Jenélle Dowling, Ph.D.

Professional development

My start in teaching was as a pre-school instructor in a curriculum based child care center in Baltimore, MD, at which I worked through high school and part-time during college. During this position, aided by my own energetic enthusiasm about the natural world, I took it upon myself to research and design biology focused lessons. I utilized the meager resources at my disposal and taught the children about animal behavior and habitat preference and excited their interest in the fauna found in streams and under rocks, even in developed areas.

 

Since then, I have gained experience with non-traditional teaching practices in several venues, including designing and leading hands-on activities in outdoor field courses, teaching an auto-tutorial format biology course, leading active learning activities for large lecture courses, teaching at a correctional facility and independently designing curricula for two of my own courses that incorporated case studies, student teaching, interactive multimedia modules and independent investigation and hypothesis testing activities. 

 

During my graduate training and after, I attended teaching workshops, lectures and courses and put this knowledge to use not only in the classroom, but also while leading public outreach sessions. Here is a representitive list of workshops, courses and outreach activities:

 

 

Teaching courses I've completed:

 

• The Practice of teaching in higher education (ALS 6015)

 

• Creating Undergraduate Resources Using Online Data (BIOEE 7600)

 

Workshops and seminars (Cornell center for teaching excellence):

 

• Neurobiology and behavior Diversity and inclusion forum (co-creator/organizer)

  • ​​A forum conversation on diversity and inclusion in science, and how it affects all of us. This forum was tailored to the NBB community, and focused on achievable solutions that we have since implemented.

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• The Practice of Inclusive Teaching in Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) 

  • ​​A workshop focused on providing current and future STEM faculty with strategies for building inclusivity into their course designs and syllabi.

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• Teaching Scholar Seminar. Teaming up to Teach: Best Practices

  • In this seminar we discussed what makes a successful team-taught class and ways to use team-teaching to increase student engagement and interdisciplinary partnerships by creating more dynamic learning environments.

 

• Teaching with Technology Seminar. How to Get Started Flipping Your Class

  • ​During this session, we identified techniques and technologies we could use to expose students to course content before they come to class, and explored individual and group activities to use inside your classroom. We developed a plan to flip a class.

 

• Junior Faculty Discussion. Developing a Plan to Document Your Teaching

  • ​We learned how to gather data about your teaching and present the information about our teaching effectively.

 

• Active learning workshop. Hands-on experience applying case studies and activities 

  • We discussed and took part in active learning exercises and determined how they can be applied to small and large biology classes.​

 

Outreach:

 

• Graduate Student School Outreach Program (Grasshopr)

  • ​Collaborated with local teacher to design a hands-on course on animal communication for 5th grade class at local elementary school.

  • Link to my Grasshopr mini-course lesson plan

 

• Expanding your horizons conference (EYH)

  • Taught workshop that introduced middle school girls to the science of sound. Presented at Cornell and a local women’s juvenile detention center each year for four years.

 

• Dewitt Middle school (Ithaca city school district)

  • ​Presented a lesson on animal communication and lead a bird recording demo for 10+ fourth and fifth grade students at a local middle school in Ithaca, New York.