In pursuit of a holistic learning environment: the impact of music in the medical physiology classroom

2009 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-45 ◽  
Author(s):  
Harold I. Modell ◽  
Frank G. DeMiero ◽  
Louise Rose

A holistic learning environment is one that nurtures all aspects of students' learning. The environment is safe, supportive, and provides opportunities to help students deal with nonacademic as well as academic factors that impact their learning. Creation of such an environment requires the establishment of a supportive learning community. For a variety of reasons, establishing such a learning community of first-year medical students can be challenging. This communication presents one approach to meeting this challenge in a medical school Human Physiology course. Steps were taken at the beginning of the course to create the community, and activities designed to reinforce these efforts were incorporated into the course as it progressed. Two pilot studies were conducted to test the hypothesis that providing students with a participatory music experience may help to promote a holistic learning environment by helping them restore a sense of balance to their emotional well-being as well as reinforce a sense of community in the classroom. Student response to these activities indicated that these efforts provided emotional support during stressful periods during the quarter, helped promote a feeling of safety within the environment, and reenergized the class during long class sessions. This project illustrates that each instructor, within the confines of his/her own classroom, can make a significant contribution to achieving a holistic learning envrionment for his/her students.

Author(s):  
Sharon K. Andrews ◽  
Lisa Lacher ◽  
Todd Dunnavant

The instructor is an integral member of the educational environment through leading, facilitating, and supporting the development of a learning community. This is integrally important within an elearning environment, wherein motivational engagement is a potentially more nuanced environment due to the differentiation in time, space, and place. The instructor's philosophical belief systems highlight the potential for transformative social learning environments that directly impact the instructional design of the course, differentiating enhancements towards supporting user experience, as well as highlighting the potential for transformative impacts within learning environments as well as the holistic learning community. Advancing an enhanced understanding around the instructor's philosophical beliefs around the teaching and learning process strengthens not only the efforts of the instructor towards critical pedagogical understandings, but also the larger learning environment that includes the impact of the virtual world upon the digital connections that undergird communities of learning.


Author(s):  
Christine A. DeLucia

The application of mindfulness practice in education has been a growing area of interest in research. Some of the benefits of mindfulness practice in education include increased focus and concentration, decreased stress and anxiety, and improved overall well-being. While mindfulness in education has been studied in preschool, elementary, secondary, and tertiary settings, little research has been done examining the benefits of mindfulness in an online learning environment. As online learning continues to be an emerging trend in higher education, it is important for educators to consider alternative ways to support the holistic needs of online learners. This chapter explores the impact of mindfulness resources on the academic and emotional experience of the online learner.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 192
Author(s):  
Susana León-Jiménez

Friendship has been studied along centuries, since ancient times to present-day, as the basis of the social cornerstone, present at all stages of the lifespan and belonging to the world of truthful sentiments. Benefits of friendship on health have been demonstrated. Less is known about the role of friendship on seniors. The aim of this case study has been to show how the end friendship developed in an adults’ school operating for more than 40 years in Barcelona is having a positive impact on the well-being and health of their participants. Through the communicative discussion group, we have deepened in the trajectories of some of the school participants. The results show how participation in the school and the dialogic gatherings have contributed to the emergence of a non-instrumental friendship feeling and to consider an impact on the perceived general wellness and health and an improvement of their life quality. It is discussed how this research provides more elements to the existing literature. More research on how other communitarian environments have similar effects on this population, or on the impact of these dialogical spaces in the development of end friendships in other stages of the life cycle would be of interest.


2010 ◽  
Vol 7 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sharon Kabes ◽  
Dennis Lamb ◽  
John Engstrom

Quantitative data collected from graduates of the Southwest Minnesota State University Master of Science in Education program examined the impact of the learning environment, the role of the facilitator, and their professional development. The results showcased the success of the learning community model in facilitating personal and professional growth and transformation. Essential elements of the program include: best practices, learning environment, effective teaching strategies, research-based decision making, scaffolding, peer collaboration, learning community philosophy, professional growth, empowerment, reflective practitioner, inquiry, and transformational leader (change agent). The data collected from student surveys over a five-year period indicated a high level of impact on their empowerment and transformational practices.


2008 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 71-82 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shironica Karunanayaka

Online course delivery is rapidly growing among educational institutions all over the world, especially in Open and Distance Learning institutions. The frequent criticisms on distance education for having only limited interactions between teachers and students as opposed to traditional face to face teaching can be significantly minimized with the increased use of online methods, due to its unique instructional capabilities. Online learning provides ample opportunities for students learning at a distance to constantly interact with their teachers as well as peers, sharing experiences and working collaboratively. The creation of a sense of social presence is essential to establish a collaborative online learning environment, as it is a most important factor that helps people actively collaborate, thus increasing a sense of belonging to the learning community. The Faculty of Education of the Open University of Sri Lanka offered the online course, "Teacher Educator as an Educational Technologist" in December 2007, using the learning management system Moodle. The course was designed using a collaborative learning model, allowing adequate opportunities for the distant learners to actively engage in their learning process, engaging in a number of learning and assessment tasks with the support of learning resources and instructor guidance, while collaborating and sharing experiences among each other, mainly through discussion forums. Using the case study approach, an investigation was carried out to find out the specific strategies and techniques adopted by designers, instructors and students in enhancing community building among the participants in the online learning environment. It further explored the impact of community building on the distant learners, who were also novices to online learning. This paper discusses the development process in the building of an online learning community and emphasizes on the roles of designers, teachers, and learners.


