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Abstract: Chemistry education research has revealed numerous challenges students face learning organic chemistry, including barriers learning chemistry’s language, interpreting, rationalizing, and predicting mechanistic processes and driving forces, and curricular limitations connecting organic chemistry to broader contexts. In this presentation, I will more describe some of these challenges, explain our efforts at addressing them with a redesigned curriculum, share our associated research findings, and suggest possible uses of research findings in courses. Given the recent unprecedented attention and changes to teaching and learning, I will also invite us to consider what values will drive us going forward. What do learners need to prepare for the next steps in their education, their careers, and the rest of their lives? What evidence might we gather to empirically test our decisions? In what ways might the chemistry community come together as educators, researchers, and other professionals to launch chemistry education to the next level?
Bio-sketch: Alison Flynn is a Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biomolecular Sciences at the University of Ottawa and university’s Associate Vice-Provost, Academic Affairs. She is a 3M National Teaching Fellow, Canada’s highest recognition for excellence in education at the post-secondary level and a member of the Global Young Academy. Her work includes developing open-access online learning tools and flipped course structures to support student learning, especially in high enrolment classes. Her research group studies student learning in organic chemistry (FlynnResearchGroup.com) and how students develop learning skills more broadly. As uOttawa’s Chair in University Teaching, she developed and is studying the impacts of a new Growth & Goals Module for students. She has been a Director on eCampusOntario’s Board and of the Canadian Society for Chemistry as Director of Accreditation, and is the inaugural associate editor for chemistry education research with the Canadian Journal of Chemistry. In all her work, she is committed to helping students succeed in their chosen careers and goals.
Location
McClelland Park, Room 105
Presenter
Dr. Alison Flynn Professor, Associate Vice Provost, Department of Chemistry, The University of Ottawa
Hosted by: Dr. Vicente Talanquer