and professional educators around the world. While there is no independent peer review for publication to YouTube, the “likes” and viewership totals give some idea into the efficacy of a lesson. These very same data can be misleading, however, as many videos that I scanned prior to making my own channel were very popular, yet rife with errors, or presented in a style more concerned with getting an answer algorithmically, rather than understanding important concepts and problem solving. The availability of OERs for organic chemistry were particularly limited during my first semester of teaching the course. I made the decision to create my own YouTube channel in response to this void of available content. Since this time, mobile technology and internet proliferation of OER’s continues to advance. Chemical education has entered an era of explosive growth in open virtual content. As chemical educators, we would all do well to create a digital OER footprint in a most versatile and supported platform such as YouTube as early as possible if we are to be influential in this revolution.

How To Build an Instructor YouTube Channel The most daunting task for building a YouTube channel is posting the first video. While there are many considerations, both technical and content related, the process can be simplified into a few easy steps: prepping the technology, recording the lesson, editing and rendering the raw video, and uploading the finished product to a playlist. Pushing through and uploading the first video will allow you to learn by doing, rather than trying to be too perfect the first time. If you are unsatisfied with this upload, you can polish up your approach for future videos. Many successful channels approach these criteria from different perspectives; however, I will discuss the approach used for my classes to lay the groundwork for later discussion and provide a starting point for those interested in getting a quick start.

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Prepping the Technology First, decide on a recording solution appropriate for your goals. In flipping the lecture or producing a problem set video key, I find that the video recordings are most easily produced via screen recording software on a pen-enabled touch screen computer. This technology allows you to have a mobile studio on campus or on the go. It also allows for prep-to-post all in one sitting, on one device. When purchasing the proper touch screen computer, to ensure inking accuracy, it has traditionally been very important to ensure an “active digitizer” screen accompanies such a computer rather than merely a capacitive touch screen. However, as technologies progress, many current active pens (sharp tips, not rounded felt tips) suffice in the absence of such a screen. Try before you buy is of the essence. I have for nearly 10 years used Fujitsu T-series tablet computers to support my online courses and flipped classroom videos. As of this writing, however, many options have now become commercially available with the advent of Windows Ink software and hardware. I have used Cyberlink Screen Recorder as part of the Cyberlink PowerDirector editing suite only because the software came with the purchase of my Fujitsu Tablet series computer many years ago. Free options are available, usually disallowing direct production of a streamable file without a purchased upgrade; however, the Power Director package is relatively inexpensive and has everything needed. In preparation to utilize screen recording software, it is advantageous to outline the lesson on a notetaking software such as Microsoft OneNote. Recording the First Lesson Use the option within the recorder software to only record the portion of the screen where the notes are located in the digital page, eliminating toolbars and personal effects from view. Also, be sure the lesson is recorded in sufficient resolution at a 16x9 aspect ratio for streaming (most programs will suggest this automatically and YouTube automatically adjusts files outside of this range to fair results). I upload to YouTube as 640x360 as the final upload resolution to save storage space and processing time, but often record in higher resolution to fit the space in which I am writing on the screen, as seen in Figure 3. New high-resolution tablets may be set to less than native resolution if you are finding file sizes are too large when recording your writing space. Through experience and data from the channel statistics, I have found that shorter targeted modules of about 5-10 min or less are best. For example, if the textbook chapter covers 10 reactions of alkenes, student engagement is better for 10 separate alkene videos in the 5-10 min range, rather than three full 50minute lectures. The goal is to provide the students with the flow of a brisk lesson emphasizing the problem-solving aspects of notes. Note that while figures and headings are previously prepared, space is provided to work problems, and one may certainly annotate the figures with a digital pen. Separating the lessons also allows you to “tag” the videos very specifically so students may search for exactly what they are looking for within the YouTube interface. However, it is possible to subdivide the final video file to accomplish the same effect, if desired. 120

Figure 3. A screen capture program such as Cyberlink Screen Recorder should allow selection of only the portion of the screen appropriate for student viewing. Note that the resolution recorded may not match the final upload resolution but should be locked to 16:9 and be no less than the final upload resolution. The pictured lesson was prepared in OneNote.

Editing and Rendering the Raw Video Storyboard style video editing software is used to modify the raw recording into a professional and uploadable final product. When preparing course videos, perfection is certainly the enemy of progress. In general, it is best to fix simple mistakes with a live “excuse me, let me fix that” just as if in lecture. Starting over in search of the perfect take will cost precious time and make the experience quite untenable. Sometimes, however, we will make major mistakes that simply cannot be present in the final video production. With editing software, it’s possible to record a short correction and splice it into the original video while also excising the mistake, again without starting over. Additionally, within this type of software it is possible to split the video takes into separate files, or insert digital effects such as a watermarking, titles, foreground text, and background music. An example workspace of storyboard editing software is seen in Figure 4. It may also be necessary to convert a produced file to a streamable form. In general, .mp4 or .m4v file encoding is currently best for streamable formats, including YouTube, but they also ensure student device compatibility within the LMS. These formats are most broadly streamable, meaning you don’t have to worry whether or not some students will have difficulty opening the videos. Most likely, your software can export directly to the formats, but if not (like many of the free options), Handbrake is a widely used and free open-source software that can do the conversion. 121

Figure 4. Raw video files are imported to the top left of the PowerDirector workspace, then dragged and dropped into the production space along the bottom of the screen. Clips may be merged, edited, or split, then previewed in the top right view window.

Uploading to the Course YouTube Channel Now that the upload file of the course video has been created, the final step in the process is uploading the video to the course YouTube channel. I teach 7 different courses spanning general chemistry and organic chemistry, so I further organize my videos into playlists by course and unit. For example, “CHEM 2211 Exam 1 Material” and the previous semester’s “CHEM 2211 Exam 1 Video Key” are easily identified by my first semester sophomore organic chemistry students, as seen in Figure 5. Students can add the videos to their own playlists or subscribe to everything for that unit all at once. The actual upload process is begun by a simple drag and drop from your file folder. You should then carefully describe each video as succinctly as possible with your students in mind, but also the internet at large if you are choosing to make your channel an OER. Proper keyword tagging is also a must to help students get to exactly what they need. After a minute or two, YouTube will process the file and provide you with a suggested still frame portrait for your video, which can be used or changed. Closed captioning can also be added at this time, either before or after bringing the video live. Over time, interfaces will undoubtedly change as features are modified and added; however, the overall process remains fairly consistent.

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Figure 5. Playlist organization allows one channel for all courses taught. Careful naming of the playlists allows for course and unit differentiation.

Student Engagement and Analytics of the Open Channel After being dissatisfied with student engagement in course videos within the University of Georgia course LMS, I settled upon YouTube to host course videos in March of 2015, while teaching in my first semester as a faculty member. To date, videos have accumulated over 200,000 views, averaging over 100,000 views per year. This is a bit misleading, as the growth has been somewhat exponential due to making the channel (28) a public OER. The statistics kept by YouTube in the “Analytics” tab allow for detailed analysis of who’s viewing what, when, and how they are viewing. Even the plots given in the following figures are automatically generated by YouTube. It is quite the collection of tools.

Total Viewership For example, let’s investigate lifetime total “views” within the first portion of the analytics view, shown in Figure 6. A line graph is automatically displayed showing the viewership over time in both minutes viewed, as well as number of views. Note that the spikes in viewership align with cramming for the 4 hourly exams and the final exam on the course calendar! Engagement is also monitored by one of several other usage statistics. For example I have 803 “likes” to 59 “dislikes”, 475 shares by viewers, and course videos have been added to 1,298 external playlists. A curious but encouraging trend develops as time progresses, in that the exam spikes are widening over time, which would indicate improving study habits. But how can we be sure that the trend observed is from my course, given that the channel is an OER?

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Figure 6. A partial overview of the channel Analytics tab, showing lifetime engagement data from all sources. Note the spikes correspond to exam dates.

Who Is Watching? Not only does the instructor have the ability to see how many are watching, but we can see demographic data for who is watching as well. YouTube has tools to track who’s watching via the IP addresses and location data of streamed videos. When using the geography tool, a world “heat” map and table is automatically generated to show concentration of viewership by country. I can see that the USA accounts for only 64% of my current viewership in the last 90 days. Clicking on the USA on the map, I can see a state-by-state breakdown, where the State of Georgia, home to the University of Georgia, accounts for 57% of total viewership in this same period. For comparison, if I change the time window to the first 90 days of the channel, the USA accounted for 98% of total viewership and the state of Georgia 85%. As demonstrated in Figure 7, I can filter all viewing sources except the State of Georgia from my lifetime channel view counts and virtually eliminate the background views.

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Figure 7. Expanded lifetime view totals from all sources (top) vs. results filtered to include just the State of Georgia. The background viewership is largely removed.

I can now investigate to see how study habits have changed since the course channel has become established. Figure 8 illustrates how viewership has changed for exam 2 of first semester organic chemistry from the Fall 2015 and Fall 2016 semesters. The exam is largely consistent in material covered for each semester, with the only difference being that the Fall 2015 course was not emphasized as a “flipped” classroom model. Since that time, I have partially flipped courses in which in-class clicker questions enforce advanced reading. Note the Fall 2016 course shows 16 additional days of advanced viewing, with some days reaching into the hundreds of views. Also, note the excellent baseline after exam day, further indicating the removal of background views even within the State of Georgia.

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Figure 8. Viewership data from Fall 2015 and Fall 2016 first semester organic chemistry, highlighting the days near exam 2 for first semester organic chemistry. The influence of partial course flipping and further establishment of the channel appear to significantly improve engagement.

It is also possible to differentiate the viewership of one course from another. For example, Figure 9 illustrates the convoluted total viewership data from my Spring 2017 teaching schedule, containing two sections of first semester organic chemistry and one section of first semester general chemistry. By filtering the results by course playlist, the data in Figure 9 show excellent resolution of the two classes. Age and gender demographics are also kept for registered YouTube users, and easily accessed via automatic plotting, as shown in Figure 10. Understandably, the largest demographic of viewers (64%) are college age (18-24 years old). In that range, 62% of viewers are female to 38% male. For comparison, 57% of the student body currently at the University of Georgia is female, indicating the desired lack of gender bias for the channel. Averaging the older and younger demographics yields a total viewership of 51% female and 49% male over the lifetime of the channel. Age and gender data are self-reported to both the University of Georgia and YouTube.

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Figure 9. Total views for a segment of spring semester 2017 (top) can be separated into viewership for first semester organic chemistry (middle) and first semester general chemistry (bottom) by filtering by playlist. *Note: exam 1 was given on the 9th day of the semester for the lower plot.

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Figure 10. Autogenerated age and gender viewership data for registered YouTube users. Videos appear equally utilized among male and female users.

How Are They Watching? With yet more analytical features at the instructor’s disposal, it is very intriguing to look into the usage data by device. Most apps and browsers are encoded to report their identity and device type to websites browsed. This data is readily available via the “Analytics” tab. Very interesting is the comparison of viewership from the first 90 days of the channel to the last 90 days of the channel. Views from my channel homepage make up 99% of all views, while the rest are embedded in other websites by internet users via YouTube’s web developer platform. This has remained consistent and is to be expected; however, the way in which the channel is accessed has changed. In the first 90 days, 15% of viewership came from “suggested videos” from the internet at large, and not direct linking or clicking on the homepage as students in my class would be expected to do. This relatively high initial number for a new channel agrees with the lack of organic chemistry OERs within YouTube in early 2015. Also, 15% external viewership complements the 85% of viewership coming from the state of Georgia during the first 90 days. In the last 90 days, 32% of viewership is coming from “suggested videos”, indicating the rising background of external viewership of the increasingly popular open channel. A breakdown in this manner for device type is also quite interesting and indicative of the way chemical education is becoming a mobile discipline. During the first 90 days of the channel, beginning March 24, 2015, channel view totals as a percentage were 83% personal computer, 11.8% phone, 5% tablet, and 0.2% smart television. In the last 90 days, as shown in Figure 11, the personal computer had dropped to 67%, with mobile phones leaping up to 28% and tablets shrinking to 4% of total views. Smart TV’s and game consoles contributed a combined 1% of total views. This trend will be closely monitored in the future. However, as currently indicated, the need for a mobile platform such as YouTube has never been greater. 128

Figure 11. Total channel views by device type is given for the first 90 days of the channel beginning in March 24, 2015 (top) in comparison to the last 90 days leading up to July 30, 2017 (bottom). A clear shift to mobile phone viewership is observed. What Are They Watching? As an educator, one of the most powerful tools of the channel is to retrieve engagement data for specific topics. Over the lifetime of my channel, I can see that “Interpreting (IR) Infrared Spectra” is the most popular video, with “Mass Spectrometry” not that far behind. Like in-class clicker data, this can give insight as to what students are struggling with in real time. The clicker can give data, such as percent correct for a question before and after a lesson, to indicate preparation or to measure learning while in class. In a flipped classroom model, the viewership of a particular video before class can let the instructor know what students are struggling with so that a plan of action can be prepared ahead of time. For a discipline such as organic chemistry, where online homework engines are somewhat less effective in their current form, this can bring quantitative analysis to a qualitative subject. Along the same line of reasoning, my course video keys are organized with each question getting its own video within a playlist. As seen in Figure 12, the more difficult questions show higher viewership numbers for the key videos. Sometimes this can be unexpected, giving insight into a topic that should be 129

revisited in class. To make sure background viewership is not a factor, this analysis can be done by limiting the window to the previous week of class, for viewership only from the university’s home state.

