Jaclyn Dee recently started implementing a Choice Project assignment in her courses, which as its name suggests, gives students lots of choices. Students can choose to opt in or out of doing the assignment, in which 10% of their grade moves from exams to the project, they can choose to work alone or in a group, and they can choose what type of project they want to work on from a list of possible options.
Below, Jaclyn describes why and how she includes the Choice Project in her courses, how students have responded, and what she has learned along the way.
What was your motivation for developing the Choice Project assignment?
I wanted to give people opportunities to demonstrate their learning in different ways, to learn about topics that interest them, to practice transferable skills, to network, to learn about research, to feel like they belong in the UBC community, to let them show off their strengths and talents, and to bring a piece of themselves into the class in a meaningful way. I also wanted to mark projects that I thought might actually be entertaining and educational for me to mark.
Student time was also a factor. I wanted students to have some flexibility in how they use their time in this class. I’ve worried about the extra burden of time on students when they have a project in class and they are expected to do that work outside of class time. I heard that ~70% of students have part-time jobs. I think group and independent projects skills are valuable, but I don’t think everyone absolutely needs to practice them in a second-year organismal diversity course unless they feel that it adds value to their experience, especially if they’re juggling a heavy course load, a job, and personal things. In the context of this class, I think it’s better for them to choose whether or not they want to build some of these skills, only if they feel it’s a priority for them.
How did you create and implement it in the course?
I had to develop a few partnerships with other folks at UBC to help run some of the activities. For example, in BIOL 209, Karen Golinski and Justin Ngo from the UBC Herbarium facilitated the student work in the Herbarium. In BIOL 111 this term, I’m working with Daniel Mosquin at the UBC Botanical Garden and Brianna Bristow from Let’s Talk Science. I created a Canvas page that had information on 4 different types of projects students could choose from. There were descriptions for the project types and where possible, I included examples of the types of products I was looking for. There were also rubrics, instructions, and timelines. Students were told that they had the option of doing one of these four types of projects or just choosing the default exam pathway. They had to opt into the project by the add/drop deadline.
What has been the result?
Students really enjoyed this last term in BIOL 209. I can tell by the work they did that they were able to extend their learning outside of the course content and link it to their lives outside the classroom. One student told me multiple times (unprompted) that he was so happy that he had an opportunity to go out and ID mushrooms, as it was something he had always wanted to try. Some people signed on to keep working at the Herbarium.
We’re going to be analyzing some of the responses in the student reflections and exit surveys to see what else students were getting out of this, but so far, it’s mostly positive comments. Some students did feel they needed more reminders and instructions and that is something that I had expected and will take into account in the future.
What have you learned or found surprising?
I was surprised by how much effort and care some people put into this. A lot of love went into the majority of these projects. I’m really proud of those students. I was genuinely moved by the emotional investment and vulnerability demonstrated by the students and their parents when it came to the projects investigating the use of fungi of cultural significance from their own background.
What challenges did you encounter when creating or implementing the Choice Project assignments?
I’m not going to lie. This takes time. Most of the time cost happens at the beginning though. Fortunately for me, I had the summer off to do Universal Design for Learning projects, so that’s really what enabled me to develop this project framework. I did have to offer some open lab times for students to work on their natural history collections and spend some time giving them feedback at the halfway point, but it was a manageable amount given that it was about 36 students out of 92 that opted into the project.
What advice would you give someone who wanted to incorporate something similar in their course?
Context matters. BIOL 209 (elective) and BIOL 111 (for non-majors) are not exactly required courses and I see them primarily as gateways for getting students more interested in botany and biology in general. Doing a project where they explore their own biological interests related to things we are learning in the course is in line with that goal. If fundamental biology concept learning is your main goal, I think this might be harder to justify.
Class size matters too. I can manage ~30 projects, but not 100 or 200. This term, I am doing it in a much larger class, but I have three TAs and I’ve allotted big chunks of TA time to help facilitate this work and provide feedback. If you want to give this a try, I would recommend starting with just 2 or 3 options and providing examples of the types of products you expect whenever possible.
Is there anything else you would like to share?
I’m happy to share instructions and rubrics and show you examples of student projects, if you’re interested. If so, you can reach me at jaclyn.dee@botany.ubc.ca.