Boris’ Headache

Case Study

Boris has been teaching Chemistry 11 at a regional high school in the Bulkley Valley of northern BC for over a decade. He uses his school district’s Moodle server to disseminate lecture notes, lab forms and to answer student questions outside of class time.
Over the years he’s found a distinct gap between some students’ performance in laboratory exercises and their exams. In particular they seem to have difficulty transferring what they learn about the Periodic Table in their labs (and readings) to their exam work. Some students do well, but they are those who find it manageable to memorize the entire table: students who cannot, who comprise about half his students in any given year, are the ones who struggle.
There isn’t a single hour of extra time for Boris to spend on Periodic Table review in class. He does have some extra handouts to give students who want more practice, but knows these only scratch the surface – substantive review would require a more detailed and systematic approach.
Boris is trying to find some way to create a stand-alone, self-directed review tool for students learning the Periodic Table. It should allow students to review material, then test their knowledge. In a perfect world it would give students instant feedback that not only tells them if they’re right or wrong: it would give them formative feedback that helps them move towards the right answers.

Boris seems to be in a state of confusion at the moment. Though his intentions are clear, he is being overwhelmed by the large percentage of his class that is struggling; and rightly so. Boris needs to adopt Moodle exclusively as his learning platform. Through this channel, he would be able to make up for lost time and have all his activities under one umbrella. He can upload youtube tutorial videos dealing with the issue. As a result, students can view these videos at their own convenience and provide comments. In addition, he could design his tests in Moodle where they can be done and marked instantly and feedback provided