collaborative learning

Co-creating the Research League: Into the Multiverse of REx Workshops

cdtlsd Paper Presentations , , , , , ,

Losheini RAVINDRAN* and John Leo CAINES
Undergraduate Research Coordinating Team, Office of the Provost (PVO) 

*loshr1@nus.edu.sg

 

Ravindran, L., & Caines, J. L. (2023). Co-creating the research league: Into the multiverse of REx workshops [Paper presentation]. In Higher Education Campus Conference (HECC) 2023, 7 December, National University of Singapore. https://blog.nus.edu.sg/hecc2023proceedings/co-creating-the-research-league-into-the-multiverse-of-rex-workshops/

SUB-THEME

Interdisciplinarity and Education

 

KEYWORDS

Undergraduate research, collaborative learning, Undergraduates Research Opportunity Programme, UROP, REx, course upgrade

 

CATEGORY

Paper Presentations 

 

ABSTRACT

This paper focuses on interdisciplinarity and education, and the role of the REx programme in building partnerships with the various departments and disciplines across the campus. Research Experience, known as REx is a course upgrade to the UROP (Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme) course. The pertinence of research in undergraduate education has been underscored in the recent innovation and development efforts of today. Given the rising importance of the research and innovation sector, it is important for the institution to work towards providing quality research education for students in the very early stages of their undergraduate education. In pursuit of contributing to increase the number of undergraduate students engaged in research, the REx course upgrade programme was conceptualised to provide students with a strong foundation in research by introducing them to topics which include formulating good research questions, constructing good hypotheses, choosing optimal research methods, writing a research paper, and communicating research professionally.

List of REx workshops offered by the REx programme
Figure 1. List of REx workshops offered by the REx programme. 

 

The course upgrade design of the programme has been structured in a way that the running of each workshop provides an introductory interaction with the topics and caters to the general research foundational needs of students across the various disciplines. This ensures that there is sustainability and consistency associated with the learning of the REx workshops and programme at large (Hansen, 2000).

 

Workshops such as “Ethics in Research” focused on that idea that educational experience is interaction, particularly in the form of “free communication” (Garrison, 2015, p. 14), where students were given the task of analysing various case studies that posed an ethical dilemma in research. This enabled students to have more space in brainstorming the thought processing of ethical factors without any inhibitions. This interaction facilitated greater critical thinking in developing greater awareness about what were the considerations to be made when dealing with human participants, for instance.

 

It is pertinent to note that these workshops were collaborations with the various units in NUS. The workshop “Research Methodologies” was conceptualised with regular discussions with NUS Libraries, and the expertise of colleagues from the NUS Centre for Future-ready Graduates (CFG) was sought for the workshop “Career in Research”. We have also opened our discussion and collaborative efforts with external vendors that aim to explore effective ways in communicating data and also reached out to Kontinentalist to conduct the “Data Storytelling” workshop. This REx-branded workshop received much support from our faculty colleagues and students. The reason for our consistent pursuit in seeking partnering opportunities with the various units (and relevant research organisation/industries moving forward) stems from the sense of shared purpose and mutual interdependence in achieving intended learning outcomes in promoting research to undergraduates, given the benefits of collaborative approaches to higher-order learning (Garrison, 2015). We are focusing in moving towards a collaboration in forming a cohesive research ecosystem than a cooperative one, given that cooperation deals more with a common task than a common goal.

 

We have been cognisant of the importance in measuring the effectiveness of this collaborative pursuit in making research an enriching experience for students enrolled in the UROP+REx programme and collated students’ feedback. For example, in the feedback data for the seminar “Research with Visual Narratives”1, 61% of REx attendees liked the hands-on segment of learning how to design a comic. Most of the REx fellows shared that the seminar was well-facilitated and encouraged them to brainstorm the various illustrative dimensions to any research undertaking.

Quote highlighting feedback findings for Research with Visual Narratives seminar.
Figure 2. Quote highlighting feedback findings for “Research with Visual Narratives” seminar.

 

Although all the REx attendees found the seminar to very useful in communicating research to the general public, the REx attendees from the Faculty of Science felt that most of the time, unless their research is some large scaled scientific discovery, they will be communicating and presenting their work to other fellow peers in the same field as them. Hence, they felt that a formal presentation or something like a scientific poster would be expected in such cases rather than an informal presentation. While these considerations pose the question of the level of relevance of this approach across the disciplines, it is significant to note that more than half the number of attendees saw a visual narrative approach in presenting research as a tool of communication that connects audiences across various disciplines.

