Virology in the Classroom: Current Approaches and Challenges to Undergraduate- and Graduate-Level Virology Education

Kushner, David; Pekosz, Andrew

doi:10.1146/annurev-virology-091919-080047

Cited by 4 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 56 publications

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“…The COVID-19 pandemic aroused an interest in learning about virology. It has made virology more visible and provided content in real time to help students understand and contextualize aspects of emerging coronaviruses ( 33 ). In addition, by virtue of instant chat tools such as WeChat, students are more open to participating in group discussions due to the less intimidating environment ( 34 , 35 ).…”

Section: Thoughts On Medical Education In the Time Of Covid-19 And The Post-pandemic Eramentioning

confidence: 99%

Online Medical Teaching in China During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Tools, Modalities, and Challenges

Zhang

et al. 2021

Front. Public Health

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Background: The novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has tested the ability of universities to provide a high-quality, safe educational experience for students due to campuses shutting down. As a result, online learning could shift from a traditional classroom teaching mode and make education accessible to students. Previous studies have used individual online teaching cases to exploit a variety of online learning tools to ensure the continuation of medical education during this difficult time in China. However, for the first time, we have conducted a systematic review of local online teaching approaches, existing challenges, and potential solutions.Purpose: We present the issues and experience of conducting online medical teaching practices in China with the aim of communicating them to our peers in other countries or regions when examining the transition to e-learning during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond.Methods: We searched the keywords below from public databases and reviewed relevant publications reporting on medical online teaching in China during the COVID-19 pandemic to analyze and summarize the online tools, modalities, and challenges.Results: We listed common online teaching tools and described a variety of online teaching modalities, as well as possible challenges. We also discussed potential solutions for those challenges, as well as the impact of the transition to online teaching on traditional education.Conclusion: By investigating local online medical teaching in China, we present useful tools and modalities that have been successfully exploited in education during the difficult time of COVID-19, although some challenges remain. The exploration of the transition to online teaching or learning will likely continue to have a profound impact on traditional classroom teaching.

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Section: Thoughts On Medical Education In the Time Of Covid-19 And The Post-pandemic Eramentioning

confidence: 99%

Online Medical Teaching in China During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Tools, Modalities, and Challenges

Zhang

et al. 2021

Front. Public Health

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“…Regarding the U.S., it has been found that the situation very much depends on the individual school. Thus, a school focusing on sciences may offer very detailed information concerning virology and even practical work, while students at other schools may learn virtually nothing about viruses [64]. However, the essential health education an individual student receives should not depend on a school's location or type.…”

Section: Contentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Virology in Schoolbooks—A Comprehensive Analysis of Austrian Biology Textbooks for Secondary School and Implications for Improvement

2022

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Virology has gained much attention in recent years due to the COVID-19 pandemic and other recurrent epidemics/pandemics such as Ebola, zika, or now, monkeypox. We have analysed all recent biology schoolbooks for secondary school approved for the Austrian market. Our aim was to find out whether virological content was presented comprehensively, comprehensibly, and in an error-free manner. This also relates to visual representations of viruses, processes related to virology (e.g., replication), and references to daily life. Furthermore, we looked for tasks related to virology that may help students to deepen their newly acquired knowledge and/or to put it into practice, either by hands-on experimentation or transfer tasks. We examined 97 books (76 books for lower secondary and 21 books for upper secondary school). For this analysis, we developed and tested a coding matrix accompanied with a comprehensive coding guide to facilitate reproducible and reliable ratings. Since inter-rater reliability was found to be very high, both the coding matrix and guide can be recommended for further studies in this field. Overall, the virological content provided was free of errors, with the text and illustrations being mostly comprehensive and comprehensible. This was expected, since all Austrian school books must be approved by a governmental commission. However, individual books even for the same target (age) group differed widely in content and detail. In particular, few books clearly differentiated between viruses and bacteria, clarified that viruses are non-living and emphasized that antibiotics are ineffective against viruses. Yet precisely such knowledge is essential to enable students to make scientifically based decisions in health-related situations, especially for the prevention and treatment of viral diseases (e.g., whether to take antibiotics when suffering from a viral disease).

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“…One benefit from the COVID pandemic is the increased awareness of and general curiosity about viruses and biology concepts (Kushner & Pekosz, 2021; Abir et al, 2020). Masses are turning to social media, news articles, and other online mediums to learn about virology and vaccines, but many of these channels are reservoirs of confusion and misinformation (Larson, 2018; Bursztyn et al, 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Alpha, Delta, Omicron—Oh My! A SARS-CoV-2 Genome Alignment Activity to Understand Mutations and COVID Variants

Steel¹,

Romero²,

McElmurry³

2023

The American Biology Teacher

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COVID took over the world starting in 2020. Everyone quickly “knew” about the novel coronavirus, but how much do they actually know about the virus behind COVID-19? This classroom activity gives students real-world practice in evaluating actual genetic sequences from SARS-CoV-2 and working with genome alignments to identify mutations and cluster different emergence patterns. This activity works through alignments, mutations/variants, protein folding, structure and function, and medical/immunology implications of the different variants. There are seven parts to this activity, and each one can be incorporated alone into a lesson or collectively used for a lab, case study, or other supplemental activity to strengthen learning objectives in genetics, biology, immunology, and public health. This learning activity is scalable to different levels and has successfully been incorporated into K–12 education as well as college and graduate education.

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Virology in the Classroom: Current Approaches and Challenges to Undergraduate- and Graduate-Level Virology Education

Cited by 4 publications

References 56 publications

Online Medical Teaching in China During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Tools, Modalities, and Challenges

Online Medical Teaching in China During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Tools, Modalities, and Challenges

Virology in Schoolbooks—A Comprehensive Analysis of Austrian Biology Textbooks for Secondary School and Implications for Improvement

Alpha, Delta, Omicron—Oh My! A SARS-CoV-2 Genome Alignment Activity to Understand Mutations and COVID Variants

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