Figure 12. The video key playlist for first semester organic chemistry gives each question its own video, so that total viewership of the video can give a clue as to which questions gave students the most trouble and can be revisited in class.

Figure 13. Plotted average view duration over time as a daily average. Early videos were longer on average, giving higher spikes, yet the average view duration remains flat near 3.5 minutes.

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Attention span is another category kept in the analytics section. As plotted in Figure 13, the average view duration for the course videos is 3 min 42 sec. Longer videos coax at most about 6 minutes of viewership, whereas the 5-10 minute videos sit right in the 3.5 minute average viewership range. Because of this consistent trend, I have moved to keep my lessons as short and targeted as possible, while still properly covering the topic. Note that the average length of my videos decreases over time, yet the average view duration remains relatively flat.

Student Survey Data After the Fall 2016 semester, the first semester organic chemistry students were given a survey concerning the course channel, using an anonymous Google Form survey. Students reported increased engagement throughout the semester, with 64% using the channel for exam 1, 75% for exam 2, 72% for exam 3, 60% for exam 4, and an encouraging 85% for the final exam. Note that the students get to drop one exam, accounting for the reduced participation in exam 4. Responses to additional questions are summarized in Figure 14. Note almost 90% of students say that the channel was helpful to their exam prep, with 18.8% calling the channel “essential”. Other benefits include the 25% who say that they used the channel to catch up after an absence. One additional question asked in the student survey that I am pressing to get a full picture of is the view by students, educational professionals, and university administration concerning opening the course channel to ad support. From the beginning of my OER channel, I have enabled ad support in hopes of supporting undergraduate teaching and research assistants in our chemistry department, in an era where that support is hard to come by. To date, the channel has amassed over $400 in revenue from total viewership. While we don’t achieve the revenue numbers of a typical internet cat video, this is not an insignificant stipend for a month or two of summer research or teaching assistant support for an undergraduate. The estimate is that, with current viewership, one such opportunity could be funded yearly. Figure 15 gives the latest opinion of students in my class concerning the matter. While no student responded that ads were a deal-breaker, 8.7% said that it would be better without the ads. Ultimately, the students are charged nothing, but the types of ads seen are out of the control of the instructor and university. It remains a gray area until a final consensus can be reached.

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Figure 14. Student survey data from fall semester 2016 first semester organic chemistry students.

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Figure 15. Student survey responses concerning ad-enabling on the course channel

Summary An instructor YouTube channel is a convenient, universal, and engaging technology for the hosting of a personalized course video library in the modern chemistry course. The ease of upload, device compatibility, closed captioning platform, analytical tools, and demonstrated student engagement make YouTube hosting a superior solution for most course video goals. The decision to make the channel private to students within the course or a public OER is retained by the instructor, though subject to YouTube’s user agreement. In the era of rapid information dissemination, I find it unrealistic and disadvantageous to keep the content private. Instead, I have chosen to host an OER for all to use. By making the channel open, after 2 years the channel has gained an increasing online presence from internet viewers at large, currently receiving nearly 35% of over 210,000 channel views from the automated “referred videos” feature. The course has viewers from all 50 US states and 191 countries and territories supported by YouTube worldwide. Many University of Georgia students find the course channel ‘essential’ or ‘helpful’ and convey trust that their instructor is directly producing the videos. Looking ahead to future goals for the channel, in addition to continued development of general and organic chemistry course modules and video keys, I plan to use the new YouTube livestream platform to host review sessions and live office hours, now that the channel has exceeded the 1000 subscriber minimum threshold. Also, the new ability to post an “end of video” interactive slide will allow linking to other videos for more information on a topic. As mobile technology progresses, who knows what will be possible in the near future? However, investing in a platform with solid history and ownership gives the best odds of taking advantage of the most exciting features to come. In conclusion, no matter the size of the course or school, or whether the course is on campus, online, flipped or traditional, YouTube provides a powerful platform that you, the instructor, can use to enhance student engagement in your course. And it is all possible within the current semester, so get started today! 133

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Chapter 8

Online Tools for Teaching Large Laboratory Courses: How the GENI Website Facilitates Authentic Research Benjamin J. McFarland* Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Seattle Pacific University, Seattle, Washington 98119, United States *E-mail: [email protected]

One educational problem that technology can address is how to facilitate authentic research experiences in the classroom for large numbers of students. The collaborative online platform GENI (Guiding Education through Novel Investigation, found at geni-science.org) provides an application that transfers protocols among institutions and into undergraduate teaching laboratories, then collects the data from students for analysis and publication. I have used this tool for several years to conduct bioinformatics research with three or four 16-student lab sections in Biochemistry I and to prepare recombinant proteins with two or three 16-student lab sections in Biochemistry II. These projects also feed into a Survey of Physical Chemistry course. Here I present technical details of how research projects have transitioned into the teaching lab. Others in the GENI consortium have accomplished similar projects in molecular biology and genetics contexts. Education researchers on our team are developing and applying assessments to shape our use of GENI as a tool. Altogether, these show that online lab protocols and data collection can be an effective way to teach students through the creative and exploratory process of asking and answering research questions.

© 2017 American Chemical Society

Introduction Large courses with many lab sections pose particular challenges for the chemistry teacher. One acute challenge is the tension between the value of individual projects in learning science and the limitations of resources in time and funds for accomplishing those projects in the context of a large class composed of students with varied backgrounds and motivations. These authentic research projects, also called Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experiences (CUREs), have been integrated into many different chemistry courses, ranging from general chemistry to analytical chemistry (1–3). CUREs require organized management of information in multiple directions, primarily in providing protocols to the students before an experiment and in collecting data from students after an experiment. The general benefits to providing structured relationships to the undergraduate research experience have been noted (4). This suggests that a course of study that more closely mimics an authentic research experience will teach students more effectively than a standard set of labs in which the instructor already knows the expected outcomes. Here I describe my use of an online tool that facilitates research collaboration in a central location that can be easily transferred and modified. The adjectives “large” (as in “large courses”) and “authentic” (as in “authentic research”) are relative terms that may vary based on the individual institution and instructor. Here “large” is defined relative to student expectations and institutional resources such as teaching load. In this chapter, the tool described is most useful for any situation in which a project is carried out in multiple lab sections, whether they are multiple lab sections offered in the same academic term at one institution, multiple sections offered at multiple institutions, or the same project carried out over multiple academic terms. In all of these cases, the online tool described here can provide standardization of input and output that helps to scale up the project and disseminate protocols and data among multiple sections of students. Many different institutions are implementing authentic research in situations that fall under this definition of large courses. One of the largest collaborations is the Genomics Education Partnership, a consortium of more than 100 institutions that investigated evolution of the Muller F element in undergraduate laboratories, and which developed a central support system of resources tailored to that particular research project (5). The tool described in this chapter was developed to serve as similar, more flexible online resource that could be readily adapted by the individual instructor to match individual needs for conducting diverse projects across multiple sections. Recent examples of CUREs conducting authentic research with multiple lab sections either within or among courses include a systems biology project described as “large-scale” at The University of Queensland with yearly cohorts of 33 and 47 students (6); a project studying zebrafish development in two undergraduate biology laboratory courses at Indiana University-Purdue University (7); and a medicinal chemistry program conducted as an undergraduate capstone experience at multiple small universities (8). For the first two projects, the same project is carried out over multiple years, and for 138

the third, similar projects are carried out at multiple institutions. These are the types of projects that this tool can best facilitate. The precise meaning of the term “authentic” has been discussed since at least the turn of the 21st century (9). Recently, an editorial in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Education (BAMBED) described the current diversity of projects considered to be authentic research in an undergraduate biochemical context (10). I will adopt a similar definition of “authentic” here – one that emphasizes that authentic research is both collaborative and publishable in peer-reviewed journals. The editorial’s authors note the need for a tool that would promote authentic research collaboration: “In BAMBED and other educational journals, examples of single investigator/institution integration of research into the classroom exist, but these examples function in isolation, lacking the collaboration that promotes long-term authentic research evolution and team-based skills. Again, partnerships between institutions can begin to develop these resources, but an organized community effort would be better positioned to provide the variety and depth of projects necessary to sustain CUREs in the biochemical curriculum” (10). Here I describe such a tool. This tool was initially developed by a consortium and has been used at multiple academic institutions to communicate genomic data. I have used this tool to transfer information among multiple sections in large Biochemistry classes, and among multiple years of the same Physical Chemistry class. The protocols can be passed from institution to institution through HTMLcoded webpages and the data is collected in one place for students and instructors to access from any web browser. This tool has been used in multiple contexts and has been adapted to many different types of research projects, so that researchers who teach can adapt their own projects to the classroom and bring an authentic research experience to many students. I have used this tool to bring authentic research protocols from my post-doctoral research used for protein production into the undergraduate biochemistry laboratory since 2012. Its utility has been demonstrated among multiple sections, multiple classes, and multiple projects. The online tool is titled Guiding Education through Novel Investigation (GENI) and can be found at the URL http://geni-science.org. It was originally developed by a group of biologists from multiple institutions to provide protocols for genome annotation to large groups of students, and was then expanded to include protocols for “wet lab” procedures in molecular biology and genetics courses. GENI’s flexible nature allowed me to transfer protein chemistry protocols from my own research projects online for use in three courses: Biochemistry I (four lab sections of up to 16 students each), Biochemistry II (two or three lab sections of 16 students), and Survey of Physical Chemistry (one lab section of 4-8 students). In each of these courses, GENI provided all students with an interactive online framework for carrying out protocols to accomplish novel research projects in the lab, providing new and potentially publishable results in the context of an undergraduate course. Other disciplines inside and outside of chemistry can adapt projects for use on the GENI platform. The primary purpose of GENI is to give protocols and collect data in the teaching lab, and because it is located online, it can facilitate other types of authentic-research knowledge transfers as well: 139

1.) The same project at different institutions: The biologists in the GENI consortium have used it to coordinate genome annotation projects at multiple institutions across the U.S. 2.) The same proteins in different courses taught by different professors: At my institution, I have coordinated a bioinformatics GENI project in Biochemistry I with another professor’s GENI project in Molecular Biology, so that students can use findings from their homology models obtained in Biochemistry I to plan experiments in Molecular Biology. 3.) The same protein in different courses taught by the same professor: The proteins students purify in Biochemistry II in the winter quarter have been analyzed for binding thermodynamics and kinetics in Survey of Physical Chemistry in the spring quarter. Because the data collected in these projects are novel, they may ultimately be transferred to the scientific community at large in the form of a peer-reviewed publication. In this way, students contribute to the edifice of scientific knowledge as they learn how to complete protocols, collect data, and make new substances. Through publication, the findings of the new knowledge can be used by the international scientific community.

Using the GENI Website Once an instructor account is created on the GENI website, a list of available projects becomes accessible, including projects in biochemistry, ecology, functional genomics, and genetics (Figure 1). Many of the tools for the multi-institutional genome annotation projects are collected under the “ACT” heading, being associated with the Integrated Microbial Genomes Annotation Collaboration Toolkit (IMG-ACT) (11). Other projects are located under the “Available Projects” heading with brief descriptions. The diversity of available projects demonstrates the broad applicability of the GENI platform. After an instructor creates a project on GENI and assigns it to a specific class, the website provides a PIN that students can use to associate their account with that specific class and access the class protocols. For each project, five tabs are available to store context for that class: “Background,” “Syllabus,” “Kit Materials,” “Media, Reagent and Chemical List,” and “Equipment List.” Each of these tabs can be populated with HTML text by the instructor. A sixth tab, “Files,” can be used to store PDF documents or image files for student use. Below the tabs is a list of expandable headings for protocols and data collection, each of which contains four parts: “Introduction,” “Protocol,” “Upload Results,” and “View Results.” The first two of these are HTML text documents, including, for example, a step-by-step list of numbered items for the students to follow in the lab (Figure 2). At my institution, we commonly make laptops available in the lab for protocol access and allow students to bring their own laptops into the lab. If this is not possible, the text in each window can be printed 140

by the students so they can bring paper protocols into the lab. (Assessment tools and surveys may be embedded under appropriate headings at the beginning and/or end of the project.) The “Upload Results” heading contains up to 20 fields for students to enter text or upload a file as prompted by the instructor (Figure 3). File sizes up to ~1MB can be accommodated at present. Once the information is uploaded, all users can view it under the “View Results” heading. This feature makes collaboration among student groups possible, because they can download and view the results of all other groups in the class.

Figure 1. Screenshot of biochemistry projects available on GENI site. Reproduced with permission from Kathryn Houmiel, GENI Program Manager.

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Figure 2. Screenshot of a biochemistry protocol. Reproduced with permission from Kathryn Houmiel, GENI Program Manager.

