Dr. Lauren Brooks presented a ten-minute recorded session for ASMCUE 2022 entitled “Online unknowns: a supplement for the microbiology lab.” Brooks is faculty at Nazareth College in Rochester, NY. Their learning objectives were to revisit the unknown identification lab since it is often only performed “once or twice in a semester.” Brooks recreated the unknown lab in a digital format. This allows Brooks to explore bacteria that they otherwise could not bring into a teaching lab. Brooks teaches introductory and advanced medical microbiology courses. I thought it was impressive that Brooks does this unknowns digital lab as a Google Form! I am excited about trying Google Form case studies such as the one Claire and her students created for sequencing. The example that Brooks shared included photos of plates and interpretation of data. The last step is identification of the organism. The form had twenty different sections: for example, one for catalase. Each section ends with a question with branched logic. Brooks wants to include more angles for photographs of the test results/colonies, for example. Additionally, one challenge is how to do this with mixed cultures. Setting up the form correctly does seem like a challenge, though Brooks has a system now. Importantly, students can explore and receive automatic feedback! I wonder how I can use a system like this!?
