Hi All:

 

These demos are what we typically do for school groups and for our annual campus open house – Picnic Day.  Keeping a good distance between the audience and the performer (yes, Monona – we call them “performers”), engineering as much risk out of the demo as possible, talking through the hazards with those performing the demo, good oversight and training, etc. and I’m comfortable with how the demos are presented.

 

That said – the video did make me cringe because the person performing the demos is really annoying.  And _really_ cavalier about what she’s doing.  They may have just snipped out the “juicy bits” for the news piece but the message seems pretty laissez faire from the performer.

 

To Harry’s point about tenure and promotion based (in part) on student evaluations:  maybe gee-whizzy demos engage students and translate to good evaluations.  But that’s the point, isn’t it?  Good teaching engages the student in learning.  I have a professor who uses a lot of demos in his teaching but he’s also an excellent instructor!  He gets stellar evaluations (and has a waiting list for his lectures) because he engages students, beyond the demos he uses to illustrate the pedagogical point.  To those instructors who get crappy evaluations – up your game!  Sheesh!   Figure out how to deliver the curriculum outside of the Oxford model of instruction – from the 1800’s!  Unfortunately, R-1 institutions (mine, included) don’t always value good teaching or support instructors to employ well-researched, modern teaching techniques to engage students.

 

<soapbox off>

 

Debbie

 

Debbie M. Decker, CCHO, ACS Fellow

Past Chair, Division of Chemical Health and Safety

University of California, Davis

(530)754-7964

(530)304-6728

dmdecker**At_Symbol_Here**ucdavis.edu

 

Birkett's hypothesis: "Any chemical reaction

that proceeds smoothly under normal conditions,

can proceed violently in the presence of an idiot."