Figure 3. Screenshot of the “Upload Results” tab for the eighth week of protein production. Reproduced with permission from Kathryn Houmiel, GENI Program Manager.

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At this point, I have published eight protein chemistry projects on the GENI website and used them in three courses over six years of teaching, so that 425 students have completed 176 projects: constructing and testing 132 homology models, purifying 30 different recombinant proteins, and measuring thermodynamics and/or kinetics of 12 different protein-protein interactions (Table 1). The general limitations to adapting authentic research experiments to the teaching laboratory are the time constraints of the assigned laboratory period and the resource constraints of the institution. Bioinformatics projects have an advantage in both of these areas, but benchtop experiments are possible as well, if carefully planned and organized with the help of the GENI website. Another factor to consider when planning experiments is the constraint of the academic calendar and the institution’s class schedule. Because fewer classes are scheduled during the summer, independent research projects can be assigned to students to investigate interesting results from the authentic research projects carried out in teaching labs during the previous academic year. Then those summer projects can help shape the questions asked and proteins assigned to students during the next academic year. In the GENI consortium (a group of academics who developed and use GENI), we call this self-reinforcing interplay between independent research and research in the teaching lab the “Research Cycle” (Figure 4). The key is to adapt research projects to the class time and schedule given by one’s particular institution. The primary technical characteristic of GENI that sets it apart from cloud drive storage is that it is an independent, central, and persistent web platform dedicated to CUREs and based on the HTML web programming language. Every web browser therefore has the potential to access it, and project registration and authentication is handled on the GENI site, rather than by an external third party. Adapting a research project to GENI is assisted by basic conversance with HTML tags. The results entered into GENI are stored in a central database accessible to all project users, so accessibility and authentication issues associated with student user accounts on third-party cloud drives are minimized. These issues can interfere with collaborations among groups of students in multiple lab sections, so GENI was designed to facilitate authentic research by facilitating this type of information transfer. Because GENI has been developed by a relatively small consortium, most new features are added upon request from users. For example, at some institutions laptops posed safety concerns in the lab, so a feature was added allowing students to print protocols in one step directly from the website before lab. GENI is optimized for users who want to carry out projects among multiple lab sections or at multiple institutions at a scale at which cloud drives become less efficient or transferable, but who do not have the resources to develop their own central support system.

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Table 1. Biochemistry projects completed with GENI. Quarter

Course

Project Title

Students

Results

Winter 2012

Biochem II

Preparative Protein Production from Inclusion Bodies…

19 in 9 groups

5 MICA & 2 NKG2D proteins

Fall 2012

Biochem I

Bioinformatics… of Genes Related to Three Agrobacterium Paralogs

47 in 23 groups

23 ProC homology models

Winter 2013

Biochem II

Preparative Protein Production from Inclusion Bodies…

27 in 13 groups

2 MICA & 6 NKG2D proteins

Fall 2013

Biochem I

Comparative Homology Modeling of ArgE Paralogs and Orthologs

62 in 29 groups

29 ArgE homology models

Winter 2014

Biochem II

Preparative Protein Production from Inclusion Bodies…

28 in 13 groups

3 MICA & 5 NKG2D proteins

Spring 2014

P. Chem Survey

Protein-Protein Binding by Surface Plasmon Resonance

11 in 5 groups

5 MICANKG2D interactions

Fall 2014

Biochem I

Comparative Homology Modeling of ProC Paralogs and Orthologs

53 in 28 groups

28 ProC homology models

Fall 2015

Biochem I

Predicting Structure and Function of ProC Paralogs

47 in 22 groups

22 ProC homology models

Winter 2016

Biochem II

Preparative Protein Production from Inclusion Bodies and Crystallization

31 in 15 groups

1 MICA & 3 NKG2D proteins

Spring 2016

P. Chem Survey

Protein-Protein Binding by Surface Plasmon Resonance

4 individuals

4 MICANKG2D interactions

Fall 2016

Biochem I

Predicting Structure and Function of Siderocalin Orthologs

60 in 30 groups

30 lipocalin homology models

Winter 2017

Biochem II

Preparative Protein Production from Periplasmic Expression

42 in 21 groups

5 lipocalin proteins

Spring 2017

P. Chem Survey

Protein-Protein Binding by Surface Plasmon Resonance

4 individuals

3 antibodyantigen interactions

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Figure 4. Flowchart of Research Cycle connecting Biochem II and Physical Chemistry Survey in the academic year. There are many challenges inherent to bringing authentic research projects into the teaching lab, first and foremost being the fact that even the instructor does not know exactly what will happen. Straightforward projects with a high probability of success and with a low likelihood of surprise are more appropriate for undergraduate research in general and for authentic research projects in large lab courses in particular. In my experience, such projects are possible and can produce useful data. Below I will discuss a few of my personal experiences with conducting authentic research in the teaching lab to show that these challenges are always present but also can be met, especially if the primary goal is the education of the student rather than the collection of results or construction of new proteins. Novel results will usually be collected, but the students will always be educated with this approach.

Biochemistry I: Homology Modeling and Functional Annotation GENI organizes a three-week computational protein chemistry exercise in the Biochemistry I (BIO/CHM 4361) laboratory scheduled in the fall quarter at Seattle Pacific University. Fifty to seventy students take this course in three or four lab sections, each staffed with a lab instructor and a teaching assistant. At this point in the course, the students have learned enough about the basics of protein structure that they can start to use PyMol, the industry standard tool for protein structure visualization. Instead of giving them a standard protein structure to visualize, they use online tools to build a homology model of a novel DNA sequence and interpret the structure in light of specific, authentic research questions. GENI provides an online protocol through a web browser with embedded links that take students directly to the bioinformatics tools they are told to use. After data are collected, GENI provides online database fields in the same browser window for students to input the data so that the process is more fully integrated on the students’ laptops. During the first week, students follow a step-by-step tutorial protocol in GENI to examine the structure of cytochrome c in PyMol (originally written by Peter C. Kahn). At the beginning of the second week’s lab period, they are introduced to the research question being asked, are given a gene with unknown structure and function, and are shown several online tools and databases for gene analysis, homology modeling, and protein structure analysis. During the lab period, they work in groups on laptops to access online tools that analyze DNA homology and primary protein structure. By the end of the three-hour lab period, they submit their 145

gene sequence to homology modeling on the I-TASSER server, which typically takes 48-72 hours to complete. The third week of the laboratory is scheduled as a workshop in which students work independently, examining the quality of their homology model and comparing it to experimentally determined crystal structures using PyMol and online tools for tertiary structure analysis. PyMol has several functions useful in this regard, including the ability to align multiple structures and map the distribution of charges on a protein surface. Students gather information and synthesize it into a written lab report to answer a question about the unknown function of their novel DNA sequence. At the end of the lab report, students design a simple experiment to test one of their functional hypotheses. Some students have used this experience to develop experiments in their later Molecular Biology course, and it could also form the basis of an independent summer research project. GENI’s independent, central location online means that students’ data remain available to them on the GENI web platform for later use. The ability to update HTML protocols in GENI allows for easy annual reformulation of the research question and updating of online tools used as web addresses change from year to year. A nearly unlimited supply of research questions can be found in publicly available genomic databases. The relative simplicity and wide diversity of species represented by microbial genomes make them especially amenable to this approach. The first four projects I completed in this class originated in a collaboration with a colleague in the Department of Biology who conducts experiments on the microbe Agrobacterium tumefaciens and was involved in the original sequencing of its genome (12). Several amino acid metabolism genes in the genome had paralogs with unknown function, including the proline biosynthesis gene ProC and the arginine biosynthesis gene ArgE. These paralogs were used in various BLAST searches to find similar orthologs with unknown function, compared to the E. coli genes and other related genes with known functions. Each year the class examined 20-30 versions of ProC or ArgE genes and asked if physical characteristics of the protein model indicated preservation or divergence of function and binding specificity. The centralized online nature of GENI made modifications easier and allowed students to access other student groups’ data for comparison. The online Enzyme Similarity Tool from the Enzyme Function Initiative (EFI-EST) was used in the most recent projects to organize large numbers of DNA sequences into groups that may correlate with functional subgroups. EFI-EST can collect 10,000 DNA sequences from the UniProtKB database and organize them into a similarity network (13). For the projects described here, EFI-EST produces a manageable number of subgroups (4-6) so that representative sequences from each group can be assigned to different students for investigation with the working hypothesis that sequences from the same subgroup may have similar function. Sequences from the subgroup with Protein Data Bank structures or published functional data can be provided to the students as hints for structure and function of that subgroup. The larger research question of functional annotation of these subgroups has been divided into smaller research questions in different ways. Students 146

have used direct links in GENI to access the National Center for Biotechnology Information Basic Local Alignment Search Tool (BLAST) and the Joint Genome Initiative Integrated Microbial Genomes (JGI-IMG) (14) database in order to compare their sequence to other sequences across genomes or within their source organism’s genome. Because all student data on GENI is visible to other students, they can compare results to those obtained by other students with other organisms. One year, the project asked students to identify ribosome binding sites upstream from their assigned sequence because computational identification of these sites is still problematic (15), and students may be able to identify divergent, context-dependent sites better than some algorithms. Another year, the project linked to a number of online primary sequence analysis tools and asked students to use them to predict protein characteristics like pI and secondary structure from primary structure, and then to compare these characteristics to those of reference proteins with known function. For homology modeling, the I-TASSER protein structure and function prediction server was chosen because of its ease of use, high capacity, and good performance in comparison studies (16). I-TASSER output includes model validation and functional prediction, and students are directed to particular parts of its output for their own interpretation. Students also perform external model validation using other online tools. In one case, a model validation service stopped working midway through the project. Because GENI is online, the protocol was modified to point the students to another validation service as the students performed their research. The homology model is downloaded in the .pdb format so that students can compare it to other structures in PyMol and can submit it to other online tools that calculate characteristics like structural conservation, charge distribution, and aggregation propensity. Many web-based tools for structural analysis are published each year; the instructor can write default settings for these into GENI that will work with most students, and then work individually with groups that need different settings. Students are commonly uncomfortable with command-line entry, but most interfaces are menu-driven and can be used by students with minimal computer-science skills. In the most recent iteration of this project, we explored a new family of proteins representing a new direction developing in my research. My personal interest in siderocalin function, and the fact that I observed several well-defined subgroups in the EFI-EST network, led me to investigate this family of proteins with this process, despite my personal inexperience. We explored this novel area of research in class and built 30 lipocalin homology models. A Linux terminal was set up in the lab to run a binding-site identication program (17) and students accessed it during the workshop week. This gave all students time to run the program, which took a few hours, and collect the results to integrate with the others for the lab report. With the final lab report, students also submit a spreadsheet to GENI containing specific information from each phase of the project. I compile these and organize them by phylogenetic similarity, and can detect patterns within similar subgroups that may be related to function at the overall level. For example, we have developed working hypotheses for the binding specificities of 147

the different subgroups of lipocalins, and now these provide independent research projects for students. GENI’s online nature allows for fast response before the final due date for the project. I set an earlier deadline for data entry than for the final written report and review student data before the report is due. When some data from a particular tool are inconsistent on the spreadsheet, I notify the groups that they have used a particular tool incorrectly, and they can return to that tool and fix the problem before the final report is due. I typically need to correct some data from 5-6 groups every year, so the fact that GENI allows me to do this provides an important checkpoint in the process of authentic research. One additional strength of GENI’s centralized, online nature is that a timestamp is associated with each submission, so the instructor can track how the students proceeded through the project. The students are given two weeks to work independently on the project before the data are due. As the instructor, I can see if a group has been working steadily on the project or if it has been completed in a final rush of activity immediately before the due date, and this can be used to analyze the organization of the students’ own research process or to calculate late penalties.

Biochemistry II: Protein Purification and Crystallization GENI organizes an eight-week preparative protein chemistry exercise in the Biochemistry II (BIO/CHM 4362) laboratory scheduled in the winter quarter. About thirty students take this course in two or three lab sections. The details of how protein purification protocols from my post-doctoral research experience were adapted to the context of the teaching laboratory have been previously described (18). The primary challenge in this class is managing time constraints and bottlenecks so that each group of students can incubate liters of media for eight hours on limited shaker space, and so that the groups can share instruments like glass-bead lysis homogenizers efficiently. Some steps are conducted by grouping pairs of students into groups of four to accomplish tasks like column chromatography. With this arrangement, each lab section can make four novel recombinant proteins. GENI’s collection of data in a database that is immediately accessible and transparent to all online allows ready data sharing within groups, within sections, and among the entire class. Several small-scale protein design projects have been completed with this format, building on previous protein design projects. In 2011, a student used an online protein design program called HyPare (19) during summer research to design electrostatic stabilization into the MICA-NKG2D protein-protein interface. Plasmids were synthesized and students made mutant proteins in the winter 2012 teaching lab, which were tested for binding in later independent research. Some mutants resulted in significant interfacial stabilization (20). Then a research student used an online linker design program to link the two domains of the NKG2D homodimer, and in 2013 six designs were produced in the winter Biochemistry II teaching lab, and then tested for binding in the spring Survey of Physical Chemistry teaching lab. The NKG2D interdomain 148

interface was optimized with Rosetta in various ways, and these were produced in Biochemistry II in 2014 and 2016. These projects had varying degrees of success in completing the design objectives: the HyPare mutants stabilized the interface, but the NKG2D interfacial mutants did not have a significant effect on binding. In the pedagogical sense, all were a success because they brought students into an authentic research project in the teaching lab, giving them patterns of thought and laboratory skills that provided the basis for success in graduate school, medical school, and industry. The primary goal of this process is educational, and generation of new knowledge is a welcome but secondary effect. As with the bioinformatics project in Biochemistry I, the location of these projects on GENI allows annual modification of a basic framework. The framework of Biochemistry II protein purification experiments implemented on GENI has been used for two different novel projects, showing how the teaching lab can become a place for genuine scientific exploration. In one project, a pre-veterinary biochemistry major found gene sequences of previously unexpressed MIC and NKG2D proteins from mammalian genomes. These proteins were produced in Biochemistry II labs and tested for binding in Survey of Physical Chemistry labs, showing significant cross-species binding (data to be published). In another project, previously unexpressed lipocalins that were modeled in Biochemistry I labs were produced in Biochemistry II labs. These proteins required significant modification of the previous protocols because lipocalins are produced by periplasmic expression, not in inclusion bodies. Students working with the modified protocols produced good amounts of lipocalin proteins, showing that GENI can be used in large classes with different kinds of protein production protocols.

