Ideally, an opening class activity should allow class participants to get acquainted with one another and to remove pre-class distractions. It’s always challenging to design an opener that is related to the content of the class.

The “A-Z” word game is one possibility for a group activity: divide the class into groups of 3-4. Using large post-it notes on the wall, ask each group to come up with a word for each letter of alphabet that relates to the class content. Give each group 3-5 minutes and instruct them to work as fast as possible.

Can you think of words related to PubMed for each letter of the alphabet (not including PubMed, MEDLINE, or specific search terms)? “Z” can be difficult, but a recent group in one of our classes came up with an answer (see the photo).

The University of Minnesota’s Center for Teaching and Learning has created a page dedicated to using games in the classroom. Below is one example that can be used in-person or online as an ice breaker or a review.

http://www1.umn.edu/ohr/teachlearn/tutorials/powerpoint/games/index.html#twenty

The University of Pittsburgh Health Sciences Library System is trying a new approach to offering library instruction classes called FlashClass. FlashClass is based on the growing daily deal phenomenon of Groupon, Deal of the Day, CrowdSaving, Living Social, etc.

Read about it at: http://info.hsls.pitt.edu/updatereport/?p=5977

The title of the article I’ve linked to here is 5 Great eLearning Boredom Busters, however, I think the suggestions work for in-person presentations as well. I’ve listed the 5 suggestions below. Follow the link to read more and about each item and solutions.

http://info.shiftelearning.com/blog/bid/248676/5-great-elearning-boredom-busters

You’ve carefully prepared for and rehearsed your content for a class and you’re ready to go… but what are some training errors that can “kill” the training regardless of how much you’ve prepared?  In a recent blog post Bob Pike lists four training killers:  1) slow start; 2) a late ending; 3) asking “are there any questions?” and 4) using illegible graphics (the infamous, “you probably can’t see this, but…”).

Read more about those training killers and ways to avoid them:  “Some Training Room Errors are Excusable…“, by Bob Pike, published on May 4, 2012.

SaveMeeting is an app that records meetings on iPhone and Android devices. The app allows you to record the audio of your meetings, transcribe the audio, and share the recordings and transcriptions with others. Free (1000 minutes of audio) and paid versions are available. Works with a PC as well. Coming soon: SaveMeeting for iPad and Blackberry.

There is still time to register for the TOXNET® and Beyond in-person class to be held in Chicago, IL on April 4, 2012.  This is a free class and comes with 6 MLA CE credits.

This course is designed to convey the basics of searching the NLM’s TOXNET, a Web-based system of databases in the areas of toxicology, environmental health, and related fields. The course will also teach students how to utilize NLM’s environmental health and toxicology portal which provides resources beyond the TOXNET databases. Participants will learn the content and structure of files covering toxicology data, toxicology literature, toxic releases, and chemical nomenclature. Among the databases highlighted will be TOXLINE, the Hazardous Substances Data Bank (HSDB), the Integrated Risk Information System (IRIS), the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI), and ChemIDplus. The course will be conducted in a computer lab and includes lectures, online demonstrations, and hands-on exercises.

Register today!

Registration is now open for NTC spring classes! The NTC will be teaching PubMed® for Trainers in Houston, TX; Chapel Hill, NC; and Chicago, IL. TOXNET® and Beyond will be taught in Houston and Chicago. See the NTC class schedule and register now!

I can hear myself say it…Any questions?

From Elliott Masie’s Learning Trends blog: 9 seconds – The number of seconds between the time an instructor asks a question and the next sound that they make! Unfortunately, most teachers ask, “Any questions?” and, in less than 3 seconds, start to speak again.” It takes a learner many seconds to recognize that you have stopped teaching and asked for a question, review what you said, evaluate what they would like to ask, formulate the question, raise their hand and then ask it! Not possible in 3 seconds!! Masie suggests to extend your wait time to at least 9 seconds in order to give learners a chance to formulate a question and respond.

During recent in-person classes, the NTC trainers tried out a free online polling tool called Poll Everywhere. We polled the class participants with multiple choice questions to check understanding of concepts during class, as well as presenting an open ended text question to gather comments from the class. Participants can respond to the poll through a text message on their cell phone or through a web browser. Most of the NTC class participants used the web browser method since they were already sitting at a computer.

Overall we found Poll Everywhere easy to use; question set up was simple. The presenter can control whether the participants see the poll results immediately or wait until the voting is completed. During our recent classes, Poll Everywhere generally worked without problems; we had one glitch with the results of an open-ended question appearing immediately, but that may have been due to a network issue in the teaching facility. If you plan to have participants send a text message response, you may need to explain the procedure; we found the text message instructions for the open-ended question to be confusing.

We received good feedback from participants in the classes; told us they liked using the polling program and asked us for information about the program we were using.

Poll Everywhere is free for up to 30 responses per poll (you can have as many polls as you like). Larger classes would require purchasing a monthly plan. In summary, we have had good results with Poll Everywhere and think it’s worth a look for use with in-person classes.