 

Hence, REx’s pilot efforts reinstate the possibility of venturing into a “multiverse” of research learning possibilities across various disciplines, with the common shared purpose in making research an insightful experience that propels undergraduate education towards a collaborative learning ecosystem.

 

ENDNOTE

  1. This seminar teaches students how to look closely at visual narratives. The main examples are comics/graphic novels, but including brief discussion of other types of narrative visual media, such as film, animation, and even memes. Looking at some recent publications that present complex theoretical concepts in comics format, students will learn how visual narratives direct our attention and create meaning.

 

REFERENCES

Garrison, D. R. (2015). Thinking collaboratively: Learning in a community of inquiry. Taylor and Francis.

Hansen, R. E. (2000). The role and experience in learning: Giving meaning and authenticity to the learning process in schools. Journal of Technology Education, 11(2), 23-33. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/8234

Kortz, K. M., & van der Hoeven Kraft, K. J. (2016). Geoscience education research project: Student benefits and effective design of a course-based undergraduate research experience. Journal of Geoscience Education, 64(1), 24-36. https://doi.org/10.5408/15-11.1

Semingson, P., Smith, P., & Anderson, H. I. (2018). The Community of Inquiry framework in contemporary education: Emerging research and opportunities. IGI Global

Undergraduate Research Coordinating Team, PVO. (2023). REx Programme Pilot Report.

 

Does Promoting Diversity of Opinion in Collaborative Learning in Conservation Enhance Student Learning?

cdtlsd Paper Presentations , , , , ,

Ian Zhi Wen CHAN
Department of Biological Sciences, Faculty of Science (FOS)

ianchan@nus.edu.sg

 

Chan, I. Z. W. (2023). Does promoting diversity of opinion in collaborative learning in conservation enhance student learning? [Paper presentation]. In Higher Education Campus Conference (HECC) 2023, 7 December, National University of Singapore. https://blog.nus.edu.sg/hecc2023proceedings/does-promoting-diversity-of-opinion-in-collaborative-learning-in-conservation-enhance-student-learning/

SUB-THEME

Communities and Education 

 

KEYWORDS

Diversity, collaborative learning, learning outcomes, learning objectives, conservation

 

CATEGORY

Paper Presentation 

 

ABSTRACT

The use of pedagogical techniques to promote collaborative learning has wide-ranging social, psychological, and academic benefits for students (Panitz, 1996; Laal & Ghodsi, 2012). Academically, the successful implementation of collaborative learning results in increased student motivation, improved learning, and generally enhanced classroom results. However, there exist many potential pitfalls along the process of forming and working in groups which can detrimentally affect learning (Bitzer, 1999), such as differing motivation levels amongst group members and potentially disruptive interpersonal conflict. It is important for educators to be aware of these hazards to manage them well.

 

One area that would benefit from further study is how diversity in groups affects learning outcomes. In the literature, diversity is often seen as a challenge to be overcome (Ashman & Gillies, 2013) or a problem to be solved through collaborative learning as a form of social intervention, e.g. see the Jigsaw method (Aronson, n.d.) and Loes et al. (2018). Anecdotally, educators typically try to achieve a balance—too little diversity may lead to less robust discussions and groupthink, whereas too much could cause excessive conflict (Barkley et al., 2014). Yet, how the presence (or absence) of diversity in groups affects eventual academic outcomes such as the achievement of learning outcomes is generally not well researched—as an exception, see Curşeu et al.’s (2018) study on the benefits of gender diversity. In this study, I ask whether assigning students to work in groups with diverse views on a divisive topic in Conservation Biology enhances their learning.