Survey of Physical Chemistry: Protein Interaction Thermodynamics GENI organizes a three-week protein-protein interaction thermodynamics exercise in the Survey of Physical Chemistry (CHM 3410) laboratory scheduled in the spring quarter. This course is small, ranging from four to twelve students, so the exercise is less structured, and the instructor is able to interact with students in the personal ways that scientists lead their research groups. In this context, GENI provides protocols and collects data like before, but the instructor can be present in the lab to help the students discern the quality of data, indicating which proteins show binding strengths appropriate to the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) technique. For several years, this course has been able to use the proteins made in the previous quarter in Biochemistry II. GENI’s use as a single, universal online archive means that students are able to access Biochemistry II data online to see the results for their assigned protein in Physical Chemistry. In the Physical Chemistry lab, a three-week structure is used that may be transferred to other types of biochemical projects. The class meets in the lab during the first week to learn how to use the instrument and to measure preliminary “preconcentration” data on the SPR instrument. Then, over the next two weeks, the instrument is made available for students to sign up for about six hours of 149

instrument time. Students are assigned multiple protein-protein interactions to screen and choose one interaction to test in triplicate for publication-quality data. This allows for the possibility that some protein-protein pairs may not bind well enough to be detected by SPR; the one-out-of-three chance for binding has been sufficient for all students to have a stable protein-protein interaction to test. If one student is unlucky enough to test three protein-protein pairs that fail, that student can be given the data posted on GENI from another student who tested two or three protein-protein pairs that worked. This is another form of collaboration facilitated by GENI’s accessibility for all students with an internet connection and simplified by the fact that all data is located in one project-centered database. We have collected binding data for multiple projects, including redesigned MICA proteins binding NKG2D, single-chain and redesigned NKG2D proteins binding MICA, multiple mammalian species of recombinant MICA binding NKG2D, and serum antibodies binding recombinant microbial adhesion proteins (data to be published). SPR is an expensive technique that is not commonly accomplished in the undergraduate curriculum. We purchased a used SPR systems from the mid-1990s, and found that it is sufficient to measure nanomolar to micromolar binding constants such as are found with the MICA-NKG2D system and typical antibody-antigen systems. This older instrument is not automated, but the students can compensate for that by completing repeated sample injections by hand, while refining their pipetting techniques. Other protein-protein interaction measurement instruments can be substituted on GENI with minimal modifications within this adaptable framework and used at any institution with an internet connection.

Conclusion The online nature of GENI facilitates electronic links to assessment tools that can survey the entire populace of students using GENI. The GENI Consortium has collaborated with faculty and graduate students from schools of education to develop online surveys that take advantage of this fact, which is another sense in which the online nature of GENI fosters collaboration. Three surveys have been collected in each class, and the results are now being validated and interpreted to help us find best practices for using GENI and implementing authentic research in the teaching lab. Ultimately, as GENI connects students to protocols and collects data online, it helps promote a host of deeper connections: among institutions, between courses, and to the community at large through publication. The flexibility of the GENI website has allowed me as a scholar to keep learning about protein design and protein-protein interaction chemistry as I have fulfilled my teaching responsibilities. The most important connections that GENI facilitates are internal to each student, as the individual makes new connections between what is done in the lab and what is learned in the classroom, motivated by the prospect of accomplishing something truly novel and unique. Others have noted that this kind of open collaboration and reasoning is a main goal of CUREs in general (21). Because GENI is at heart a collaborative technology, it builds new scientific 150

thinkers by giving students the chance to collaborate as scientists within the bounds of their required curriculum.

Acknowledgments Funding for GENI was provided by NSF TUES Grant Award No. 1322848. Thanks to the GENI Consortium: Derek Wood (PI), Jennifer Tenlen, and Katey Houmiel (SPU), David Rhoads (CSUSB), Lori Scott and Kimberly Murphy (Augustana), Steve Slater (Winnowgen), and Brad Goodner (Hiram). Thanks to the independent research students and teaching assistants: Melissa Hale, Sam Henager, Julia Podmayer. Thanks to Biochemistry II students, including the following: Micah Bovenkamp, Jennifer Burns, Riley Butler, Salvador Eng Deng, Alex Garcia, Amber Givens, John Rodson Grino, Reed Hawkins, Jordan Hess, Reyn Kenyon, Dustin Kress, Daniel Lee, Cara Lord, Yarenni Mendoza, Joseph Muriekes, Nathaniel Ng, Suzanna Ohlsen, Quincy Pham, Kaity Preston, Benny Robinson, Faith Stewart, Madison Strawn, Delong Tsway, Kayla VandeHoef, Caroline Vokos, Katherine Waite, Brooke Webber, Evan Will, and Kelli Wilner. Thanks to Survey of Physical Chemistry students: Shamele Battan, Solon Bass, Alex Garcia, Jordan Hess, Sierra Hinkle, Cara Lord, Nick Mellema, Spencer Merrill, Dao Nguyen, Quinton Ouellette, Juyeon Park, Alex Pinaire, Melissa Rowe, Michael Vajda, and Caroline Vokos.

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Chapter 9

The Application of Drones in Chemical Education for Analytical Environmental Chemistry Fun Man Fung1,2,* and Simon Watts1,3 1Department

of Chemistry, National University of Singapore, 3 Science Drive 3, Singapore 117543 2Institute for Application of Learning Science and Educational Technology (ALSET) University Hall, Lee Kong Chian Wing UHL #05-01D, 21 Lower Kent Ridge Road, Singapore 119077 3National University of Singapore, Environmental Research Institute (NERI), 5A Engineering Drive 1, Singapore 117411 *E-mail: [email protected]

In recent years, Drones (Unmanned Aerial Vehicles) have become more accessible to the public as a platform for photography. Particularly in the last five years, they seem to be commonplace around the globe. So far, there are few reports on the use of drones in education. In this chapter, we document the use of drones as a new technological filming tool to enhance student learning in the field of analytical and environmental chemistry, environmental sampling exercises in particular. We share our developed and tested guidance for would-be academic drone users. Additionally, we present the perceptions of students towards drone usage and their feelings during the course of drone training.

Ubiquity of Videos in Chemistry Education As we enter the 21st century, where the use of technology is omnipresent, we need to ensure that education at the college level does not do away with tools that enhance learning (1). While educational technology (EdTech) continues to thrive in the online arena, educators have to engage with the new dynasty of continuous proliferation of technological tools, some of which could enhance teaching and © 2017 American Chemical Society

learning. In the way that educational technological advancement evolved from being a teacher-centric to a more student-centric model, one might need to think outside the box to identify the right tools to complement traditional classroom teaching. Traditionally, educators conduct classes via the didactic approach. A “didactic” model is one where teachers dispense wisdom and knowledge across to students. The didactic model is becoming outmoded as EdTech wheedles educators and learners into becoming independent thinkers who seek knowledge via the internet, most commonly through watching YouTube, searching Google, and reading Wikipedia files. Students in today’s generation are technologically astute and have extraordinarily wide access to online videos and technology devices. With rapid technological advancement in filming methods and platforms, the education sector has gained traction in utilizing videos in their teaching modules, be it flipped classroom or instructional videos. One method of filming has not been fully explored by educators, chemistry educators in particular: the use of drones (UAV).

A Brief Introduction of Drones Before the advent of drones 20 years ago, any outdoor filming from sky view would require the exorbitant hiring of helicopters to be elevated from ground level. The estimated cost of a 30-minute ride is USD $500, and that is not even inclusive of the renting of a high output video recorder set and the cameraman. Acquiring high-quality videos of ridgelines and meandering tributaries would be prerogatives to heavily endowed movie production studios, but such vertical and financial challenges mean filming of eagle-eye view footage for land surveyance would be insurmountable for most research groups with limited funding.

Review on Current Use of Drones Currently, most organizations that use drones are private corporations, primarily businesses. They fly drones largely to make video and photography for marketing purposes. Video enthusiasts and adventurists have also used drones to capture mesmerizing landscape footage. Drones are essentially flying robots that are piloted by a person on the ground (2). These drones are capable of taking aerial video and photography (3). Drones have been used to facilitate activities in several key areas: providing ordnance fallof-shot reporting and battle field intelligence, delivering cargoes in the logistics industry, obtaining aerial photography in agriculture and leisure, data collection, and surveillance (4–6). Drones were first introduced in 1967 to capture aerial images during military combats (7). In recent years, non-military use of drones has spiked, with approximately 325,000 civilian drones registered with the United States Federal Aviation Administration (5). Filmmakers have been using drones since at least 156

2000 (10). In 2016, drones in Singapore were tested for over 25 uses in the public sector (8). The trials included: fighting dengue transmission with drones that can monitor infected areas and deposit larvicide on hard-to-reach places like roof gutters (9), marine authorities using drones in marine incidents (e.g., to support oil spill cleanups), and search and rescue operations (8). Drones are particularly used for science. They are deployed by geologists, chemists, ecologists, conservationists, environmental scientists, etc. Current applications include use in Animal Management & Conservation (11), Plant & Soil Conservation and Management, Forestry, Change Monitoring (glaciers, coastlines, storm events), Terrain Modelling, Coastal Management, River and Flood Assessment, Earthwork and Rock Face Management, Regulation Enforcement, Expedition Planning, etc. In addition to surveyance-type work, drones are also being used for aerial recharge work on remote sensors (12, 13), crop height estimation (14), and active water sampling (15). One could envisage a series of further chemical laboratory applications for these devices, for example, taking and ‘fixing’ labile water samples (e.g., measurement of dissolved O2), mobile chemical reaction of samples, atmospheric chemical measurements (usually for AQ), etc. Science research application examples include atmospheric sampling of volcanic craters (16), Great Barrier Reef monitoring (17), and quantifying ecological habitats (18). The UK Environment Agency (EA) and Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) are both using drones for riverine and flood surveys, algal status surveys, and waste enforcement, significantly reducing their operating costs (10, 19, 20). Drones are also being used for educational purposes. Geologists are using drones for mapping, as well as in fieldwork and as part of their undergraduate courses (21). Environmental chemists are using them in undergraduate courses for soil and water sampling site recce, as well as for water sample collection and chemical fixing on board. The existence of training in the use of drones for staff and students in University Ecology (22) and Conservation courses (23) suggests these applications will increase. Moving to one example in more detail, our chemistry students have difficulty in applying knowledge learned in the practical context, for instance, finding potential sites for soil sampling. Our effort was focused on improving the understanding of terrain and examining potential ‘good’ sampling sites by providing instructor’s point of view (IPOV) videos filmed with a drone. Students responded positively to this innovative filming method in a perception survey. The merits and challenges of filming with drones will be discussed. To fulfill the course requirement at the National University of Singapore (NUS), chemistry undergraduates are mandated to complete the module CM3292: Advanced Experiments in Analytical and Physical Chemistry. This module consists of 13-weeks of advanced laboratory experiments across the areas of analytical chemistry and physical chemistry, with each session lasting 6 hours. The students work in pairs and as a cohort, and students prepare before coming to the lab by viewing a series of pre-recorded lectures on the lab protocols, including videos employing IPOV (24). In this practical module, students have to conduct an environmental sampling experiment on either air or soil. In this experiment, 157

students are given 2 to 3 hours to find suitable sampling sites within the university where they can collect soil samples or deposit passive samplers (Palmes’ tubes). In the previous run of the experiments, students in pairs had to explore the sampling sites on foot. The duration could last more than 3 hours during inclement weather, and there were few alternatives to inconvenient travel on a rainy day. Usually, students walk to the possible locations, capture photos of the sites, and report back to the lecturer in the class for discussion on the suitability of prospective sampling sites. With the drones, students can survey what sites are available for sampling and save themselves the time that arises from multiple trips incurred to explore the terrain. In our pilot project, we flew the drone DJI Phantom 2 Vision Plus. It has an in-built gimbal-stabilized 14-megapixel camera. As we are more familiar with the terrain within the university, we could discern quickly where to guide the drone in order to film pertinent spots we felt were most appropriate for the objectives of the exercise (Figure 1). These spots may not have been the safest or most suitable for land exploration, as some of the locations were hidden in dense vegetation. Before attending the lab sessions, students in CM3292 viewed the videos captured by the instructors. Then, on the actual lab day, they picked their sampling sites and conducted a risk assessment. Once approved, students were allowed to proceed with the outfield sampling.

