First-year students who already plan to major in chemistry don’t require any special bells or whistles to motivate them to study the subject. But introductory chemistry is a required subject for all students at MIT, regardless of their intended major, and materials scientist Jeffrey Grossman has found that for many students in his course 3.091 Introduction to Solid State Chemistry, the subject becomes much more accessible if he takes conscious steps to make it real for them. He does this both inside and outside the classroom. First, he makes sure that part of each lecture he delivers explores the connection between the topic of the lecture and his students’ actual experience. Second, he gives students the chance to play around with real-world materials so they can learn the principles of chemistry firsthand. As Professor Grossman explains in this episode, it was by playing around with materials that the very first chemists began to learn about matter and its properties, and this kind of basic experimentation has an inherently multisensory quality that deepens and enriches students’ understanding of the concepts they learn.Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator Portal Professor Grossman’s course on OCWProfessor Grossman’s faculty pageMIT’s General Institute Requirements (GIRs)“Plenty of Room at the Bottom” (PDF) (Richard Feynman’s lecture on atomic-scale engineering)Music in this episode by Blue Dot SessionsConnect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617 475-0534On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn InstagramStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter.Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep those programs going! Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman

For millions of years after the Big Bang, nearly all the matter in the universe was in the form of hydrogen and helium; other elements like carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen only formed later, in nuclear reactions inside stars. To learn what the universe looked like back then, MIT astrophysicist Anna Frebel studies the oldest stars we can find—13 billion years old, to be precise—scanning them for traces of elements that will give a clue to their history. As Professor Frebel explains to Sarah Hansen in this episode, curiosity about the origins of the universe we live in is a profoundly human trait, just like curiosity about one’s own family history. To help communicate to laypeople the wonder and amazement that motivates astronomers like herself, Prof. Frebel has written a book and recorded a companion series of videos, both of which are intentionally designed to be as user-friendly as possible. It doesn’t matter, she says, if viewers and readers don’t grasp all the details; her hope is that they will develop the desire to understand more, and that that desire will spark further learning.Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator Portal"Cosmic Origin of the Chemical Elements" on OCWProfessor Frebel’s book Searching for the Oldest StarsProfessor Frebel’s faculty pageMusic in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617 475-0534On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn Instagram Stay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep those programs going!  Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman

One might imagine that an expert on financial technology would view human relations through a primarily transactional lens. But Professor Gary Gensler, in teaching his course on financial technology (or “FinTech”) at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, tries to base his interactions with his students on a different model. Feeling indebted to the older mentors who helped and supported him in his student days and his early career, he seeks to repay that debt by nurturing his own students’ intellectual and professional development and by teaching them to do the same for others in years to come. In this episode, Prof. Gensler discusses his teaching philosophy and how he sees his role in the FinTech course as involving the communication of values and respect as much as it involves transmitting knowledge of the course’s up-to-the-minute subject matter. Along the way, he touches on what FinTech is, how artificial intelligence is shaking up the financial sector, and how, when teaching remotely during the Covid-19 pandemic, he helped students develop a sense of community.   Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator PortalProfessor Gensler’s course on OCWProfessor Gensler’s faculty pageBenjamin Franklin quote referenced by Prof. GenslerMusic in this episode by Blue Dot SessionsConnect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617 475-0534On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn InstagramStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman

