Abstract
Simple SummaryThe Human Continuum is a classroom exercise for secondary and tertiary students that offers a cooperative/cognitive learning strategy, requiring students to identify and commit to a position in response to a stimulus question. The purpose of the current submission is to contextualize and introduce online, a virtual human continuum for teaching purposes. It describes an innovative tool design while also reporting its use for a particular cohort: a small group of veterinary science students.The merits of students exchanging views through the so-called human continuum exercise (HCE) are well established. The current article describes the creation of the virtual human continuum (VHC), an online platform that facilitates the same teaching exercise. It also reports feedback on the VHC from veterinary science students (n = 38). First-year Doctor of Veterinary Medicine students at the University of Sydney, Australia, trialed the platform and provided feedback. Most students agreed or strongly agreed that the VHC offered: a non-threatening environment for discussing emotive and challenging issues; and an opportunity to see how other people form ideas. It also made them think about how to express their ideas and make arguments; and left them feeling more comfortable about expressing their views using it than they would discussing ideas face-to-face (98%, 84%, 79% and 76%, respectively). All respondents agreed or strongly agreed that the VHC encouraged them to consider other opinions. These data suggest that the transition of the HCE to an online platform facilitates dialogue on difficult ethical issues in a supportive environment.
Highlights
The Human Continuum (HC) is a classroom exercise for secondary and tertiary students that offers a cooperative/cognitive learning strategy requiring students to identify and commit to a position in response to a stimulus question
We developed a virtual human continuum (VHC) through ChatterboxTM to promote engagement by all the veterinary schools and veterinary faculties in Australia and New Zealand that were participating in a teaching development project
The VHC reported here is an online version of an HC exercise
Summary
The Human Continuum (HC) is a classroom exercise for secondary and tertiary students that offers a cooperative/cognitive learning strategy requiring students to identify and commit to a position in response to a stimulus question. This sometimes relates to an ethical dilemma, but may just test student understanding of a complex issue, with peer discussion being a valuable learning tool. We anticipated that online delivery could facilitate discussion and interaction across schools and avoid face-to-face peer pressure, helping students learn to take an ethical stance and to justify this, to make and refine arguments in response to challenges by their peers from a diversity of backgrounds, and to listen to and assess the values and positions of others [6] The VHC exercises are intended to encourage students to appreciate strong and well-constructed arguments and to inspire them to research the facts that underpin discussions on animal welfare [7] (pp. 43–46)
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