Figure 1. Snapshots of the soil sampling video filmed by a drone.

Why the Drone Is Useful Things can change quickly in the ever-growing city-state that is Singapore. New buildings are erected daily, and there are other forces for change at work. Weather sculpts the landscape (sometimes overnight!), and tropical storm means that landscapes can change very quickly. The older videos recorded by the drone can give a general preview of the potential sites to avoid, e.g., roadsides with heavy traffic, steep slopes, the region near the canal, construction sites, and 158

private properties, etc. Using the drone can give a real-time preview of the actual sites, to inspect if the ground is flooded, closed, or occupied by events. This instantaneous video capture could save students enormous time by eliminating unnecessary trips to the proposed sampling sites. In addition, the probability of accidents can be minimized by not having to inspect a location in person. Furthermore, the monetary and time savings gained from drone recce free up time for more student-teacher interaction and discussion on higher-order questions.

Potential Drawbacks and Safety Precautions Once flown in the air, the drone has to be carefully maneuvered in order not to infringe the law by illegal trespassing (5). Additionally, drones have a relatively short battery life. Currently standing at 30 minutes, they have limited endurance and range as to how far they can fly. If the drone is disconnected from the controller and becomes a runaway, the drone may drop down and hit passers-by when its battery runs down. Damage to vehicles and infrastructures might ensue. Also, drones are prohibited from trespassing private properties aerially; landings and takeoffs have to be carefully executed by a trained pilot (25). Lastly, it is vital for the drones to be flown away from people and buildings in order not to cause accidents (26).

Perceptions to the Proposed Drone Usage by Students At the end of the semester, students were asked to participate in an anonymous survey on their fieldwork experience in sample collection, and their thoughts on the potential use of drones in future teaching (class size: 60; number of respondent: 23; response rate: 38.3%) As summarized in Table 1, a small majority (65.1%) of the respondents felt the day of sampling was relaxed and that they had ample time to survey the land. This could be due to the seasonal weather in Singapore during the June/July period when rain is scarce, as there were no downpours that would have impeded the students’ fieldwork. Only a small minority (13%) of the students suggested that walking around the potential sampling sites on foot helped them find the best locations to take samples. The survey result is unsurprising, as the NUS Kent Ridge campus borders a land size of 150 hectares. There would be no plausible way to sample all potential sites before deciding which location would be most salient towards sample collection. Presumably, the same minority group of respondents also noted they were convinced that they selected the best sampling site, which can be false due to the lack of available choices and time constraints. The majority (87%) could not be convinced that they chose the optimal sampling sites. Even so, it is no wonder that 91.2% of the respondents agreed vehemently that knowing where they planned to conduct sampling enabled them to conduct risk assessment more accurately and knowledgeably. Almost half of the respondents (47.7%) felt that using a drone to pre-survey sites would have saved time in the selection of better sampling sites. Given a choice, 56.4% expressed preference 159

in using a drone to conduct land surveying before venturing to identify the best sampling site. With these strong sentiments from more than half of the respondents, we sought to test the feasibility of training students in drone use for potential future sampling fieldwork experiments.

Table 1. Learners’ Perceptions of the Potential Application of Drones in Assisting Surveying Sampling Sites Survey Statements for Student Response

Responses by Score,a N

Combined Categories,b %

1

2

3

4

5

1+2

4+5

1

The day was relaxed, the timing was sufficient.

1

2

5

9

6

12.9

65.1

2

Walking around the sampling sites hardly helped me in finding the best location to withdraw samples.

0

3

12

7

1

13.0

34.7

3

I am convinced that I chose the best sampling site.

1

8

11

3

0

39.0

13.0

4

Knowing where I plan to conduct sampling would allow me to write a Risk Assessment form more accurately and knowledgeably.

0

1

1

16

5

4.3

91.2

5

The use of Drones to pre-survey sites would have saved time in the selection of better sampling sites.

1

3

8

10

1

17.3

47.7

6

Given a choice, I would like to use a Drone to conduct land surveying before venturing to identify the best sampling site.

2

2

6

12

1

17.3

56.4

a The scores from 5 to 1 represent the following agreement levels:

“strongly agree”, “agree”, “neutral”, “disagree”, and “strongly disagree”, respectively. The total number of responses for each level of agreement are tabulated. b The combined category “4 + 5” represents the percentage of students responding with “agree” and “strongly agree”; the category “1 + 2” represents the percentage of students responding with “disagree” and “strongly disagree”. N = 23.

Feedback on Drone Training Three student testers were provided with the document “Procedure for Drone Pilots and Basic Training Package” (presented in the Appendix). This guidance had previously been trialed and revised with a field ecologist from the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) who had run the same training. After using this for their own training on our Phantom3 drone, students were asked to write less than an A4 side of how they felt about the experience, and for any detailed comments on the guidance distributed. 160

All testers were glad to have had the opportunity and experience, and found it exciting. All recognized the possible applications of this technology and the usefulness of the aerial real-time drone view, and understood what they were doing and why. All thought that this was useful for undergraduates as a tool, and allowed the subject matter for which the drone was being used to be more impactful. All testers reported that they became nervous/nerve wracking/worried when the drone got further away under the wind conditions prevailing at the time of the tests, feeling that they were losing control of the drone. All felt that the given procedure was either “clear” or “quite succinct and helpful”, though one felt that the procedure needed to be “very succinct”. In the proceeding paragraphs, we cite two of our testers’ feelings engendered by their first experience flying the drone. Tester X Commented “The thought of flying a drone excited me because it was one of the few opportunities I had to interact with something very novel. Besides that, I feel that it is always refreshing to be able to capture images from unconventional angles, i.e. aerial shots. In fact, I think the ability to observe an aerial view of the environment in real-time would be beneficial for monitoring of sites that are hard to access, e.g. lakes and high sites. However, I noticed that the maximum distance for the drone is quite small. This would defeat the purpose of using drones to sample sites that are quite far-off; perhaps in the future you can consider using a drone that can reach a greater maximum distance. My experience flying the drone was quite pleasant since the drone is very responsive to the controller. The instructions were quite straightforward, although it was still a bit hard for me to turn on the drone. Navigating the drone was not an issue although I still tend to want to orientate the drone such that the movement of the controller always corresponds with the movement of the drone, which may waste time. What can be a bit nerve-wracking to some, including me, is when the drone shakes (usually because of the wind), when it starts to fall, and when it is too close. As a prospective user, I would want a manual that is very succinct. I feel the current manual is quite succinct and helpful.” Tester Y Commented “I am thankful for being given the opportunity to learn to fly a drone. The instructions given in the instructions booklet were clear and to the point. While getting hands on in trying to operate the drone (after testing out that the right and left levers were working), I felt excited to try to maneuver the drone along the perimeter of the field. However, as the drone got further away from me, I could not help but feel like I was losing the control of the drone (could be aggravated by weather conditions). It could possibly be that more time may be needed for users to get used to the controls of the drone. With more time comes greater confidence with its use. The incorporation of the use of drones in undergraduate modules I believe will be 161

greatly welcomed by students as it brings in more fun and will be more impactful for undergraduates.” As a result of this exercise: • • • • •

The correct app was highlighted. The order of turning on the WiFi network was modified. Diagrams were added to procedure of the Gimbal Guard. Instructions were added regarding Gimbal Guard at termination of the flight. Instructions were added for manual landing.

The Future of Drones in Chemical Education and Research Modern technological advances have allowed and prompted educators to adopt new methods of teaching (27). Most contemporary university students expect some forms of technology to be used in classroom teaching. There are many challenges in chemical education and research that the drone can solve. One possibility is the transportation of laboratory samples from one building to another. The drones would act as the courier service, repeating their delivery flight plan, saving precious man-hours and working electricity from overused elevators. Students can retrieve their spectroscopic data faster and have more time to work on their laboratory assignments. On top of that, chemistry educators whose teaching requires outfield excursion to sequestered forests and lakes with poor WiFi connection may find the drone useful. They could take the drone as a proxy to the internet, to upload instant images and videos taken at the sampling site. Additionally, any samples that are predisposed to chemical change due to external atmosphere can instantly be flown to the lab by the drone. It is easier to carry the drone outfield and have that drone transport samples than to attempt to transport a portable analytical instrument that has worse detection limits than its lab-based cousins, e.g., portable UV-VIS spectrophotometers. Having said that, it might be highly feasible to use a smaller drone to survey the sampling sites and acquire the flight path before sending in a bigger drone to transport the instrumentations, and possibly the scientist, to the site for real-time analysis.

Concluding Remarks As educators, we ought to be careful that the main motivation of using technology in education is primarily base on pedagogy: improve teaching delivery, cultivate learners’ curiosity and increase overall student engagement. Educators should be careful not to be seduced by the allure of the “cool” factor, choosing to apply technologies in teaching just because they are trendy and popular. Careful planning of classroom activities, assessments, and the writing of good module learning outcomes should go hand in hand with the incorporation of technology in good teaching. That being said, we should lead by example and nurture curiosity by being inquisitive ourselves: finding out the latest gadgets, 162

online platforms, and mobile applications, and critically analyzing how some of them could assist us in achieving the learning objectives. With the first steps taken, it could go a long way.

Acknowledgments The authors are grateful to the Department of Chemistry for funding the drone purchases and leadership towards Technology-Enabled Blended Learning Experience (TEBLE). The authors wish to thank Dr. Emelyn Tan, Ms. Woo Oon Yee, Ms. Alvita Ardisara, Ms. Valerie Tan Shu Li, and Ms. Ruth P.E. Watts for their assistance in the drone training and testing.

Appendix: Procedure for Drone Pilots and Basic Training Package Procedure for Drone Pilots P1 − Pre-Flight Planning First of all, think carefully about WHY you want to do a drone flight. What are your aims? Is using a drone the most effective way of achieving those aims? What are the regulatory issues and safety issues associated with? • • •

Where you are flying When you are flying (weather and daylight) What you want to use the drone for (e.g. recce, sampling on board chemical reactions, other….etc.)9

To assist your thinking the following may be helpful: • •

•

• •

•

Do you need a license to fly the drone, and/or do you need to lodge a flight-plan? Are there restrictions on where (forbidden areas), or how high you can fly (never exceed 120 m altitude, and for most WiFi controlled drones, that is about the effective WiFi limitation (line of sight). Do not pilot a drone in an enclosed space. Select a location that will mitigate the effects of a crash or other error. We advise to begin flying in an open space, such as a football field. It might be good to practise on grassy land, such that if the drone needs to make a crash landing, it will at least have some cushioning. We strongly suggest the pilot and drones to stay away from people or animals. Any crashes could cause serious injury, equally, on the ground, cow vs. drone only has one outcome. After deciding the purpose of the flight, and approximate location/area, write out a flight plan with altitudes, duration and geography, (see 163

•

•

•

example Figure A1). Be sure that this plan meets your objectives for the flight Perform a basic risk assessment and feed this into the process of reviewing your flight plan. (NUS staff/students use the standard Risk Assessment form) Drones have limited endurance, so plan for shortest flight possible, preferable landing with 20% of battery remaining (safety reserve). To comply with this limitation your maximum endurance is less than 20 minutes. Charge batteries and control panel and phone before the planned flight time ▪ ▪

• • •

The Batteries take about 1-2 hours to charge The Control Panel take about 3 hours to charge

Abort the flight if the weather is unsuitable, rain, thunder or winds…avoid stormy weather. Pre-install the DJI GO app on your mobile phone (Note, NOT DJI GO 4), register for an account. Finally, plan the flight, fly the plan.

Figure A1. A typical flight plan

P2 – The Pre-Flight Checklist Take water and an umbrella (sunshade) with you. Work in pairs. Set your phone’s screen brightness to maximum. 164

Appendix contains the instruction sheet for the Phantom 3 (one of the drones we have here). See Figure A2 for Control Panel architecture.

Figure A2. Control Panel Architecture Assuming that batteries are charged and that you have gone through the processes above. If any part of this preflight checklist fails, the flight should be aborted. 1. 2. 3. 4.

Check the weather and weather forecast. CARE: slide off Gimbal guard and lens cover and place in bag Ensure that the micro SD card is inserted into the camera. Make sure the camera I fitted securely and has free rotation Ensure the batteries in the battery pack and controller are fully charged (check) • •

Press the button on the battery pack, OK if three or more of the bars are lit. Insert the battery pack securely in the drone. Turn on main console switch, OK if four LEDs are green. Leave on. 165

5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

10. 11.

12.

13. 14. 15. 16.

17. 18.

19. 20. 21.