Many instructors in recent years have turned to open educational resources (OER) so that their students don’t have to pay for an expensive textbook. And that is indeed one of the foremost benefits of OER. But Professor Elizabeth Siler, who teaches at Worcester State University, has found that using OER offers advantages to instructors too: doing so allows you to teach the material you think your students need to learn, and to teach that material the way you think your students need to learn it, rather than being tied to a prepackaged sequence of material. Professor Siler enjoys being able to select and adapt material for her courses from publicly-available sources. One source that she’s used successfully in teaching negotiation at WSU is the OpenCourseWare version of a course originally taught at MIT by Professor Mary Rowe. In this episode, we talk with both Professor Siler and Professor Rowe about why instructors might decide to share, reuse, and remix course materials, and how that decision plays out in teaching actual courses like their own courses in negotiation.Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator Portal Mary Rowe’s MIT faculty pageElizabeth Siler’s Worcester State University faculty page15.667 Negotiation and Conflict Management on OCWDealing with an Aggressive Competitive Negotiator case study [PDF]Guidelines for writing a Perceived Injurious Experience letter [PDF]Other negotiation courses on OCWMusic in this episode by Blue Dot SessionsConnect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn InstagramStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman

Professor Jonathan Gruber, an educator passionate about making economics accessible, discusses how to teach economic principles through relatable examples. He uses pop culture references like Kim Kardashian’s corset and LeBron James’s college decision to connect theory with real life. Gruber emphasizes the importance of economic intuition, urging students to apply mathematical models to everyday situations. By fostering critical thinking and contextual understanding, he makes economics engaging and relevant, proving it’s not as boring as many think!

Can you really learn to fly by sitting in a classroom and attending lectures? Of course not! But the course offered by Philip Greenspun and Tina Srivastava in 16.687 Private Pilot Ground School has proven surprisingly popular as a means of learning the basic principles one needs to know before getting into the cockpit of a small aircraft. Originally offered in weekly class sessions over the course of a semester, 16.687 has evolved over the years; it now takes the form of an immersive three-day classroom experience. In this episode, Greenspun and Srivastava discuss how they’ve maintained flexibility in their teaching while still making sure they cover the standard body of material that prospective pilots are required to master. They also explain why they feel that online study can’t completely substitute for the in-person learning experience: to be a pilot, one needs not only to learn facts but also to become comfortable with decision-making in the quickly changing circumstances presented by flying planes. This skill, Greenspun and Srivastava say, is much harder to acquire through individual study than in the interactive environment of a classroom discussion.Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator Portal Private Pilot Ground School course on OCWMIT Flying ClubFAA website: Become a PilotFlight manuals available onlineMusic in this episode by Blue Dot SessionsConnect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn InstagramStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman

“We all hold dear certain attitudes about language,” Professor Michel DeGraff says in this episode centered on his course 24.908 Creole Languages and Caribbean Identities. Those attitudes can be positive for ourselves and for others, DeGraff says, but they can also have negative effects. His goal is to make linguistics accessible to a broader audience, to connect language to issues of culture and identity, and to show how language prejudices are rooted in hierarchies of power. Specifically, he seeks to increase public awareness that the creoles of the Caribbean, like his native Haitian Creole (or Kreyòl), are fully developed languages worthy of as much respect as higher-prestige languages like French or English. To pursue this goal, he promotes dual-language education for Haitian-American students, and he himself speaks Kreyòl in as many public forums as possible—including in the videos on the OpenCourseWare site for his course, and at various points in this podcast itself! At the same time, as he explains, he encourages his students to examine their own backgrounds to see how their attitudes about the languages they speak have been shaped by explicit or implicit attitudes about culture and identity.Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator Portal Professor DeGraff’s course on OCWProfessor DeGraff’s faculty pageThe MIT-Haiti Initiative English / Haitian Creole dual-language kindergarten in BostonMusic in this episode by Blue Dot SessionsConnect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn InstagramStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman

