Challenge
How do I reach students with unloved content? Example of unloved content: the science foundation course in the Faculty of Health Care.
Solution
At the beginning of a learning section, students are first motivated to pay attention by means of low-threshold everyday questions. Answers are collected, hypotheses are formed and solutions are worked out together afterwards.
Advantages
The reality of the students' lives is often diametrically opposed to the learning content. They often do not make the leap into the lecturer's way of thinking, or not quickly enough. Picking up the students by means of everyday phenomena helps them to do so.
Details
- Degree programme Health Care Management & Medical Informatics in FB10
- 120 to160 students
- 4 SWS in the first semester
The teaching concept includes the willingness to appreciate the students. A friendly atmosphere with a light entertainment character breaks the ice. The key of the concept is the participation in new topics on an initially low-threshold level: everyday questions and practical relevance as well as the subsequent joint development of solutions lead to the first sense of achievement. This increases curiosity about the next topics, which in turn can be successfully completed. This positive feedback loop leads to a stronger sense of self-efficacy.
Teaching/learning methods or digital methods
Short sequences from films (science fiction) form the beginning. After all students are watching, the question of feasibility is asked, which ideally cannot (!) be answered intuitively. The still continuing attention window of the students is used for a collection of possible answers, which in turn provide the basis for the hypothesis development. The necessary foundation courses for theory development are then tolerated by the students, as they want to know how the initial question is answered.
Stumbling blocks
Individual students already know the solution, which makes the further process less exciting. Or: The initial question is too complex and is simply not answered at all.
Recommendation
The presented method is strongly dependent on preferences and not feasible for all lecturers, but it is easy to implement.
Involved
Dr. rer. nat. Peter Klauth
