The A&P Professor: Desirable Difficulty | More Web Meeting Skills

Students want things easy. We often make it hard for them. Host Kevin Patton discusses desirable difficulty and contrasts it with undesirable difficulty. Did you know that healthy human cells have little sections of 4-stranded DNA? We can be better in our web meeting skills. And don't forget our new online community of anatomy & physiology faculty!

00:46 | G4 DNA
05:58 | Sponsored by AAA
06:38 | Even More Web Meeting Ideas
18:55 | Sponsored by HAPI
19:55 | Desirable Difficulty
35:35 | Sponsored by HAPS
36:26 | Our New Online Community
39:54 | Staying Connected

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G4 DNA

5 minutes

Oh come on? Is there really a quadruple-strand DNA in our normal, healthy cells? Or is that only in space aliens? Or zombies?

Quadruple-stranded DNA seen in healthy human cells for the first time (news summary of the discovery) my-ap.us/2RXp7Vt
Single-molecule visualization of DNA G-quadruplex formation in live cells (journal article in Nature Chemistry) my-ap.us/2EwXr6O
Image: G-quadruplex by Julian Huppert my-ap.us/3i70AIv

Even More Web Meeting Ideas

12 minutes

Yep, more Zoom. In this segment, Kevin talks about unintended harmful effects of banter, comments on home webcam locations, and turning off video. Plus some advice on backgrounds, both real and virtual. And stuff.

Communication, Clarity, & Medical Errors | Episode 55
Pandemic Teaching
Zooming While Black | Videoconferencing from our private spaces opens a lens on cultural authenticity, professional image, workplace code-switching and white privilege. (article by Shonda Buchanan) my-ap.us/2S3doEQ
Krisp artificial-inteligence noise-eliminator theAPprofessor.org/krisp
4 Tips for Choosing the Best Virtual Backgrounds on Zoom Meetings (blog post) my-ap.us/2EBNN2Z
pxhere (free photo site) pxhere.com
Unsplash (free photo site) unsplash.com
Some sample images suitable for Zoom virtual backgrounds:
- Dramatic sky my-ap.us/3j6Mk3F
- Wilderness my-ap.us/2G9yU8z
- Sunrise my-ap.us/2GcetHU
- Forest road my-ap.us/2S49P1f
- Misty my-ap.us/2FXAQ4j
- Broken sunlight my-ap.us/349gA7w
- Chalk board (black) my-ap.us/3cA78xW
- Green chalk boards my-ap.us/338dFwV
- Geometric shadows my-ap.us/3mWAL1f
- Wood planks my-ap.us/36dHiPb
- Book shelves my-ap.us/337maIg
- Leeds Library my-ap.us/335wwZl
- Gladstone's Libary my-ap.us/3cz4l86

Desirable Difficulty

15.5 minutes

Robert Bjork proposed that the difficulties posed by retrieval practice, spacing, and interleaving are desirable difficulties that improve learning. But there are undesirable difficulties that do not help learning. Why must learning be difficult? How can we avoid undesirable difficulty? Hey, wait! Aren't we supposed to make learning easy for students?!

Communication, Clarity, & Medical Errors | Episode 55
More on Spelling, Case, & Grammar | Episode 56
Desirable Difficulties Perspective on Learning (Robert Bjork's brief summary of his concept) my-ap.us/3kM0asE
Making Things Hard on Yourself, But in a Good Way: Creating Desirable Difficulties to Enhance Learning (Elizabeth and Robert Bjork's contribution to Psychology in the Real World) my-ap.us/3i1Sv7J

Our New Community

3.5 minutes

Take The A&P Professor experience to a new level by joining the new online private community away from distracting social media platforms, tangle email threads, and the roiling sea of available webinars.

Discussions that matter. In our private space, we can have the vulnerability needed for authentic, deep discussions. Discussions not limited to a sentence or two at a time.
No ads. No spam. No fake news. No thoughtless re-shares. Just plain old connection with others who do what you do!
Privacy. The A&P Professor community has the connectivity of Facebook and Twitter, but the security of a private membership site. None of your information can be shared outside the community, so you can share what you like without it being re-shared to the world. Like your dean, for instance. In our community, you can share your frustrations freely. And find support.
No algorithms. You get to choose what you want to see. You curate your own feed, selecting only those topics that interest you. Join subgroups that resonate with who you are—or who you want to be.
Access to mentors and like-minded peers. Our community is made up of all kinds of people from all over the world, each with different perspectives and experiences of teaching A&P. Find members near you—or far away. Connect with members online at that moment.
Courses, groups, and live events. As the community grows, we'll add mini-courses and micro-courses—some with earned micro-credentials, live virtual office hours with me and other mentors or guests, private special-interest groups, and more.
There is a very modest subscription fee to join our community. All subscriptions include a free trial period!

Deep discount on subscription to The A&P Professor community (good all of September 2020) theAPprofessor.org/Insider20

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