I’ve started to notice a couple of consistencies in our instructional practice that concern me. First, there’s the consistency in practices across courses, regardless of level. I mentioned in a previous post that I didn’t think capstone and other upper division courses should have the
My second cousin will soon graduate with a degree in graphic design. Yet his heart isn’t in his major—it’s in stand-up comedy. He first majored in communications, found that “boring,” contemplated a theatre major, and finally settled on graphic design. His parents supported the graphic
Kant declared false the commonplace saying “That may be true in theory, but it won’t work in practice.” He acknowledged that there might be difficulties in application, but he said that if a proposition is true in theory, it must work in practice. What about
There continues to be interest in the kind of feedback that helps students make changes that improve their work. Take something called feed-forward, for example. It’s defined as “timely and constructive feedback that feeds into the next assignment.” (p. 451) Here’s a study that assessed
For the past several semesters I’ve have had students in my border community college classes who are part of our grant-funded migrant student program, known as CAMP. These students are usually first-generation college students. Their parents work in the fields from dawn until dusk, and
Unfortunately, all too often performance on the first exam predicts performance throughout the course, especially for those students who do poorly on the first test. Faculty and institutions provide an array of supports for these students, including review sessions, time with tutors, more practice problems,
For the past couple of years I have been using some technologies that require setup before the class starts and have found that the setup interferes with my ability to converse with students before and after class.
A recent and excellent article that proposes a model for “building teams that learn” recommends that teachers have students develop a team charter early in their interaction. “Completing a team charter encourages team members to set goals and discuss how they will work together; it
Most teachers love teaching metaphors—the teacher as guide, as coach, as gardener, as maestro in front of the orchestra. At some point in our careers most of us have been asked to pick or create a metaphor that captures how we view the teacher’s role.
Students nowadays can be pretty demanding about wanting the teacher’s PowerPoints, lecture notes, and other written forms of the content presented in class. And a lot of teachers are supplying those, in part trying to be responsive to students but also because many students now
