ABSTRACTS - Learning Stack Sessions

NOTE: Learning Stack sessions are approximately 15-20 minutes (depending on how much time is allotted for Q&A). There are two presentations per 1-hour time slot.

All sessions take place in Butler-Carlton Hall on the Missouri S&T campus

THURSDAY, MARCH 12, 2020

Online gallery Walk: An Active Learning Technique for Large-Enrollment Courses

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenter: Dr. Jillian Schmidt - Assistant Teaching Professor of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering; Missouri S&T

Audience: Higher Education, K-12 Education

Time and Location: 12:15 - 1:00 p.m.; Room 121

This session will introduce and demonstrate an adaptation of the "Gallery Walk" active learning technique for large enrollment courses. The Gallery Walk technique typically involves students working together in groups to answer questions or solve problems on display boards stationed around the classroom, then rotating around the room to view and comment on other groups' work. In a large course, it can be difficult to ensure that all students have a chance to view and process all other groups' responses within a single class period, so this activity has been adapted into a hybrid inperson/ online format, to allow students the time to view and reflect on all of their peers' solutions without taking up additional class periods.


From Fossils3D to PaleoApp: Developing e-Learning tools in Paleontology

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenters:
     Damián Cárdenas Loboguerrero - Graduate Student in Geosciences, Geological & Petroleum Engineering; Missouri S&T
     Dr. Francisa E. Oboh-Ikuenobe - Interim Associate Dean of Academic Affairs for the College of Engineering & Computing;
          Professor of Geosciences, Geological & Petroleum Engineering; Missouri S&T

     Jeff Jennings - Instructional Designer; Missouri S&T

Audience: Higher Education

Time and Location: 12:15 - 1:00 p.m., Room 121

The development of new interactive and student-centered eLearning tools in paleontology not only ensures distance students have access to teaching fossil collections outside the classroom/laboratory environment at their convenience, but also provides educational online resources for the devolepment of new blended courses in paleontology. Consequently, we have been digitizing the systematic paleontology teaching collection to develop an online database (Fossils3D) and a web app interface for desktop and IOS/Android devices (PaleoApp) to improve Missouri S&T students' learning experience.


The Granular Grading Rubric: Feedback that supports the student and the instructor

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenter: Dr. Jossalyn Larson - Assistant Teaching Professor of English & Technical Communication; Missouri S&T

Audience: Higher Education, K-12 Education

Time and Location: 12:15 - 1:00 p.m., Room 124

This session will advocate for a shift away from traditional rubric constructs for writing-intensive courses, and toward a "granular grading rubric," which assigns a small amount of points to specific components of a summative project rather than providing a large point pool for a few generalized criteria. The granular grading rubric eliminates grade ambiguity, speeds feedback delivery time, and reduces subjective grading practices. I will demonstrate how to convert a traditional rubric into a granular rubric, and we will discuss best practices for written feedback in formative and summative assignments.


Using Drawing Tablets with Zoom: Giving in-the-moment Visual Feedback Online

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenter: Dr. Sarah Hercula - Assistant Professor of English & Technical Communication; Missouri S&T

Audience: Higher Education, K-12 Education

Time and Location: 12:15 - 1:00 p.m.; Room 124

In this session, the presenter will discuss students’ use of drawing tablets as a tool enabling instructors to provide instantaneous feedback on students’ visual drawings during online synchronous instruction through Zoom. The presenter will describe her design of an online synchronous English grammar course with a focus on form-function tree diagraming: an analytical tool for grammatical analysis that involves students’ creation of hand-drawn visual diagrams. Sharing strategies for effective instruction in this setting and showing examples from her course, the presenter will explain how the technology works and suggest ways that this course setup might be adapted for use in other disciplines.


Technologically Guided Discussions to Increase Participation

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenters: 
     Dr. Devin Burns - Assistant Professor of Psychological Science; Missouri S&T
     Dr. Nicolas A. Libre - Assistant Teaching Professor of Civil, Architectural, & Environmental Engineering

Audience: Higher Education

Time and Location: 1:15 - 2:00 p.m., Room 124

A common problem with class discussions is that only a small number of students feel comfortable speaking up, yielding limited participation, especially in larger classes. We present the framework for a technologically enabled “guided discussion”, where students offer anonymous explanations and vote on their favorites, increasing participation and practicing critical evaluation skills. A civil engineering and a psychology professor will discuss their unique experiences implementing this tool in their separate domains, how it affected student learning outcomes, and what the students thought about it.


Initial Development of an Online Ecology Class

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenter: Dr. Dev Niyogi - Associate Professor of Biological Sciences; Missouri S&T

Audience: Higher Education

Time and Location: 1:15 - 2:00 p.m., Room 124

This presentation will review the process of designing, preparing, and teaching an online ecology class as a summer semester offering at Missouri S&T.  Dr. Niyogi received an eFellows grant from CAFE to support this development.  He taught the online class for the first time in summer of 2019, and had 18 students enrolled.  He will provide his opinions about the entire process, from designing and preparing materials to the actual teaching and assessment of the class.  Dr. Niyogi will also highlight some data from assessments and an evaluation of student performance.


Exploring the Effectiveness of Training in Increasing Cross-Culture Competency for a Global/Virtual World

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenter: Dr. Joan Schuman - Associate Teaching Professor of Engineering Management & Systems Engineering; Missouri S&T

Audience: Higher Education, K-12 Education

Time and Location: 2:15 - 3:00 p.m., Room 124

In our global/virtual world, engineering students have a greater need to develop cultural competency, but at least one study showed that students who travel to another culture for a short time saw no increase in cultural competency.  This work explores whether training students in cultural differences would in fact improve their competencies and possible reasons for the outcomes.  The results indicate that students who studied cultural differences throughout a graduate course showed on average no significant change in their cultural competency.

This research was funded in part by the CCDI mini-grant.


Engaging Students in an Online Web Course

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenter: Dr. Christi Patton Luks - Teaching Professor of Chemical & Biochemical Engineering; Missouri S&T

Audience: Higher Education

Time and Location: 2:15 - 3:00 p.m., Room 124

In 2019, a laboratory course was adapted as an online-only course. In order to develop a relationship with the students, the first assignment was a one-on-one teleconference. The hands-on activities of the course were modified as videos with the instructor as their lab partner. This presentation will discuss the efficacy of these techniques for engaging her students.


Diversity and Inclusion at Curtis Laws Wilson Library

LEARNING STACK SESSION (15-20 minutes)

Presenters: 
     Sherry Mahnken - Research Librarian at Curtis Laws Wilson Library; Missouri S&T
     Roger Weaver - Director of Library Operations and Scholarly Communications at Curtis Laws Wilson Library; Missouri S&T
     Ellen Cline - Research Librarian at Curtis Laws Wilson Library; Missouri S&T

Audience: Higher Education

Time and Location: 3:15 - 4:15 p.m., Room 124

As we move forward with online teaching and learning, we connect with people and places near and far from home, encountering a diverse range of opinions and worldviews. In cooperation with the CCDI mini-grant that the Library received in 2018, the Curtis Laws Wilson Library solicited opinions on diversity and inclusion from various stakeholders in the campus community and used that feedback to build and curate the library’s collection of diverse materials. We will share strategies for communicating with underserved campus populations, share insights on the project itself, and show how these new resources can be used to support students in both traditional and online learning.