Sounds of explosions reverberate through chemistry classrooms as UW-Madison instructional specialist Jim Maynard breaks the monotony of the traditional approach to teaching by doing live demonstrations of scientific experiments.
Maynard develops and facilitates interactive activities for students to receive the most beneficial education experience. He emphasizes active learning, even in lecture halls containing as many as 300 students.
“We’ve been approaching that in a way where we have made some of the experiments and demonstrations more interactive. Do less talking and more asking,” Maynard said. “We are trying to get students’ opinions and have them be involved with observing the chemistry, understanding what they are seeing and drawing their own conclusions.”
Maynard collaborates with the REACH program to enhance these approaches and include more independent comprehension and peer guided teaching.
“We are redesigning the whole curriculum, not just one individual piece of material, but the whole thing to be more student-focused and peer-guided,” Maynard said. “The goal is for the students to teach themselves and each other during their own education.”
These strategies rely on students engaging with the material and having access to the concepts presented in the classroom, so he uploads lecture recordings online.
“We’re not trying to replace anybody, we’re just trying to give the students every single avenue to learn that there is. Show them every possible way to get the information out there so they can succeed,” Maynard said.
The specialist’s central role is having students get the most out of their lectures. This often includes getting classrooms ready for professors, setting up lecture demonstrations and focusing on promoting the educational mission within the Chemistry department.
The mission stresses the importance of using these approaches to help qualified students master their course skills and take their scientific skill into any field.
“Our goal is never to fail people. Our goal is to get as many people well-qualified and going into science and technology,” Maynard said. “I understand it’s not easy. There has been pushback because it’s not easy, but in the long run, we want mastery so students can build those strategies that they can use in any field.”
