Teaching
Teaching at university is an inspiring mission. Working with enthusiastic young people is generally very enjoyable. We are instructing top professionals of the future, and hopefully new researchers as well. I therefore strive to constantly develop my teaching. Encouraging critical thinking, distributing most recent research results, and motivating the students are challenging tasks, and therefore also rewarding to the teacher.
For a scientist, teaching provides a great opportunity to learn topics outside the often very narrow field of scientific expertise. In addition, the teacher gains valuable presentation experience.
As a natural scientist I find it difficult to point out any specific learning theory or concept. These however provide useful tools for assessment and development of teaching. Constructivistic practices such as problem-based learning are excellent especially for research training. I emphasize the relativistic perception of information, which often is challenging to the students. Versatility of teaching methods is necessary in order to support different kinds of learners and to maintain motivation. Learning is enhanced by activation of students to actually to build and apply their knowledge. Simply put, time spent working on a topic is roughly proportional to the level of learning. Thus, the teacher needs to select methods which allure (or force!) the students to really spend time actively thinking the topics. Obviously, the methods need to be chosen to suit the specific subjects. A good lecture is a delightful experience to the audience, and sometimes memorizing raw facts is necessary.
I have been teaching since 1998, mostly as an assistant of veterinary anatomy. I have been responsible for teaching of histology and developmental biology. I have revised the courses, teaching materials and teaching methods. In histology, we re-introduced drawing of tissues, which is very effective and also motivating for most students. In developmental biology I use learning diaries, groupwork with scientific articles, web tools and traditional dissections. I also regularly invite expert visitors from other institutions.
I have given lectures and organized laboratory exercises for advanced studies and instructed undergraduate students in the research group.
I aim to produce illustrative study materials of high quality for all my courses. I use plenty of illustrations and also other types of multimedia where useful. In addition to the traditional lecture materials I have participated in the development of educational technology in the project VIELO (virtual organ models in veterinary education). In this project, interactive 3D models are being produced for illustrating animal anatomy. The project was awarded the Helsinki University educational technology award and funding in 2002.
My personal evaluation of teaching is primarily based on assessment of students’ performance and on student feedback. The feedback has been generally very positive. This is of course largely due to my personal interest to the topics I have been happy to teach.