Stress is a huge factor affecting student performance. While it is most acute when dealing with traditionally anxiety-provoking subjects such as math, it’s seen even when they are dealing with relatable subjects, such as psychology.
Given the direct effects of stress on social interactions, learning, memory, motivation and more, this semester we might look at new ways to reduce it to manageable levels.
The idea is to make it easier for them to move from automated, ‘low-level’ responses to calculated ‘high-level’ ones.
We will be discussing memory techniques, reminding them of work by Ebbinghaus, Miller, Loftus and others, to help them study better.
And by promoting the scientific method, which we will discuss and argue about, too, we should hopefully have a better handle on how research really works – through a process involving both discovery and elimination.
To understand the students better, we will also discuss their interests on the Discussion Board and form a WhatsApp (or other social media) group.
In the asynchronous class, a Zoom meeting will be held soon after they post the material. If all goes well, this could mean that the students can form bonds with both peers and faculty, and also be a little more assured when they take a deep dive into the dense material.