When you start off as a PLTL leader you don’t really know what you’re getting into. Yes, you go through training and orientation but the minute you stand before your peers a million questions start running through your head and you suddenly forget the well-rehearsed speech you had been practicing on your dog all week. “What was the first thing I needed to do? Was that guy in my Calculus class? Awkward. Am I sweating? Okay okay, I’m ready.”  As if your nerves aren’t enough, you stand in front of a class of mostly freshmen Biology majors who have no intention of returning your enthusiasm. This was my experience last semester. I was assigned to lead a general biology 1 session. As I enthusiastically explained the syllabus and structure of our session they all stared at me wide eyed and definitely not bushytailed.  I figured they were just a shy bunch and that once we started the worksheet they would be much more inclined to participate. I figured too soon. The next 10 minutes were painful and the next 10 slightly more painful than the first. You get the idea. Here are a few tips and tricks to avoid being given the silent treatment by your students.

Our goal as PLTL leaders should be to encourage learning and make our students excited about science. This could start way before you even walk into the classroom. Use your discussion board, on the PLTL webpage, to your advantage. A couple of days prior to your meetings post the general topics for that week along with an interactive related website, interesting YouTube videos or anything else related to the topic that you find interesting. YouTube can be a great tool for your sessions! There are a ton of interesting videos that not only explain topics but also illustrate them in and a way that’s easy for students to understand and hopefully get them talking. Using videos also breaks up the sometimes monotonous flow of a session and gives students a new perspective. The most important thing to do prior to any session is to do YOUR homework! Being well prepared for a session will allow you to ask the right questions and spark your student’s curiosity about the topic.

Your student’s participation during your session will depend on you as a leader. If you walk into the classroom wanting to get in and out as soon as possible, your students can tell. If you don’t want to be there, why should they? You should always get to your session a few minutes early, preferably before your any of your students. As they walk in and take their seats ask if they watched the big game last night or maybe about what other classes they are taking. The point is to just ask! Get a conversation started and get to know your students a little better. My painfully quiet class loved to talk about their professors, the classes they were taking and they were particularly fond of making jokes about how excited I was when we discussed Mendelian Genetics. I still don’t know why they thought that was so funny. Regardless of the fact that I was at the end of that joke, they connected with me on some level and it helped build a more comfortable atmosphere for the rest of the session.

The majority of your students are taking science in an auditorium with, on average, two hundred students. In other words, they’re not used to being asked questions during class. It’s no wonder during PLTL they don’t speak. As a PLTL leader, you must be the one to break them out of that habit and engage them in a much more active learning environment. Walk around the room, ask specific questions to guide the conversations and direct questions to a particular student each time. Try to aim for every student reading a question, answering a question and discussing a few questions. Don’t feel bad about making them a little uncomfortable. The more they participate, even if they don’t know the answers, the better retention and recall of material they will have later.

Ultimately, it’s about you as a leader and if you’re determined to make science exciting you’re students will be much more interested. Think of the way you study, the things you find most interesting and put yourself in the shoes of your students. Chances are that the ways you study will also help your student’s study and the things you find most interesting they might enjoy as well. What techniques help you study, what areas of science interest you the most and how can you incorporate these things into your PLTL sessions?

Gretell Gomez
Biological Sciences, Senior
Florida International University
Miami, Florida, USA