Colleagues:
A few years ago, I stopped worrying about how many points to allocate to
lab vs lecture when I converted both of my upper-level botany courses
(Plant Form & Function and Plant Diversity) to a workshop format. In that
context, each of the two three-hour sessions per week is a combination me
lecturing for a while, and students looking at specimens, performing
experiments, etc for the remainder of the time. Thus, there is no lab
grade or lecture grade. Instead, each exam is a mix of theory-based
questions as well as questions that are based on specimens that students
view.
This workshop approach is borne out partly out of my attempt to inject some
inquiry-based learning (thanks Gordon Uno), as well as a desire to have
students realize the tight interconnection between theory and reality. The
workshop format seems to work well, judging from the fact that my students
(who are mostly pre-med) like the courses, and the overall class
performance is high.
Ken K.
Kenneth M Klemow, Ph.D.
Department of Biology
Wilkes University
Wilkes-Barre, PA 18766
(717) 408-4758
kklemow at wilkes1.wilkes.eduhttp://wilkes1.wilkes.edu:80/~kklemow
