Innovative teaching methods: Biology didactician receives prestigious award!

Innovative teaching methods: Biology didactician receives prestigious award!

On April 25, 2025, the renowned “Ars legendi Faculty Prize for Mathematics and Natural Sciences 2025” was awarded to Prof. Dr. Benedikt Heuckmann presented. Prof. Dr. Felicitas Pfeifer presented the award, which is worth 5,000 euros and is given in the biology category. The jury praised the successful networking of specialist science and didactics as well as the comprehensive digitalization of the courses offered by Heuckmann, a biology didactician at the Center for Biology Didactics at the University of Münster.

Heuckmann bases his teaching on current findings from scientific and didactic research. The special focus of his courses is the areas of “health” and “digitalization”. These topics combine traditional biological content with modern research approaches and contemporary teaching methods.

Innovative teaching formats

Heuckmann’s courses are offered both digitally and in person. This includes blended learning approaches and online assessments. Two outstanding formats that are used in teaching are particularly noteworthy:

• Lehr-Lern-Labor: Studierende besuchen außerschulische Lernorte, um sich fachliche Grundlagen zur Anatomie und Physiologie anzueignen. Dabei lernen sie auch den Einsatz digitaler Medien kennen. Ein Praxistag mit regionalen Schulklassen wird unterstützt durch modernste 360-Grad-Kameras.
• One Health Teaching Clinic (OHTC): Hier wird das „One Health“-Konzept vermittelt, das die Gesundheit von Menschen, Tieren und Umwelt verbindet. Die Studierenden arbeiten dabei eng mit internationalen Forschenden auf dem Gebiet des One Health und nutzen digitale Kommunikationsplattformen. Sie sind in ein Netzwerk eingebunden, das sich über Deutschland, Österreich und die Schweiz erstreckt.

Challenges in teacher training

Teacher training is faced with the challenge of preparing prospective teachers for the digital changes in their everyday professional life. The need for digitalization requires transformation processes in teaching, which entails the integration of digital offerings into existing teaching-learning laboratories. Not only are existing formats being revised, but completely new teaching-learning laboratories with a digital orientation are also being created.

The developments in the digitization of teaching-learning laboratories are also the subject of a collective work entitled “Teaching-learning laboratories and digitization”, which addresses current, digitally influenced changes in the teaching-learning laboratory landscape. It is fed by the experiences of the quality offensive for teacher training, which is being implemented by several universities, including the Westphalian Wilhelms University of Münster. The project is funded by the federal and state governments with funds from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.

Overall, it is clear that the digital transformation brings not only opportunities but also challenges for university teaching, especially in the MINT subjects and educational sciences. Prof. Dr. With his innovative teaching approaches, Benedikt Heuckmann represents an important contribution to the further development of higher education.

The “Ars legendi Faculty Prize” is awarded annually for innovative achievements in university teaching and is awarded by various scientific societies and associations. uni-muenster.de reports that the jury praised Prof. Heuckmann's achievements. For a more in-depth look at digital teaching-learning laboratories and the corresponding developments, please refer to tu-dresden.de on the current collection and the associated projects.