The How-Tos of Research

Alongside the Center for Teaching and Learning, Caroline Marvin, and a graduate student colleague of mine, I co-designed a course called “The How-Tos of Research.” In this class, we seek to provide students with practical research skills in the fields of psychology and neuroscience, delineating the important components of a successful research project to students through hands-on research experience, team-based work, and iterative assignments. We take a semi-flipped classroom approach, where students watch short lectures on their own time and use class time to engage in “challenges” with their peers that assess students’ understanding of material in a low-stakes manner.

Inspired by inclusive teaching practices, the course does not focus on grades, as concepts are never tested through traditional exams, but instead through a multitude of different assignments that allow students to showcase different strengths. By providing thoughtful feedback on all elements of students’ research proposals in sequenced form throughout the semester, we encourage integration of feedback in a manner similar to the peer-review process present within the actual field, while also de-emphasizing final punitive grading policies and the notion of “correctness.”

Watch our presentation on the How-Tos class at the Celebration of Teaching and Learning Symposium here!

Other Classes Taught and TA’d

 Classes TA’d at Columbia

  • Analysis of Change, co-instructor

    • Spring 2024: Mean teaching effectiveness score 4.90/5

  • The How-Tos of Research, co-instructor

    • Spring 2022, 2023: Mean teaching effectiveness score 4.73/5; Mean satisfaction with support and guidance 4.84/5; click here for students’ comments about my teaching

  • Social Psychology, TA

    • Summer 2021: no teaching evals conducted in summer

  • The Science of Psychology, TA

    • Fall 2019: no teaching evals due to administrative error

    • Summer 2020: no teaching evals conducted in summer

    • Fall 2020: click here for evals — mean teaching effectiveness score 4.21/5

 Other teaching during graduate school

  • Columbia University Scientific Computing Workshop, Workshop instructor           

  • Summer Internship Program in Psychological Science (SIPPS), Workshop instructor

  • Analyzing Intensive Longitudinal Data (Curran-Bauer Analytics), TA

    • Lead instructors: Dr. Niall Bolger & Dr. Jean-Philippe Laurenceau

    • Summer 2021, Summer 2022, Summer 2023

Classes TA’d at NYU

  • Introduction to Psychology, Recitation Leader

    • Taught 5 recitation sections across two semesters

    • Average satisfaction score from course evaluations: Fall 4.86/5, Spring 4.84/5