Join us as we talk with Justin Reich, assistant professor in comparative media studies at MIT. Professor Reich runs the Teaching Systems Lab, which was founded with the mission of designing, implementing, and researching the future of teacher learning. With the emergence of the current coronavirus pandemic, Prof. Reich has been turning his attention to helping teachers and education policy makers figure out how to transition rapidly to remote learning. In this special episode of Chalk Radio, Prof. Reich discusses the need for teachers to use a balance between asynchronous materials and synchronous check-ins, the challenge of making home learning equitable for students, and the value of existing open educational resources (like the materials on OCW!) for teachers who are suddenly forced to teach their classes remotely. “It’s totally normal to struggle during a pandemic,” Reich says, but he reassures teachers and parents that effective education at home may look different from effective in-school education—we simply need to recognize and cultivate the kinds of learning that can happen best under these extraordinary circumstances.  Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator PortalThe Teaching Systems LabProfessor Reich’s faculty pageProfessor Reich’s TeachLab podcastInterview with Prof. Reich on WBUR’s “On Point”Resources, tools, and support for teaching remotely at MITSupport remote learning by donating to OCWSupport OCW by sharing your storyMusic in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions Connect with UsWe’d love to hear from you! If you enjoyed this episode, have a suggestion for a new episode, or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story.  On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn Instagram Stay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter.  Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman

You might imagine that fluency is an inherently good thing in teaching. But Dr. Christopher Terman, Senior Lecturer Emeritus at MIT’s Computer Science & Artificial Intelligence Lab, explains that breaks in the flow of the classroom can actually make the learning experience more memorable. This is just one of the insights Dr. Terman has gained in twenty years of teaching the course 6.004 Computation Structures. “If you’re going to spend 40% of your time in the classroom,” he says, “you might as well teach well.” He and the rest of the teaching team for 6.004 are always seeking to optimize their students’ learning experience, adapting the course through repeated iterations to include as much as possible of what they’ve found works best. Among the details Dr. Terman shares in this episode are how the course engages students from different backgrounds by offering a “buffet” of learning materials through the use of the MITx learning platform, how creating hands-on browser-based digital design lab experiences help students internalize the material, and how online forums reduce student frustration by offering quicker answers to questions that arise outside of class.Relevant ResourcesMIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator Portal6.004 on OCWDr. Terman’s Faculty PageEnhance your teaching at MIT with the MITx Residential PlatformMusic in this episode by Blue Dot SessionsConnect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn InstagramStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman

What would Shakespeare have made of today’s popular television shows? He might or might not like them, but he wouldn’t dismiss them simply because they’re popular. In this episode, Professor David Thorburn, who has spent his career challenging conventional assumptions about what kinds of works have artistic merit, speaks eloquently about why popular art forms like film and television belong in the classroom. He explains that in his course 21L.011 The Film Experience, which he has taught at MIT for over 35 years, he strives to reframe classic works for modern audiences—with “classic works” in this context meaning everything from Charlie Chaplin comedies to Technicolor musicals, Hitchcock thrillers, and Japanese samurai movies. Professor Thorburn hopes that his lectures, which are available in full on MIT OpenCourseWare, will help as many students as possible to know how to enjoy the movies more richly, regardless of their intended major. In passing, he talks about topics as various as the usefulness of lectures as an educational technique, the difficulty of imagining a world without iPads, the universality of “All in the Family,” and his admiration for Claude Monet’s paintings of Rouen Cathedral.   Relevant Resources:MIT OpenCourseWareThe OCW Educator Portal Professor Thorburn’s course on OCWA profile of Professor ThorburnKnots, Professor Thorburn’s first book of poetryWikipedia article on Jean RenoirWikipedia article on Claude Monet’s cathedral paintingsMusic in this episode by Blue Dot SessionsConnect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! On our siteOn FacebookOn TwitterOn InstagramStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter.  Connect with UsIf you have a suggestion for a new episode or have used OCW to change your life or those of others, tell us your story. We’d love to hear from you! Call us @ 617-715-2517On our siteOn FacebookOn XOn InstagramOn LinkedInStay CurrentSubscribe to the free monthly "MIT OpenCourseWare Update" e-newsletter. Support OCWIf you like Chalk Radio and OpenCourseware, donate to help keep these programs going! CreditsSarah Hansen, host and producer Brett Paci, producer  Dave Lishansky, producer Show notes by Peter Chipman