The releases in April focus on content in Lt, including our exciting new partnership with Bio-RadTM Laboratories. The Lt Biology Collection has been enriched with six new labs, many of which use Bio-Rad's interactive and robust kits for biotechnology experiments, including those on polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and CRISPR.
Although no new Lt features were released in April, the Lt development team is currently preparing to release a new scheduling dashboard! This interface will streamline how you publish content to students, giving you more time for teaching. Keep an eye out for the beta release of this dashboard in May.
Lt Biology: New partnership with Bio-Rad
The Lt Biology Collection was built in partnership with Vernier Software & Technology, allowing students to record authentic biological data directly into Lt via Vernier's Go Direct® Sensors.
In April, we were proud to announce our new partnership with Bio-Rad! Further expanding the Lt Biology Collection, Bio-Rad's kits enable students to explore key concepts relating to PCR, CRISPR, ELISA, SDS-PAGE analysis, and more. The six new biology labs are:
- CRISPR – Lab
- ELISA: Giant Panda Problem – Lab
- Forensic DNA Fingerprinting – Lab
- Introduction to Molecular Evolution – Lab
- Modeling Population Dynamics – Lab
- Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) – Lab
PCR, CRISPR, ELISA and more! Bio-Rad kits expand the Lt Biology Collection »
“As a biochemist, I want my students exploring the frontier of new scientific knowledge.
Real experimentation in my classroom is so much easier with Bio-Rad kits. They remove the hurdles and tedium so my students and I can focus on the best part — discovering new science!”
- Dr. Joanne Figueiredo, Smithtown High School
The Bio-Rad Out of the Blue CRISPR Kit.
Now comprising 34 online biology labs, the Lt Biology Collection is a comprehensive undergraduate biology curriculum, addressing fundamental topics like mitosis and meiosis, population genetics, biodiversity, greenhouse gases, enzyme action, spectrophotometry, and microscopy, while continuing to align with Bloom’s taxonomy and the core competencies outlined in the Vision and Change action report (AAAS, 2011).
Take a look inside the new CRISPR Lab »
New for Nurse Educators: Practice Hours Logs
Nursing and midwifery students often need to record their practice hours as evidence toward certification. To meet this need, we have created Practice Hours Log lessons for each module in the Clinical Skills and Immersive Nursing Collections. These lessons are specifically for students in the UK who wish to become registered nurses or midwives, and allow your students to record the educational hours they spend within Lt.
Students can log the hours spent working on each lesson or lab in a module.
Below, Education Specialist Charlotte walks you through the new Practice Hours Logs.
You can find these new lessons in the Content Library.
Check out the Immersive Nursing and Clinical Skills Collections »
Improved Cockroach Sensory Nerve Lab
Responding to customer feedback, we have greatly simplified data analysis in the final activity of the Cockroach Sensory Nerve Lab, found in both the Animal Physiology and Neuroscience Collections.
Students no longer need to complete bins of data to build a histogram; instead, they simply look at the average interspike interval and firing frequency at the start and end of the recording. These changes save time and prevent your students from becoming frustrated.
We have also turned on the "CAP Amplitude (Filtered)" channel readout in the data panel on all Analysis pages, and updated instructions for students on how to locate the baseline.
The channel readout has been turned on for the "CAP Amplitude (Filtered)" channel. This will allow students to easily see the amplitude of the signal.
Check out the Animal Physiology Collection »
Check out the Neuroscience Collection »
Turns out breathing isn't so simple...
Students sometimes struggle with setting up gas collection protocols. To improve their learning experience, we've developed new popups and illustrations that explain how to use the valve, tap, flow head, and Douglas bag involved in gas collection.
Multiple new popups support students to successfully conduct their gas collection protocols.
These new popups and illustrations (+ updated video!) can be found in the following labs in the Exercise Physiology Collection:
- Aerobic Fitness Testing (Lab and Distance Learning Lab)
- Anaerobic Fitness Testing
- Energy Metabolism
- Energy Expenditure and Exercise
We have also added example data for the maximum accumulated oxygen deficit (MAOD) activity in the Anaerobic Fitness Testing Lab.
If your students make a mistake in data collection, or can't make it to class, you can use new example data for the maximum accumulated oxygen deficit (MAOD) activity.
Check out the Exercise Physiology Collection »
What else is coming?
We're continuously improving features and performance, and releasing updated content to Lt. To keep you in-the-loop, we’ll be posting updates on our blog each month.
If you’d like to know about releases as they come out, you can view our Release Notes.
You can send us your thoughts on our content collections directly. You can also check out the Lt Product Roadmap to see what’s on the horizon, including:
- Improving how you make lessons and modules available to students: We are streamlining the UX of our availability workflow to give you more time to develop your course content. This will involve a new Lt scheduling dashboard [coming soon!].
- Improving how you publish your content: In Q4 (April-June 2022), we will focus on identifying and fixing common errors around lesson publishing that interrupt your workflow and cause confusion. This will create more time for teaching.
- Removing email from our sign-up process.
As always, feel free to contact your CSM with thoughts and questions!