PAL Icon

BIOL 1: Biodiversity, Evolution, and Ecology

Chunk Information, Discussion Engagement, Active Group Learning

Reflection on Instructional Change:

We are shifting the introductory biology course to focus on engaging in discussion and interpretation of peer reviewed literature and lecture topics. Students have traditionally been reluctant to engage in large group discussion of materials and rely on the few more confident students to answer when prompted. I employed a few techniques from ACUE to foster confidence in participating in group discussions:

1. I provided prompts ahead of discussion for students to keep in mind as they read the material.
2. I gave students a brief chunk of time to discuss things they understood and summarize the paper within their group of 2-3 students prior to engaging in the whole-class discussion.
3. I implemented a rubric for students to self-assess their participation in paper discussions.

Students generally improved as a whole over the semester in terms of their engagement in the discussions with better responses from individuals to the discussion of in-class activities compared to the independent reading or peer-reviewed papers. Still individuals became more confident with asking their peers about concepts or observations derived from the reading with each encounter during the semester.

Of the learning activities from the ACUE Course Activities I encountered over the 2025 spring semester, the Demonstration Videos and the Practice and Reflect Written Assignments, greatly influenced my approaches to instruction. Seeing these demonstrations allowed me to see examples of how these practices were implemented in large and small group settings. The Practice and Reflect writing work allowed me to plan and reflect on how the implementation of various practices were impacting student engagement in the course activities for the week.

Evidence of Instructional Change

Images of Active Learning Practices
Providing students guidance on an activity in lesson on phylogenic relationships.	Example of group term project	Example of Resources gained in the course of the ACUE class helped to develop better ways to engage students in lectures

Practice and Reflect on: Planning Effect Class Discussions

Course Syllabus: BIOL1 Activity Syllabus

Faculty Bio

Faculty Biography
	My name is Amanda Coen and I am Biology instructor in the NSM Department. I have been teaching introductory biology lab and discussion sections for three years and participate in teaching ecology and evolution for non major students when courses are available.

Sponsors
	This work was supported by: National Science Foundation Hispanic Serving Institution Project STEM Zone DUE 1832335 US Department of Education Hispanic Serving Institution Project Degree with a Purpose P031S210061 US Department of Education Hispanic Serving Institution Project STEM4Equity P031C210012 *Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation or the US Department of Education.