2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 368-381

The aim of the action project outlined in this article was to set up a Professional Learning Community (PLC) in a school with teachers who were interested in inculcating the practices and principles of Restorative Practice in their classrooms. My intention in forming such a PLC was to establish, explore, evaluate and maximise the use of Restorative Practice in participants’ classrooms. I wanted to investigate the impact of such engagement on relationships, teaching practices and approaches, and how it could offer a stimulus for whole school change. Our investigation found that the implementation of Restorative Practice did improve relationships. It promoted empathy and encouraged teachers and students to work together. It developed emotional literacy skills among the participants. Participants gained a sense of ownership over behaviour. There was a change in approach to misbehaviour that had a positive effect on learning and on teachers’ feeling of well-being. The evidence shows that improved relationships often had a positive impact on the work ethic within the classroom. Teachers enjoyed working as a solution focused community of teachers, it helped to reinvent and enhance their best practice through the sharing of ideas. The evidence also showed that the implementation and positive impact of Restorative Practice is a process. It is something that requires repeated, structured and reflective engagement, such as that offered by our PLC.


2022 ◽  
Vol 2022 ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Shuo Zhou

Mobile learning has become an efficient way to meet the needs of work learning in the epidemic situation because of its convenience, flexibility, and freedom. This paper studies and discusses the impact of mobile learning on learning education and preschool education in the epidemic. A mobile learning community resource sharing algorithm is used to explore the speed of the online learning community to obtain learning resources. The advantages of online learning are analyzed by comparing the speed of learning resources obtained in ordinary groups. In this research, the random offloading algorithm (ROA) is proposed to analyze the student response. The results revealed that majority of the students believed that mobile learning helps in learning subjects to a greater extent.


2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Farooq Mughal ◽  
Aneesa Zafar

Abstract The aim of this paper is to investigate the impact of socio-cultural values on the process of knowledge sharing in a multicultural virtual (online) learning community. The study was conducted on a community of place consisting of a mix of students (n = 50) from different parts of the world using a virtual learning environment designed to support learning within and outside the classroom. Pertinent to this, the paper explores three significant areas: a). what societal and cultural values influence the process of knowledge sharing; b) which values are considered important by the community members; and c). do these socio-cultural values limit the utility of a virtual learning environment. The theoretical basis of this study is strongly related to Vygotsky’s (1983) theory of ‘mediated mind’ and Thorne’s (1999) theory on ‘internet-mediation’. The authors conduct a theoretical discourse of the literature to develop a framework consistent upon the VLC model proposed by Schwier (2007) and the three-phased integrative model of virtual communities as societies developed by Romm et al. (1997). The authors use an integrative ‘quanto-phenomenographic’ approach by employing a mix of descriptive and phenomenographic research. The analysis revealed that the socio-cultural values influenced the knowledge sharing process at two-levels i.e. the user level and the environment level yielding altogether 12 socio-cultural values which including nationality, integrity, trust, gender etc. which might inhibit the utility of a virtual learning environment. Keywords: knowledge sharing, virtual learning community, socio-culturalism, culture, multiculturalism, virtual learning environment, phenomenography


Author(s):  
Lauren E. Futrell Dunaway ◽  
Alessandra N. Bazzano ◽  
Sarah A.O. Gray ◽  
Katherine P. Theall

The objective of this qualitative study was to address existing gaps in the literature by gathering parent perspectives on both health and school readiness in regard to neighborhood context, specifically parents’ perceived level of neighborhood safety and support, on physical health and the behavioral and cognitive domains of school readiness. Focus groups were conducted with a total of 28 parents or caregivers whose children attended Early Head Start/Head Start Centers or who received Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) services in New Orleans, Louisiana during fall 2015. Parents discussed concepts of school readiness, neighborhood, the intersection between the two, and parental stress; however, few expressed a clear connection between their concerns about safety, their own stress, and their child’s readiness for school. Disparities in both health and school readiness exist between both racial and socioeconomic groups in the United States, and this study offers a unique and enhanced understanding of the impact of non-academic factors on the well-being and development of young children.


GeroPsych ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 27 (4) ◽  
pp. 171-179 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence M. Solberg ◽  
Lauren B. Solberg ◽  
Emily N. Peterson

Stress in caregivers may affect the healthcare recipients receive. We examined the impact of stress experienced by 45 adult caregivers of their elderly demented parents. The participants completed a 32-item questionnaire about the impact of experienced stress. The questionnaire also asked about interventions that might help to reduce the impact of stress. After exploratory factor analysis, we reduced the 32-item questionnaire to 13 items. Results indicated that caregivers experienced stress, anxiety, and sadness. Also, emotional, but not financial or professional, well-being was significantly impacted. There was no significant difference between the impact of caregiver stress on members from the sandwich generation and those from the nonsandwich generation. Meeting with a social worker for resource availability was identified most frequently as a potentially helpful intervention for coping with the impact of stress.


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