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Custom Course Bots & Learning Analytics
Join The Learning Data & Analytics Affinity Group for their next online event: Custom Course Bots & Learning Analytics Tuesday, April 30, 12:00pm – 1:00pm Online Zoom event: Register here! Many courses are beginning to offer custom genAI bots in the course site. We’ll convene for an open discussion guided by these questions: (a) When […]
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Spring 2024 Harvard i-lab & HILT Faculty Seminar
Spring 2024 Harvard i-lab & HILT Faculty Seminar: Project-based Learning / Learning-by-doing The Harvard Innovation Labs (i-Labs) and the Harvard Initiative for Learning & Teaching (HILT) would like to invite all Harvard faculty to a seminar on Wednesday, April 10th from 3-4:30 pm at the i-Labs. Our goal is to convene instructors from across […]
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2023 HILT Conference
The 2023 HILT Conference comes at a pivotal time when artificial intelligence (AI) is becoming increasingly discussed and experimented with in higher education. AI holds immense potential to enhance personalized learning experiences, automate administrative tasks, and provide data-driven insights to improve educational outcomes. However, its deployment also raises important questions and challenges. It is crucial to address concerns related to privacy, bias, transparency, disinformation, and the impact on human agency and social dynamics within educational settings. Together, we will explore how AI can be designed, implemented, and governed in a way that prioritizes human relationships and connection in education. By considering the ethical and social implications, as well as the affordances, we aim to shape a future where generative AI tools are used to empower learners, support educators, foster inclusivity, and promote a holistic approach to education. -
Building virtual community in a foundational class
Much like all our faculty across the University, Dr. Tamara Kaplan, Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School, shifted the pre-clinical neuroscience course, Mind, Brain, and Behavior, to a remote learning space this past year. In addition to considering curricular materials, Dr. Kaplan and her team agreed that it was especially important to think about the learning environment and students’ social connection with the material, the teaching faculty, and other students. As a result, they developed several systems to foster this social sense of community and “combat the sense of isolation and disconnectedness that can result from online learning” in her class. All course instructors recorded three-minute introductory videos about both their career/research and personal interests. Dr. Kaplan used Canvas to send students daily announcements with learning objectives, key points that came up that day in class, and friendly support. A balance of synchronous and asynchronous communication was used to minimize student burnout and make sure students stayed engaged. Finally, the team built in time for genuine connection with daily half-hour breaks between classes for students to get to know faculty and ask questions. Dr. Kaplan notes, “we realized that creating relationships with faculty is a huge driver of a positive learning environment.” -
The importance of incorporating mentorship into your teaching practice
Dr. Anita Vanka, Assistant Professor of Medicine and Associate Advisor & Director of Hinton Society at Harvard Medical School, co-directs Practice of Medicine with Dr. Katherine Johnston, Assistant Professor of Medicine. The eleven-month course involves several hundred faculty members at different teaching hospitals and is designed to teach first-year medical and dental students how to effectively interview and communicate with patients, perform a thorough physical exam, reason through diagnostic possibilities, and translate findings effectively in both oral and written form. Given the size and breadth of the course, Drs. Vanka and Johnston developed a mentoring system which allows for each student to meet with an assigned faculty advisor at their hospital site several times a year. These meetings encourage faculty to develop personal relationships with the students, oversee their clinical progress, provide feedback, and guide students into setting goals for their learning and progress. -
Bridging practice and theory in the professional classroom
Dr. Richard Schwartzstein, Ellen and Melvin Gordon Professor of Medicine and Medical Education, is revolutionizing textbook-dependent classrooms by incorporating real-life applications. In this case, first-year Harvard Medical School students apply their reading through case simulations. A robot functions as the patient, and a small group of students take on various roles to work together and treat the patient. Students are supported by a facilitator, who offers guiding questions but no direct answers, as well as the rest of the class, who serve as consultants or in other supporting roles in the case, like the patient’s family. “Instead of a paper case, now it feels much more real. And suddenly, they’re immersed in taking care of a patient,” Dr. Schwartzstein reflects. After a simulation ends, the whole class debriefs the case, including what students struggled with and how they felt during the exercise. -
How Good Accessibility Practices Enhance Online Teaching
When it comes to accessibility, it’s much better to be proactive than reactive—especially when designing major components of your courses. Furthermore, designing accessible courses helps provide equitable educational opportunities and added benefits for all learners. Join us to learn more from our panel of accessibility experts from across the University about the ways in which accessibility practices enhance classroom teaching and learning. -
Understanding pathophysiology with real-life vignettes
Barbara Cockrill, Harold Amos Academy Associate Professor of Medicine, uses case-based collaborative learning (CBCL) in her Homeostasis I course to help medical students explore real-life clinical scenarios they may face as practitioners. Case discussions start in cohorts of four students, formed at the beginning of the course, and focus on a series of questions. Discussion continues with the full class of 40 students, facilitated by Cockrill and other medical school faculty. -
ProjectBeta.id
ProjectBeta is a platform that aims to improve mental health literacy among parents in Indonesia by providing mental health curriculum made by experts in the form of articles and practical videos to help recognize, manage, and prevent mental illness in children; it is also giving instant access to the clinician. -
ADITUM
ADITUM is a medical e-learning platform -
Building Teaching Professional Development for Harvard Graduate Students involved in STEMM Educational Outreach
Awardees will create and curate professional development resources for evidence-based inclusive teaching that is specifically tailored to Harvard graduate students involved in STEMM outreach programs. -
University-Wide Human Rights Curriculum
We seek to bring together the brilliant minds of the different Harvard Schools to create a space for knowledge sharing and discussion regarding human rights issues around the world. -
Helping students see themselves as scientists
When Dr. Kevin Eggan, Professor of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology, did research as an undergraduate, it “transformed for me what science was and what it could be.” His Precision Genetics and Gene Therapy year-long course offers sophomores a similar opportunity. In the fall, students are introduced to a “jamboree of recent medical discoveries in Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).” Working in small groups, they explore and then choose a gene to focus on. In the spring, they continue in small groups to experiment on mice, learn tools for analyzing the data they generate, and present to their peers, instructors, and external experts along the way. -
Knot.
Case logging, which is required for all procedures, is completely manual and consequently time-consuming, inaccurate, and costly. Knot automates this process and enhances the case log to contain all of the knowledge gained from a procedure, and give residents back their time so that they may instead learn, study, perform research or learn surgeries to better serve their patients. -
Collab-O
The project aims to fulfill the need of future leaders who are conversant with the problems, have global networks and comprehensive understanding to find solutions in a collaborative One Health approach. -
MentorMEd
MentorMEd is a phone apps (which works almost like the dating apps) for mentorship combining mutual 'like' feature and matching tags percentage. -
How to improve the learning experience in core clerkships at Harvard Medical School?
The project focuses on medical students' core clerkship experiences. -
KolaboraSIM
Awardees plan to provide an immersive virtual reality simulation using 360-degree videos to place participants in a representation of a complex teamwork situation. -
Identifying knowledge gaps through illustrations
Dr. Carl Novina, Associate Professor of Medicine, and his co-instructor Shannon Turley, amended the traditional graduate seminar Critical Reading for Immunology to teach students comprehension and presentation skills essential to a career in biomedical science. -
Perspective-taking and humility training with medical case studies
Dr. Sadath Sayeed, Assistant Professor of Global Health and Social Medicine, introduces issues of ethical reasoning in medicine (e.g., confidentiality, professional boundaries, conflicts of interest, informed consent) with hypothetical cases and vignettes.
