The most important thing to understand when applying to become a PLTL leader for the first time is being open to personal changes. Personal changes can come in many forms, but the types of changes associated with being a PLTL leader involve academic, professional, and communicative evolution. Leading an effective PLTL session begins with the leader and I believe this can be accomplished during their very first leading experience. Here I will illustrate how my first PLTL experience affected me, what motivated me to remain within and grow with the program, and important changes that such an experience have inspired. An important goal of mine in this entry is to try and elucidate a “common sense” guide for incoming leaders, faculty, and others, which is universally applicable and informative.

As an incoming leader, I didn’t know what to expect of my first workshop of the semester. I had only one thing in mind: how am I supposed to run an effective session, carefully following my training from the PLTL orientation, and establish a sense of student-leader respect when I’m just a student like them? Well – that’s the whole idea! An average incoming leader will arrive to their first session with countless expectations. However, the trick is to eliminate all the assumptions made about the students enrolled in your section, make it to the location at least 10 minutes early, have your contact information written on the board, and greet them with a positive attitude. As a newcomer, I realize this is easier said than done, but it is an experiment I attempted and worked very well. Indeed, the first step to growing as a professional is to feel comfortable in your own shoes and speak with conviction.

The objective of the first session is to establish a “tone” which can fluctuate throughout the semester and is always manageable by the leader. This “tone” refers to many things, such as leader/student interest level, quality of discussions, amount/quality of feedback, good communication, etc. The average incoming leader is likely to be rigid from the amount of pressure caused by all the eyes on him, but this is part of the evolutionary process which PLTL excites in leaders, students, and participants. In order to make the best out of any session, the leader must accept his flaws and work towards turning them into strengths. Moreover, the effective PLTL leader always considers the errors he commits as, both, a learning and teaching opportunity. The plasticity of the leader-student dynamic allows for an endless variety of learning opportunities, and incoming leaders should be aware of this fact.

It is important to explain to students that PLTL does not work if one tries to be right all the time. In other words, students must be assured (and reassured) that being wrong about something simply means that they are able to use prior knowledge and synthesize a clear understanding of a concept by reproducing it in their own words, discussing it with fellow peers, and following-up with additional questions posed by the leader or others. This critical process of exposing doubts, identifying common doubts, and orchestrating a discussion to arrive to a consensus among peers is the essence of the PLTL leader’s role. So, it follows that part of a leader’s introductory speech should involve an explanation of why discussing doubts, or being wrong, is crucial for learning and holding productive discussions; no student should ever feel judged, insulted, or unintelligent during a PLTL session, and leaders are responsible for keeping this order by making sure that good questions are being asked.

I owe plenty of my own growth and development to the PLTL experience. As an incoming leader, you are always encouraged to do your best and attend sessions with a fresh, positive attitude. I developed my own approach to create a productive social environment, and it is every leader’s duty to do so. However, creating a good social environment does not mean talking about anything, rather  generating discussions which increase student motivation, knowledge retention, and critical thinking. The PBL model is able to provide a skeleton for the incoming leader to use as a foundation for creating a personalized environment where the leader and students interact like equals and learn like champions.

Jose Chang
Biological Sciences Department
Florida International University
Miami, Fl , USA