Meeting Abstract
Getting undergraduates to take notes is a struggle. They either write nothing or attempt to write every word. I have a background in teaching 6-12 science and have done professional development for K-12 classroom teachers for a several years. I constantly try methods and strategies from secondary levels in my classroom. One thing I’ve recently tried is making study tools that seem more like an activity that actually learning the content or taking notes. In lower grades “foldables” are often created and kept in a composition book using lots of construction paper, colored paper and markers, etc. I call the ones we make in my classes, grown-up foldables. White paper and a pencil or pen do just fine unless the student wants to “decorate” theirs. I let them know they are not graded, they are their creations and their study tools. Sometimes we make the foldable as a class as we go through the lecture and sometimes I put pictures of a sample on our digital platform and encourage them to make a foldable on their own as a way to study. I tried this with my 2019 Summer I Non-Majors Biology class and when the students came in for the final, they had all their foldables to continue reviewing for the exam. Students in that class even suggested other topics that would be good in a foldable. I’m not a research scientist. I have no data. I am a hand-on, brains on, non-majors, community college biology educator trying to make students realize they need to know some basic biology. If they have a little fun, make a “flappy thing” as one student called it, and learn something, it’s a success!!