 

Today over 42,000 plant and animal species are threatened with extinction. Conservation action is crucial to protect them but many academics and practitioners disagree fundamentally on what kind of action should be taken. Together with the emotional and evocative nature of the problem, this has led to heated arguments, even in the literature. In an attempt to update Soulé’s (1985) original “Traditional Conservation”, Kareiva and Marvier (2012) put forth new ideas which became known as “New Conservation”. These ideas did not sit well with Soulé (2014) who said, “[…] it does not deserve to be labelled conservation” (p. 895), prompting replies from Marvier (2014) “New Conservation is True Conservation” and others. Over the past two years, I have observed a similar (if less vocal) divide amongst my students in the course LSM4262 “Tropical Conservation Biology”, and I ask whether assigning students with differing views on this divisive topic to the same group will enhance their learning over the course of a semester.

Students’ opinions on three issues in conservation—people-centredness, the role of science, and the role of capitalism—can be broadly used to identify whether they prefer “Traditional Conservation”, “New Conservation”, “Market ecocentrism” or “Critical social science”.
Figure 1. Students’ opinions on three issues in conservation—people-centredness, the role of science, and the role of capitalism—can be broadly used to identify whether they prefer “Traditional Conservation”, “New Conservation”, “Market ecocentrism” or “Critical social science”. Adapted from The Future of Conservation (n.d.).

 

At the beginning of this semester (Semester 1, AY2023/24), I will use my students’ opinions on three issues to identify their preferred approach to conservation (Sandbrook et al., 2019; Figure 1). As far as possible, students will be distributed into groups of four students—each with a different preference—and these groups will go through the same learning activities (e.g. class discussions) and assessments (e.g. preparing and presenting a case study) as the cohort from the previous year which was randomly sorted into groups. I will compare these two cohorts based on: (i) their academic performance as assessed by me using rubrics designed to evaluate their improvement in the course’s learning outcomes, and (ii) student self-reported learning using pre- and post-surveys and reflection assignments. These results are intended to inform educators designing collaborative learning activities on whether intentionally introducing diversity to groups can enhance student learning.

 

REFERENCES

Aronson, E. (n.d.). History of the Jigsaw. Retrieved from https://www.jigsaw.org/history/.

Ashman, A. F., & Gillies, R. M. (2013). Collaborative learning for diverse learners. In C. E. Hmelo-Silver, C. A. Chinn, C. K. K. Chan, & A. M. O’Donnell (Eds), The international handbook of collaborative learning (pp. 297-313). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203837290.ch17

Barkley, E. F., Cross, K. P., & Major, C. H. (2014). Collaborative learning techniques: A handbook for college faculty. John Wiley & Sons.

Bitzer, E. M. (1999). Pitfalls and bridges: Co-operative and collaborative learning in higher education. South African Journal of Higher Education, 13(1), 11-17. https://hdl.handle.net/10520/AJA10113487_892

Curşeu, P. L., Chappin, M. M., & Jansen, R. J. (2018). Gender diversity and motivation in collaborative learning groups: the mediating role of group discussion quality. Social Psychology of Education, 21(2), 289-302. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11218-017-9419-5

Kareiva, P., & Marvier, M. (2012). What is conservation science? BioScience, 62(11), 962-69. https://doi.org/10.1525/bio.2012.62.11.5

Laal, M., & Ghodsi, S. M. (2012). Benefits of collaborative learning. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 31, 486-90. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2011.12.091

Loes, C. N., Culver, K. C., & Trolian, T. L. (2018). How collaborative learning enhances students’ openness to diversity. The Journal of Higher Education, 89(6), 935-60. https://doi.org/10.1080/00221546.2018.1442638

Marvier, M. (2014). New conservation is true conservation. Conservation Biology, 28(1), 1-3. https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.12206

Panitz, T. (1999). Benefits of cooperative learning in relation to student motivation. In Theall, M. (Ed.) Motivation from within: Approaches for encouraging faculty and students to excel, New directions for teaching and learning. Josey-Bass Publishing.

Sandbrook, C., Fisher, J. A., Holmes, G., Luque-Lora, R., & Keane, A. (2019). The global conservation movement is diverse but not divided. Nature Sustainability, 2(4), 316-23. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-019-0267-5

Soulé, M. E. (1985). What is conservation biology? BioScience, 35(11), 727-34. https://doi.org/10.2307/1310054

Soulé, M. E. (2013). The “new conservation”. Conservation Biology, 27(5), 895-97. https://doi.org/10.1111/cobi.12147

The Future of Conservation (n. d.). About the debate. Retrieved from https://futureconservation.org/about-the-debate.

 

Skip to toolbar