Ensure each propeller blade is secure and spins easily on its axis. Check that the throttles on the control panel are freely moving Verify that there are no loose parts on the drone. Check for missing or loose screws. Place the drone in a clear area (including overhead) for take-off. Ensure there is enough room around and above the drone and there are no immediate hazards, e.g. overhead power or phone cables, road with fast moving vehicles…etc. (CARE camera). Turn on phone, open WiFi networks, and select PHANTOM3_XXX, the password is 12341234 Switch on drone by pressing the power button once, then holding it down for at least 2 seconds…the Drone will make a melodic sound indicating it is ready, and rotors may turn. Note Drone navigation lights are red (port) and green (starboard). Yellow flashing Navigation lights is usually an error in startup. Close everything down, and restart entire process for control panel, drone and phone. If lights still flashing yellow, the drone will not take off, this may indicate a fault in the drone. Run the app. Wait for the calibration of GPS location for the drone until completion. Ensure that the status bar in the app reads “READY TO GO (GPS)” Fix the phone to the remote controller. On the app select CAMERA VIEW. Walk back away 5 or 6 steps (or to a safe distance) from the drone. Record Time, and set stopwatch for 15 min, absolute latest landed time. On the phone app initiate automatic take-off (press takeoff icon, and slide button (orange bar to right). The drone will rise to an altitude of about ~ 1m Keep facing the drone the entire time. (Note: keep battery pack facing you (use rotate on left controller). Gently check that the tilt lever (right) and altitude lever (left) works and that the drone responds. If either of these tests fails, initiate automatic landing immediately. Note automatic landing will initiate the drone to rise up to ~10 m before it begins a slow safe descent. Providing all is good, your flight can continue. Keep a direct line of sight at all times when flying, so you can always see your drone. Keep a track of time and battery levels, aim to have your drone back at launch site while still having 20% of available time/battery level in hand. When it comes to landing, bring the drone approximately back to the takeoff area and then initiate automatic landing from the phone app. (Please do not manually land the drone, automatic landing is safer. However, if you are using the wrong app, the automatic landing icon may not be present. In this situation, slowly lower the drone to ~1-2 m using the altitude throttle. Then navigate the drone to a good spot fairly close to you. Then very slowly lower the drone until it is touching the ground. At this point lock the altitude throttle down (towards you). The drone should settle onto the ground and go into ready mode. Note, manual landing is an advanced skill). 166

22. If at any time you either lose sight of the drone, or you pilot it out of range, there is a default program (return to take-off site) which will cause the drone to rise to ~10 m and then attempt to return to the take-off site. Clearly if there is any obstruction in the flight path, e.g. tree, building, it is likely the drone will fail. PLEASE DO NOT LOSE SIGHT OR RANGE CONTACT WITH THE DRONE. 23. When the flight is finished, turn off the drone first, followed by the control panel. 24. Re-fix the Gimbal lock P3 – After the flight Going through some basic checks after the flight could extend the life your drone and its components. This list following indicates a suggested checklist one can use after each flight: 1. 2. 3.

4.

When you leave the launch/landing site, make sure you have everything you arrived with. Visually check the area before you leave. When back at your base, redo the basic checks, (e.g. Spin your propellers and check the motor shafts etc.) Visually check the drone for damage, many keep a logbook where they record details of their completed flights, things the learned, and a maintenance/condition log for the drone. Before you store the drone, disconnect and recharge the batteries from both the drone and the controller.

References 1.

2. 3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8.

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Chapter 10

Back to Basics: Principles of Teaching That Will Never Expire Michael A. Christiansen* Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, Utah State University – Uintah Basin Regional Campus, 320 North Aggie Blvd., Vernal, Utah 84078, United States *E-mail: [email protected]

The modern internet forebodes potentially seismic changes to educational institutions across the globe, expanding both professors’ reach and students’ access. It also represents a likely source of disruptive competition to historically-insulated universities and colleges. Some consequently wonder: in the future, will the traditional tenured professor remain an unalterable fixture of postsecondary education, or eventually become a statistical novelty? While perfect predictive power remains impossible, one thing is likely: to stay competitive in an ever-shifting age of information, postsecondary educators would do well to prepare ourselves to adapt to new conditions and improve our teaching prowess. Regardless of what the future holds, our edge of efficiency and effectiveness will likely hinge on properly implementing fundamental teaching principles. To that end, this chapter’s author draws on 13 years of postsecondary teaching experience to summarize four such principles, which will never expire, but are often disregarded or poorly implemented. Though not all-encompassing, these indispensable principles are as follows: (1) avoid baffling jargon; (2) do not fear change, but be willing to learn new things; (3) love your students, love your job, and act accordingly; and (4) get to know your students, and modify your lessons to connect your course to their interests and academic goals.

© 2017 American Chemical Society

The Internet Is Changing Postsecondary Education. Will We Be Ready? In their 2011 book, The Innovative University, authors Clay Christensen (a Harvard Business School Professor and disruptive innovations expert (1)) and Henry J. Eyring (current BYU-Idaho president (2)) assert that the means of delivering higher education—and by extension, the modus operandi of higher-ed institutions themselves—have remained historically insulated from significant disruptive changes, due to the prior absence of technologies that might unseat the status quo (3, 4). However, Christensen and Eyring also warn that the previously-nonexistent internet now represents this very kind of disruptive innovation, which may affect seismic shifts in higher education and may even imperil vulnerable institutions who stalwartly resist appropriate change (4). In effect, some traditional universities and colleges, long shielded from innovative disruption, now face the reality of adapting, transforming, or obsolescing, thanks to the World Wide Web. Understandably, many educators and administrators at postsecondary institutions worry about what this academic disruption may portend. For example, Dr. David R. Wheeler, assistant professor of journalism at the University of Tampa, wrote for CNN News in 2014: “If higher education continues down its current path, full-time professors—already an endangered species—may become extinct. The reason: Uncontrollable fervor for online education” (5). Wheeler’s concern over a possible future extinction of traditional academics is not unique. For instance, in a 2012 Pew Research Center article summarizing responses from 1,021 postsecondary educators, administrators, and stakeholders, qualitative feedback included an intriguing statement from Dr. Michel Coconis, assistant professor of social work at Wright State University. Dr. Coconis’s prediction, which represents a common theme expressed by the study’s participants, seems to echo Wheeler’s aforementioned concern: Higher education will not even need all the buildings they are constructing because it will all be Walmart University. The best professors, based on someone’s criteria (I cannot yet specify) will be identified, recorded, perhaps have some enhancements, and then catalogued, and everyone can take those courses for their degree. I fear that everyone will get the same degree as this replaces high school, and perhaps the advanced education will eliminate courses such as liberal arts and focus on the technical aspects of a select few majors. I think most courses will be online with video/audio, and maybe writing will be minimal. It is possible that 2020 brings the move to hybrid, and that my scenario [occurs], say, [by] 2040 (6). While it obviously remains impossible to predict the future perfectly, significant changes in higher education undoubtedly await. We now live in a world where students often seek answers online instead of from their professors or textbooks (7, 8); and where the internet provides universities with new revenue options, such as online offerings (9, 10) or high-profit forums like Massive Open Online 172

Courses (MOOCs) (11, 12). Moreover, as budgets shrink at some institutions and traditional fulltime faculty often get replaced with less-costly adjuncts (13, 14), we naturally wonder what the future may hold for classic tenured professors. Will we remain indispensable fixtures of higher education, or will we become statistical rarities, destined for replacement by an elite few who dispense online courses, YouTube videos, and MOOCs? Again, the answer defies certainty. However, it would be wise to appropriately prepare. Applicably, in his review of a biography about world-famous chemist Henry Eyring (1901-1981), Dr. Jack Simmons, an emeritus professor at the University of Utah, wrote: “[Eyring said] that he worked harder than required because ‘if the economy goes to ruin and there’s only one chemist in the country with a job, it’s going to be me’” (15). Thus, in our modern world, where the internet has expanded competition to a global scale, and where new opportunities and challenges may invoke tumultuous shifts in postsecondary education, we need to work harder than ever, much like Eyring philosophized, to become the best teachers we possibly can. This chapter’s purpose, then, is to share crucial lessons housed within four fundamental teaching principles that I believe will never expire, regardless of what future technological innovations come: in effect, to arm you with the most critical teaching lessons I have ever learned. Some may argue that they are too basic, but I see university and college educators violate them often enough that they merit attention. Additionally, for all who aspire to bright futures in a postsecondary teaching world whose moors are shifting, and wherein the day may come when employment opportunities favor only the best, our professional destinies might depend on our mastery of such basics.

What Is the Author’s Postsecondary Teaching Background? I now preempt my central thesis to first explain my background. My goal here is not to sound arrogant, but to merely establish my credibility as a qualified, experienced, and outstanding science educator. Although my formal graduate and postdoctoral research training was in traditional lab-bench research, I am a teacher to the core: in other words, an educator first, and a chemistry researcher second. Advantageously (though I did not view it that way at the time), funding constraints during my graduate tenure often precluded me from fulltime lab research and instead afforded me a saturated teaching/TA load, dating back to 2004. As a result, I have been teaching college chemistry with very few interruptions for the past 13 years. The fact is, I absolutely love it. Teaching is not just what I do. It’s who I am. My current position as an associate chemistry professor levies a 70/25/ 5 split between teaching, scholarship/research, and academic service: that is, a 70% emphasis on teaching. Consequently, since starting my post at Utah State University (USU) in the fall of 2011, my research emphasis has shifted to chemical education, where most of my peer-reviewed publications now lie (16–20). My student evaluations are among the highest at my institution. In less than six years, I have received two institutional teaching awards and one educational grant. I 173

have a chemistry YouTube channel with over 3.2 million views (21). And my teaching success has led to my recent appointment as editor-in-chief of USU’s new peer-reviewed, cross-disciplinary journal, the Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence (22). Again, my purpose here is not to brag. I know that with all my strengths, I still (and always will) have many things to improve. Nevertheless, I hope to emphasize the fact that like you, I cherish teaching. I live it and breathe it. I read, work, and think about it continually. I have witnessed and have been guilty of both good and bad examples of it, and I wish to convey to you some of the most crucial lessons I have learned over the past 13 years: teaching principles that will never expire, regardless of what the future brings.

Teaching’s Intangibles Sometimes Make Its Evaluation Difficult and Subjective All of us have undoubtedly witnessed both good and bad teaching. However, unlike mass, velocity, length, or volume, it is nearly impossible to objectively quantify. This is complicated by the fact that there are countless examples of outstanding teaching styles and personalities, even within the same field. In other words, proficient instruction encompasses diverse methods and individuals, and though we typically recognize it when we see it, effective teaching is difficult to measure. One reason for this is that unlike the metrics of pure physical science, teaching is an art, replete with much of the variable and intangible subjectivity one encounters when evaluating poetry, literature, paintings, or sculptures. At its foundation, however, good teaching must not only transmit knowledge and information, but also enthuse, inspire, and kindle students’ interest, often in areas and ways that they had never previously considered. With that said, there are certain broad teaching principles that any educator, from any field, would do well to apply. Though not all-encompassing, I now list four that are indispensable but all too often disregarded.

Four Principles of Teaching That Will Never Expire Principle 1: Avoid Baffling Jargon It was August of 2012. Sitting in a massive conference room in Salt Lake City with hundreds of other postsecondary science educators and professionals, I watched the lights dim as our National Science Foundation (NSF) speaker, Chris Mooney, introduced an unforgettable YouTube video entitled “Turbo Encabulator” (23). Based on a satirical paper written by engineer J.H. Quick in 1944 (24), this 1977 video features classic narrator-actor, Bud Haggart, using a bewildering cacophony of meaningless technobabble to describe a fictional device. Though likely not the intent of this humorous video’s original creators, Mooney’s purpose in sharing “Turbo Encabulator” with us was clear: that 174

when talking about science, we scientists often use so much baffling jargon that laypeople cannot understand what we do or why it’s important. In fact, the primary purpose of the NSF’s workshop (“Science: Becoming the Messenger”) was to teach science professionals how to “develop writing and new media skills, to hone their public presentations and even to produce video” (25). In other words, to teach scientists how to clearly communicate to nonscientists the significance of what we do. Appropriately, this NSF workshop was led by television and communications experts, instead of scientists. The need for such a workshop became readily apparent when Mooney invited a professor—who was given weeks of advance notice to prepare for this—to take the stage and spend a few short minutes explaining her research to him, while he roleplayed as a layperson. Her instructions were straightforward: keep your explanation brief and simple enough for a nonscientist to understand. After a quick moment, the professor began: “Well, to understand my research, you must first understand the difference between prokaryotes and eukaryotes.” I almost involuntarily face-palmed, and disappointingly, her explanation only got worse, becoming ever more complex and bewildering as she continued. By the time she finished, even I, as a PhD organic chemist, had no idea what she was talking about. Now, I was almost certainly not the most intelligent person in that room, but the fact that the NSF is even holding such workshops (which have occurred annually since 2011) confirms that many of us scientists struggle with this particular issue. I accordingly reemphasize Principle #1: avoid baffling jargon. We postsecondary educators in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math) fields are among the greatest violators of this principle. In fact, this NSF workshop helped me to better realize my own deficiencies in this area. I consequently returned home and spent time developing a one-sentence, vernacular-free explanation of my own research, which I now readily dispense to laypeople who inquire. I invite you to consider doing the same. So, how does Principle #1 apply to teaching? Well, for some unfathomable reason, many professors seem to think that the more words they say, the better they are teaching. This is incontrovertibly false. The truth is often the very opposite: generally (and there are situational exceptions), the fewer—but more effective—the words you say, the better you are teaching. Many years ago, I was assigned as a TA to take notes and hold study sessions for students enrolled in a large undergraduate lecture course. Although the guest lecturer instructing the class was very kind and patient, he was also an agonizingly terrible teacher. His greatest flaw was that he could not teach chemistry with words that regular humans can understand. Even the simplest of questions, such as “How much time is given for each exam?”, were met with responses that included terms like “eigenvalues,” “vectors,” and “Schrodinger’s equation.” Here is the point. KEEP. IT. SIMPLE. If the answer is “yes,” say “yes”. If the answer is “no,” say “no.” If the answer is “50 minutes,” say “50 minutes”. Do not attempt to baffle your students with technical jargon, in a quest to make yourself look smart. When it comes to your field of study, you are smart. You don’t need to prove it. Answer students’ questions directly and with the simplest terms possible, not the most complex, so that they have the greatest chance of understanding. 175

