Abstract:

COVID-19 has been around for over a year. The way how teaching and learning is carried out is evolving under this unprecedented situation where social distancing is to be maintained for quite a long while. Face-to-face sessions in universities are significantly reduced, if not replaced by synchronous or asynchronous online sessions altogether.

In Hong Kong, there hasn't been a complete lockdown. However, no face-to-face sessions were allowed in our University in Term 2 2019-20 after the first few weeks, when more and more COVID-19 cases were reported. Undergraduates' practical experience in the lab was significantly affected. This year, the local epidemic situation seems to be under much better control, with the concerted effort of everyone in the community. In Term 2, 2020-21, we managed to run our Genetics Laboratory class in a mixed mode, with some fully online sessions, and some fully face-to-face ones, and with a reduction of student number from three to two per group. Students treasured very much the time they could get back, meet one another face-to-face, conduct real experiments, and practice hands-on lab skills with their peers, and with the bench-side coaching offered by our teaching assistants.

Students' lab performance, as revealed by their educational video production, which shows how well they mastered some lab skills, is found to be generally better than that of students before the pandemics. This is probably due to: 1) more chance to practise in a smaller group; 2) the precious in-lab experience is being more treasured after knowing that this is not a must-get; and 3) students may learn better with prior real-time ZOOM discussions on the dos and don'ts of the techniques by watching videos produced from previous students together under the mixed mode of teaching.

Keywords:

Face-to-face lab sessions, students’ experience, students’ performance, educational videos.