Beyond the gateway: measuring course impact via reflection in a student-centred introductory course
Posters
Overview
Overview
abstract
Instructors of Level I undergraduate “gateway” courses hope that their students build useful skills and practices. A new course at our institution, designed with student input (within a students-as-partners model), aimed to form incoming students’ perception of what it means to study in the Faculty of Science. Our study was designed to go beyond the usual institutional evaluations by investigating whether the course is substantially useful to students beyond the environs of the course itself.
Our methods include weaving pedagogical research design into course design in a novel way, embedding reflective writing into students’ workflow, and using qualitative data analysis software to help identify and map fields of “impact” on student attitudes, behaviours, and decision-making processes. These elements are transferable to courses in a wide range of fields, and our results will be used to demonstrate the range of insight that this type of reflection-based research can provide instructors.