Now, some confusion is unavoidable. By their nature, STEM fields are especially laden with technical vocabulary, which we educators have to use. In doing so, however, we should not worsen things by adding perplexing balderdash when simpler terms would suffice. Why use 10 words, when one is enough? Given the critical importance of STEM fields to society’s future (26, 27), tremendous resources have been devoted to decreasing our students’ attrition rates (28, 29). Some of that attrition emanates from factors beyond educators’ control, such as student underpreparedness (30, 31), disinterest (32), or other variables (33). Nevertheless, when we teach poorly, we bear some responsibility for our students’ flight from STEM, and that failure often flows from misapplying Principle #1. In saying this, I do not suggest that we dumb down our subjects, but only that we avoid unnecessarily “smarting them up” by making them more complicated than needed. One of the best ways to improve in this area is to practice out loud. If necessary, warn your colleagues, to avoid worrying them. Then, alone in your office, practice teaching your courses’ most technically-difficult concepts. Film and watch yourself. Listen to the terms and phrases you use. Where helpful, write them down. Where feasible, eliminate unnecessary words or phrases and replace complex terms with simpler ones. As you do this through multiple iterations, it will help make you a superior teacher.

Principle 2: Do Not Fear Change. Be Willing To Learn New Things Many individuals berate university educations as too expensive and ineffectual at preparing students for future careers (34, 35). Some ask, “Why can’t a university education simply prepare students to enter the workforce?” The fact is, if students traverse their entire university experience believing that its sole purpose is to give them job training, then we professors have failed them. Centered focus on job training remains the prerogative of technical institutions and colleges, but the university’s purpose is different. In the words of USU Associate Professor Matthew Sanders, “The primary purpose of college isn’t learning a specific set of professional skills; the primary purpose of college is to become a learner” (36). Cognitively, the brain is like a muscle. The more we use it, the more neurologically-complex it becomes, and the more our ability to learn new things, and to learn them more quickly, increases (37–39). Thus, one of the most important skills a university student should gain from a college education is the ability to learn how to learn. When armed with this skill, the student or lifelong learner becomes more mentally nimble and readily adaptable to any career or career change, regardless of what the future brings, which new fields emerge, or which previous fields disappear. For me, this is the best answer to the classic student question, “When am I ever going to use this?” The frank response is: you students may never use this specific thing that we’re teaching you right now. But the process of memorizing new facts, absorbing new theorems, interpreting data, critically thinking, and solving 176

new problems—even if you never use them in your career—will keep your brain honed and sharpen your ability to learn new things. That ability is indispensable, especially if you one day face the reality of having to change career paths or completely move from one field to another. When I started my career as a USU teaching-emphasis professor in 2011, I had no formal training in education research. And yet, it is now my primary academic focus. Additionally, when I decided to investigate flipped learning (19), I had never previously made and posted a video online. And yet, I now employ YouTube as a major source of content delivery. How did I gain these skills, for which I had no prior training, and which became increasingly relevant to my new teaching-emphasis position? By learning them. And why was I able to do that? Because through all of my prior schooling, I had gained one of the most arguably important skills one can obtain from a university education: the ability to learn how to learn. This skill and adaptability applies to us professors, as well. Whether accurate or not, resistance to change remains one of the most commonly-cited features of academic culture (6, 40, 41). One might imagine a professor declaring, “I’ve been teaching this topic the same way for 50 years, and I’m not about to change now!” As educators, sacrosanct immutability denies our students the opportunity to learn new discoveries in our fields, or to learn them with updated and more effective methods or teaching techniques. On the other hand, continual and purposeless change, mercurially chasing every new fad or theory, may waste precious time and resources with little payoff. Hence, striking a proper balance between these two extremes (no change versus constant change) should be our goal. Along this journey, we educators should proceed with appropriate prudence and caution, but also with courage. Do not be afraid to change how you teach, merely because it requires you to change. As I experienced with flipped learning (and hopefully with many other aspects of my teaching in the future), changing how we teach can sometimes lead to previously undiscovered frontiers that we eventually cherish and wonder how we ever lived without.

Principle 3: Love Your Students, Love Your Job, and Act Accordingly In an expression of where he placed his priorities, a personal mentor of mine frequently told me in graduate school, “Students are what we do.” Notice that he did not say “research,” “committee work,” “grants,” “publications,” “consulting,” or “conference presentations.” He said “students.” Though it may defy reason, I love my students almost as much as my own children. After all, without them, I wouldn’t have the opportunity to enjoy this career that I cherish so deeply. In saying this, of course, I do not mean that I love my students romantically or in an unprofessional or inappropriate way. I only mean that I care deeply about them, and I suspect that as a postsecondary educator, you feel similarly about your students. If not, then you’re probably in the wrong career. Principle #3, then, manifests itself in various ways, of which I will now summarize a small handful. 177

The postsecondary teacher-student relationship is unique in at least one way: in exchange for them paying us, we give them work to do. We should remember, however, that without their patronage, our jobs would not exist. Hence, we should take the time to thank them for being our students, even if only once or twice per semester. In doing this, we should not engage in groveling, flattery, insincerity, or a lack of appropriate professionalism toward them; or inadvertently make our students think that we like them so much that they can leverage or manipulate us for higher grades than what they earn. We should simply thank them for enrolling in our classes, so we can do what we love: teach them. Next, we should ensure our students that the grade they earn is not a reflection of how we feel about them personally. We may have some detestable students who earn A’s, or likeable students who fail. Nevertheless, the grades they receive are what they earn, not what we give them. We don’t give grades. Students earn grades. Next, we should never be offended by questions, even if they challenge what we teach. Time constraints often preclude us from answering, especially when questions are off-topic, but when necessary, we can civilly assure inquisitive students that we will happily answer their questions outside of class, through office hours, email, or other appropriate forums. As educators, we should encourage curiosity, not stamp it out when it becomes inconvenient. As an example, during my postdoctoral years, I did extra work tutoring students in general and organic chemistry. One day, two of my students told me that in their lecture class, someone asked the professor a completely reasonable question, which many other students also had, but were too afraid to articulate. The professor was visibly upset by the interruption, but still answered the question. Upon finishing it, however, the professor censured the student in front of the class for “wasting the class’ time” by asking such a “stupid” question. The professor’s rebuke was apparently so humiliating that the student left the room in tears, never to return again. I reemphasize, then, that we should not be offended by questions or vilify a student for asking them. When time is limited, we can respond by sincerely saying something like, “That is a great question. I am so sorry, but I do not have time to answer it right now. However, can you please email me that question as soon as class ends? I promise I’ll answer it later.” We then answer the question through email, office hours, or other appropriate means, such as a written or filmed response to the entire class, uploaded to our course management system (CMS). Relatedly, we should never be afraid to say, “I don’t know the answer to that question. I have never thought about that.” Too many professors fear this. I do not know why, having never seen it cause problems. Do some professors assume that by telling students there are some things we do not know, that suddenly the students will doubt everything we teach? Perhaps, but students may find it more frustrating to hear a professor give a rambling answer that sidesteps the original question, instead of just saying, “I don’t know.” With that said, when this occurs, a good instructor will pledge to look up the answer and share it later with the student or the entire class. Moreover, a good instructor will also follow through with that pledge. 178

Next, we should grade our students’ work and give them feedback as promptly as we reasonably can. An illustrative example comes from a current USU administrator who previously served as director of another multi-campus institution in the western United States. One summer, he received a complaint from a student, whose final grade in a class had not yet been submitted by the professor, due to the student handing in late work. The late hand-in time, however, was caused by extenuating circumstances and had been prearranged and agreed to by the professor. It was now the start of the summer term, and the student’s spring graduation was being threatened by the grade’s holdup. Upon sending emails to the professor to politely request that the final grade be submitted—conditions to which the professor had agreed in advance—the student eventually received the response: “I am currently off-contract. I will submit your grade in the fall, when I return.” Thus, the professor knowingly jeopardized a student’s graduation by refusing to submit a final grade—an act that could be done completely online, in just a few minutes—because he had a nine-month contract, and it was currently one week into the summer term. Evidently, doing even a few minutes of work outside of the contracted period seemed anathema to this particular educator. The administration had to intervene, and the student graduated on time. Next, we should show enthusiasm and love for our fields. As much as possible, speak with passion, fervor, and excitement; and avoid making your lectures dreary, monotone, inflectionless sermons. When you teach with energy and enthusiasm about your field, students notice, and it helps them enjoy what you teach. Relatedly, we should never express dislike for our jobs in front of our students or colleagues. Even professors who love every facet of their job face occasional bad days and frustrations. Do not openly manifest or express these negative feelings to your students, or they may believe that you do not like your job, and by extension, that you do not like them. Furthermore, as much as possible, avoid burdening your colleagues with your frustrations, as they are also facing their own challenges. Instead, when necessary and appropriate, discuss serious problems with your administrators. Otherwise, grit your teeth, toughen up, and focus on what you love about your job. Next, we should reply swiftly to our students’ emails or texts. Most modern college students have grown up with digital communication from the time they were small children. They are not accustomed to waiting three to five days for a response. It follows that students will prefer professors who answer their emails or texts within 24 hours, to those who do not. Last, we should suppress the tendency to stereotype students and instead focus on their tremendous potential, regardless of their backgrounds. We do not know and cannot see what our students will one day become. In fact, our ability to do so may be hampered by our own biases. As a result, we should strive to see every student as having great potential, regardless of appearance or background, and then act accordingly. An applicable quote, often attributed to writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, says, “If I accept you as you are, I will make you worse; [but] if I treat you as though you are what you are capable of becoming, [then] I [will] help you become that” (42). 179

Principle 4: Get To Know Your Students, and Modify Your Lessons To Connect Your Course to Their Interests and Academic Goals Years ago, my family visited a dentist who was being shadowed by a first-year dental student. Upon hearing that I attended graduate school in organic chemistry, the dental student innocently asked, “Organic chemists don’t actually do anything, do they?” I was disappointed—not with the dental student, but with the organic chemistry professor who had presumably taught him years earlier—because his professor had evidently failed to make any lasting connections between organic chemistry and dentistry, or even between organic chemistry and real life. This represents a lack of properly implementing Principle #4. As an aside, I suggest that if you teach organic chemistry, then at minimum, you should tell your students multiple times each term that this field is used to make medicines. This can connect the subject to virtually all students’ personal lives, because nearly everyone has taken an over-the-counter or prescription medicine and has accordingly benefited from organic chemistry. Making such connections is the essence of Principle #4. Though often harder for large classes, to start using this principle, you must strive to learn your students’ names. Additionally, a CMS-facilitated entrance survey (or other appropriate questionnaire) can allow you to learn things about your students’ degree majors, academic interests, or reasons for taking your course. With this knowledge in hand, you can now modify your lessons to help connect your students’ interests to what you teach. For example, if you teach a freshman general chemistry class that is being taken by a large number of engineering majors, you might modify some of your lectures to show how certain chemistry principles apply to engineering. Alternatively, if a later section of that course includes a heavy concentration of pre-veterinary students, then you can shift to make in-class connections to veterinary science. Although the circumstances and mode of implementation may vary widely, the objective remains the same: to pique students’ interests by helping them connect your subject to their personal lives, passions, and professional futures. With that said, Principle #4 must be used with caution and prudence, as poor execution can backfire or even lead to legal repercussions. For example, asking students overly personal or invasive questions, or openly discussing their interests or academic performance in class, may offend them, drive them away, or even violate institutional policy or national law. Furthermore, depending on your method and reasons for employing this principle, you may also need to seek the preapproval of an Institutional Review Board, or other applicable entity. When in doubt, consult your administration first. Despite such possible hang-ups, when implemented properly, Principle #4 can increase students’ engagement and interest in your class, draw them in, and help them feel a deeper connection to you, their peers, and the concepts you teach. In the end, these factors can all combine to produce greater learning. My execution of this principle comes as a direct consequence of my evolving use of flipped learning in my classes (43–45). To explain, in “flipped learning” (or “flipped classroom”), lectures are prerecorded in advance and posted online, where 180

