Brick by Instructional Brick: Using Templates as a Scaffold to Teach Research Data Management

A common frustration with teaching data management to researchers in one shot sessions is not knowing if the lesson created longer lasting impacts. One method for supporting changes in data management behaviors is to provide templates that participants can use to implement the learning objectives after the session. Templates for topics like file naming, folder organization, and documentation offer a scaffolded learning experience while also being directly implementable to the researcher’s workflow. This poster will introduce templates as an instructional scaffold, how they have been adopted in the author’s instruction sessions, and success stories for how they have been used outside of instruction. A reference list of open access templates that can be used in teaching or shared independently will be provided on the poster.