students watch them outside of class. Students then spend in-class time doing higher-learning activities or problem sets together, facilitated by the instructor. Thus, the locations of lecture and traditional homework have been “flipped”, with lecture occurring outside of class and traditional homework being done in class. Through five years of employing this pedagogy, I have found that its greatest strengths lie in the fact that it frees up class time and makes my in-class structure less rigid, which allows me to get to know my students better, address higher-order questions or misconceptions right when my students face them, and connect course concepts to my students’ individual interests and personal lives. To explain, I keep an extra laptop at my class lectern, which includes an open document listing all my students’ names, along with other appropriate information I obtain from a CMS entrance survey during the first week of class. As the semester unfolds, I periodically ask individual students to tell me interesting (but not overlypersonal) things about themselves, such as their hobbies, favorite movies, music, food, and so forth. I then discreetly record this information in my open document. I call these inquiries “bridging questions” because their purpose is to help form an eventual “bridge” (or connection) between the course’s concepts and my students’ personal or academic passions (16). To achieve this goal, whenever a student asks a concept question, I quickly look at the information I have recorded about that student and then try to give a response that answers the student’s question while also connecting the concept to the student’s interests. For example, I once used bridging questions to discover that before attending USU, one of my students had previously played basketball at a junior college. When that student later asked a question about molecular orbitals, I attempted to relate my answer to basketball. Obviously, it is not always easy (or sometimes even possible) to seamlessly relate certain topics to every conceivable student hobby or passion. However, this is not necessarily bad. In fact, students often find it humorous and engaging when their interests are awkwardly shoehorned into seemingly un-relatable subjects. Thus, this technique requires the instructor to stay lighthearted, flexible, and adaptable. Through bridging questions, I have been able to make uncounted connections between my students’ personal interests and course content. Additional examples include: •

•

• •

I once related the chemistry of fossil fuel combustion in military vehicles to a student’s personal interest in auto mechanics. (The student happened to be an army mechanic.) I once connected water purification chemistry to a recent lead contamination of drinking water in Flint, Michigan, for a student who was originally from Michigan. I once discussed the chemistry of pesticides and fertilizers with a student who lived on a farm. I once addressed a long series of questions about the chemistry of cosmetics for a student who had previously worked in the cosmetics industry. 181

Again, I would never have known about these students’ personal interests or backgrounds if not for bridging questions, and my ability to use bridging questions would be limited without the time flexibility created by flipped learning (16). For more information about bridging questions, I invite you to consult reference (16). Regardless of which techniques or approaches you use, your students’ ability to connect your course content to the real world and their personal lives will help them value what you teach. I accordingly reemphasize the importance of getting to know your students and modifying your lessons to bridge their interests and academic goals to your course content.

Conclusions Although the internet will likely effect significant changes to higher education in the future, it also expands individual teachers’ sphere of influence across the globe. While traditional career paths like public and private education will undoubtedly continue, new teaching opportunities certainly await. These include fully-online courses from both traditional and private institutions, as well as the possibility of educators starting their own free or for-profit teaching websites. For the latter, despite a lack of formal accreditation or official academic resourcing, when helmed by skilled educators, such websites may provide valuable supplemental instruction to help struggling students around the world. In the end, an expanded online reach likely signifies increased global competition. While a growing understanding of how to employ new techniques and technologies becomes ever more important, in the end, no such implements, bells, or whistles can adequately compensate for bad teaching. Thus, I believe the victory will ultimately go to those who have mastered the basics. I accordingly outline and explain what I believe to be the four most important teaching principles I have learned through 13 years of postsecondary education: • • • •

Avoid baffling jargon. Do not fear change. Be willing to learn new things. Love your students, love your job, and act accordingly. Get to know your students, and modify your lessons to connect your course to their interests and academic goals.

Some individuals may wish to avoid change, or yearn for simpler times before the internet and its incumbent competition. By analogy, some past individuals likely wished that civilization would remain fixed in eras when village blacksmiths, town coopers, manufacturers of horse-drawn carriages, or VCR repairmen were vibrant, ubiquitous, and relevant professions. In the end, human technological advancements have always brought growing pains. However, they also deliver greater conveniences, opportunities, solutions, and an increased quality of life. As the internet and other technologies alter the professional future for postsecondary educators, our impetus to remain competitive, nimble, and prosperous may depend on various factors; but fundamentally, it will always come back to our ability to 182

be outstanding teachers. To the degree that we implement these basic-but-critical teaching fundamentals, we will emerge victorious.

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Editors’ Biographies Michael A. Christiansen Mike Christiansen (Ph.D., Brigham Young University) currently serves as an associate professor of Chemistry & Biochemistry at Utah State University, Uintah Basin (USUUB), located in eastern Utah. With a background in synthetic-organic chemistry, Mike’s attention turned to chemical education after joining USUUB in 2011, and 10 of his 19 peer-reviewed publications are now in this area. Mike teaches general, organic, and biochemistry lectures and labs and was recently appointed Editor-in-Chief of USU’s new cross-disciplinary journal, the Journal on Empowering Teaching Excellence. Mike has an infectious passion for teaching and frequently asserts, “Teaching isn’t just what I do. It’s who I am.”

John M. Weber John M. Weber (Ph.D., Colorado State University) is an Assistant Professor of Chemistry at Utah State University Eastern campus in Price, Utah. His role statement comprises 90% teaching and 10% service. He teaches General Chemistry and Organic Chemistry as well as Introductory and Nursing courses. Covering a teaching assignment for his Ph.D. mentor led him to teaching at Colorado State for two years before making teaching a career at Utah State. He has served on two General Chemistry exam writing committees with the ACS Exam Institute and is the co-Director of the Rural Health Scholars program at USU Eastern.

© 2017 American Chemical Society

Indexes

Author Index Ang, A., 37 Christiansen, M., ix, 171 Deri, M., 75 Fung, F., 37, 99, 155 Geyer, A., 1 Jackson, D., 115 Jeyaraj, A., 99 Lim, R., 37

Mann, M., 55 McFarland, B., 137 McGregor, D., 75 Mills, P., 75 Naik, G., 19 Watts, S., 155 Weber, J., ix

191

Subject Index C Chemistry education, application of social media findings, 45 apps for experiments, students’ opinions, 47t Instagram and Snapchat, students’ overall opinions, 51t laboratory teaching after not using these apps for experiments, students’ opinions, 50t organic synthesis experiments, Instagram and Snapchat, 49 students’ opinions, 46t future work and closing remarks, 52 Instagram and Snapchat, differences in approach, 44 summary of the differences between, 45t Instagram and Snapchat, similarities in approach, 43 laboratory teaching, challenges faced by learners and facilitators, 38 limitations, 52 methodology, 39 Instagram, flowchart of the steps taken to upload content, 42f Snapchat story, flowchart of the steps taken to upload, 41f Snapchat and Instagram usage, overview, 37 teaching, rationale behind the integration of social media apps, 42

D Desktop streaming conclusion, 72 live streaming, current academic uses, 59 need for accessibility, project history, 57 most trafficked websites, 58 OBS and YouTube, troubleshooting Issues, 66 online troubleshooting, finding the log files, 68f OBS scenes, 62 background image, adding, 63 scene, adding a background image, 64f

scene, adding a new window, 65f scene, adding webcam footage, 64f webcam, adding in feed, 63 online learning, 55 live review session, example, 57f personal experiences, observations, and shortcomings, 68 communication, perceived shortcomings, 70 making mistakes, 71 review session participation for fall 2016, summary, 70t standard web conferencing, comparing YouTube live, 69 YouTube audience, 70 YouTube live vs. Facebook live, 71 YouTube live account, linking OBS, 61 OBS, entering in your YouTube stream, 62f YouTube video basics, 59 YouTube, three ways for finding the Creator Studio, 60f YouTube live page, 61f Drones in chemical education, application chemical education and research, future of drones, 162 chemistry education, ubiquity of videos, 155 concluding remarks, 162 drone pilots and basic training package, procedure, 163 drones, brief introduction, 156 drones, review on current use, 156 educational purposes, drones, 157 soil sampling video, snapshots, 158f potential drawbacks and safety precautions, 159 proposed drone usage by students, perceptions, 159 drone training, feedback, 160 potential application of drones, learners’ perceptions, 160t tester X commented, 161 tester Y commented, 161 why the drone is useful, 158

F Facebook case studies overview, 4

193

case study, capturing, 1 case study learning artifacts example exam question, 8f learning artifact #1, 6 learning artifact #2, 7 learning artifact #3, 7 learning artifact #4, 7 case study philosophy and pedagogical methods, 3 case study results character profile essays and reflections, assessment, 11 comfort, class distribution, 13f example case study poll, 9f Facebook posting analysis, 8 mission, values, and other disciplines, connecting to university, 11 overview, 8 student case study perception, 12 students accessing new resources, distribution, 10f conclusions and future work, 13 Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), 14 Facebook fundamentals, 4 Facebook Group, 5 social media and science, 2 online American adults, social media usage, 3t

course evaluations, excerpts, 91t overview of student criticisms, excerpts, 93t student perceptions, 90 introduction and background, 76 GENI website, online tools for teaching large laboratory courses, 137 conclusion, 150 introduction, 138 physical chemistry, survey, 149 using the GENI website, 140 Biochemistry I, 145 Biochemistry II, 148 biochemistry projects, screenshot, 141f biochemistry protocol, screenshot, 142f GENI, biochemistry projects completed, 144t GENI, primary technical characteristic, 143 homology modeling, 147 online Enzyme Similarity Tool from the Enzyme Function Initiative (EFI-EST), 146 research cycle, flowchart, 145f Upload Results tab, screenshot, 142f

I G General chemistry courses, using technology, 75 conclusion, 94 context (who we are), 77 course details clicker question and its explanation, example, 88f course website, complete topic page, 80f flipped classroom courses, topics covered, 79t guided Let’s Practice problem, 84f in-person components, 86 learning goals, 81t online components, 78 online homework, 83 online homework problem, example, 85f overall course grade distribution, 90t videos, 82t workshop, 89 flipped classroom, outcomes

Instructor YouTube channel, 115 delivery of course content, YouTube as a platform, 117 Dr Jackson UGA Chemistry YouTube channel, 118f type-as-you-listen closed captioning utility, 118f instructor YouTube channel, how to build, 119 course and unit differentiation, naming of the playlists, 123f Cyberlink Screen Recorder, screen capture program, 121f first lesson, recording, 120 PowerDirector workspace, 122f raw video, editing and rendering, 121 YouTube channel, uploading to the course, 122 limited student-instructor contact, 116 open channel, student engagement and analytics, 123 channel Analytics tab, partial overview, 124f

194

course channel, student survey responses, 133f device type, total channel views, 129f expanded lifetime view totals, 125f fall 2015 and fall 2016, viewership data, 126f fall semester 2016, student survey data, 132f first semester organic chemistry, video key playlist, 130f plotted average view duration over time, 130f registered YouTube users, autogenerated age and gender viewership data, 128f segment of spring semester 2017, total views, 127f student survey data, 131 open educational resource, YouTube, 119 summary, 133

T Teaching, principles, 171 author’s postsecondary teaching background, 173 changing postsecondary education, internet, 172 conclusions, 182 four principles of teaching principle 1, 174 principle 2, 176 principle 3, 177 principle 4, 180 STEM, postsecondary educators, 175 teaching’s intangibles, 174 Teaching and learning chemistry, role of iOS and Android mobile apps atoms, elements, and periodic table, mobile apps, 22f advanced molecular viewing apps, 26f chemical bonding theories, mobile apps, 25f electronic configuration and chemical bonding, mobile apps, 24f mobile apps suite, Gray, Theodore, 23f

molecular viewing mobile apps, 26f periodic table application, Gray, Theodore, 23f chemistry dictionary and reference mobile apps, 30 comprehensive chemistry reference apps, 31f chemistry labs, mobile apps, 28 chemistry lab experiments, mobile apps, 29f classroom instruction, mobile apps, 20 classroom projector screen, HDMI adapters and cables, 21f conclusion, 33 general chemistry concepts, mobile apps for learning, 21 introduction, 19 learning organic chemistry concepts, mobile apps, 27 organic chemistry apps, Hartel, Aaron M., 28f organic chemistry reactions, 27f student learning using mobile apps, 32 average student success rate after curriculum update, 33f average student success rate before curriculum update, 33f Technology-enabled blended learning experience (TEBLE) discussion EdTech in chemistry, 110 new applications, 111 future work and concluding remarks, 112 introduction, 99 methods filming IPOV videos, instructor wears the Google Glass, 106f flipped classroom video lectures, 109 Google Glass, 105 GoPro, 101 lightboard, 107 presenting chirality, illustration of limitations, 110f recorded teaching on the whiteboard, traditional method, 108f recording IPOV videos, effective method, 102 two GoPro cameras, demonstrator, 103f

195