As I skimmed the pages, I found this objective for student teachers: “Given a class which is not interested in the lesson, the preservice teacher will interest and involve the students in a concept lesson of at least five minutes. If necessary, the teacher will use at least five techniques to get and keep attention.”

So the advice (I think) is to extract a concept from the lesson and use it to engage students. The idea of taking something from the lesson with the express purpose of using it to get students interested in the larger lesson doesn’t seem like bad advice. Often we just start wherever the content starts or where we left off last class without making any special attempt to engage students with the day’s content. Starting with a part of the content, say an especially interesting part, could better set up students for what’s to come.

But the idea of doing this for five minutes and using at least five techniques—I have to admit, that made me smile. To think that every time students are uninterested, five minutes worth of engagement techniques will solve the problem is to imagine classroom dynamics as way more fixed and formulaic than I’ve ever experienced them. What if five minutes isn’t enough? What if the selected techniques don’t work? I keep trying to imagine a beginning teacher or any teacher trying to accomplish this objective. I am hard pressed to think of five techniques you could fit into five minutes. You could ask a question and entertain an answer. You could survey students asking for a show of hands based on their opinions. What else?

Granted, the objective is old and perhaps no longer representative, but it does illustrate what happens when you overspecify what teachers need to be doing. Plans this prescriptive make it more difficult to respond to what’s happening in the moment. There’s a fluidity about good teaching. It is carefully planned and any effective teacher has a repertoire of strategies, but as the class unfolds teachers need to be able to take advantage of what is happening and deal with what is not. As a wise teacher once told me, “There a plan for the class, and then there’s what happens in class.”

This quote appears in a study that explored how much feedback instructors should give students and whether giving too much might be deleterious.

I do take issue with the quote. Students, teachers, indeed anyone can improve with positive feedback, too. Positive feedback tells you what you are doing right or what works. If you know that, you can do more of it. It is true that you won’t improve as much if you only get positive feedback. You also need to know what isn’t working or could be done more effectively.

It seems to me what works best for students (and teachers, for that matter) is a balance of positive and negative feedback. First and foremost that balance ought to reflect the overall quality of the performance, presentation, or whatever has been completed. If the work was mostly not very good, the feedback should reflect that. But very few things are completely wrong or without anything worthy of a positive comment, although I have read some student papers that come pretty close.

The balance of feedback also needs to respond to what the teacher knows of the learning needs of the student. Does he need a sharp stick? Can he handle it? Does she need encouragement? What two or three things most need work?

Some instructors do err on the side of providing too much negative feedback. They don’t seem to think they’ve done a good job grading if they haven’t pointed out everything that is wrong with the completed work. And sometimes the feedback isn’t always framed as constructively as it might be—it’s excessively judgmental and focuses on the person rather than the performance. So, negative feedback can discourage a student, engender anger, and not produce the desired results. But these aren’t inherent flaws that should prevent instructors from providing feedback about the problems.

Providing feedback that promotes learning is a time-consuming and intellectually challenging task. But it doesn’t have to be only negative if students are to improve. Negative feedback, when balanced with positive input, can be delivered without injury to self-esteem.

Reference: Ackerman, D. S. and Gross, B. L. (2010). Instructor feedback: How much to students really want? Journal of Marketing Education, 32 (2), 172-181.

From the audience came this question: “What are the things faculty do that you really hate?” “Arrive at class late,” one student said almost immediately, “and then offer the excuse that you got caught up doing your email. Doing email? Come on, I lose respect for faculty like that.” Another student spoke, “Under required texts, list an expensive book and then never mention it all semester.” “Assigning homework before teaching the material in class. You struggle to do the homework, you don’t understand what you’re supposed to do, and you get a crummy homework grade. If you want to develop a student’s confidence, assign homework that you’ve at least talked about in class,” suggested a third.

These actions seem so obviously wrong—it’s hard to imagine faculty committing these kinds of errors. My guess is that not many do. I wish the questioner had asked this question: “What do faculty do that really compromises your efforts to learn the material?”

There was lots of discussion on the panel about the value of students and teachers connecting, interacting, and otherwise communicating with each another. One of the students provided a lovely example. “It was the end of the semester, and I was walking across campus. I ran into my English professor. I was embarrassed because I couldn’t remember her name. She remembered mine and asked about my plans for the summer. I told her I was going home to Ohio to run a big cheerleading workshop. She wished me well. When I got back to campus in the fall—it was probably the second day I was back—I ran into this same English professor, and I still couldn’t remember her name. She welcomed me back and then asked how the cheerleading event turned out. I was stunned she remembered. When I got back to my room I looked up her name, and I also looked at the courses she taught last year. She had almost 300 students across the year, and she remembered my name and what I was doing during the summer. I will never forget her name now.”

We need regular reminders that even a seemingly unimportant exchange of pleasantries can impact a student’s development—personally and educationally.

Dad was very religious, attending the same small Bible church for 65 years, and he preached there regularly until just a couple of years ago. The elder who delivered the message at Dad’s funeral service spoke about how Dad loved to tell stories when he preached. I remember them. Mostly Dad retold the Bible stories. He would read the story and then make it real. He never changed the facts, but he added details. He would imagine what kind of day it was or what kind of work someone might have done. But what he did best was describe how the people in the stories felt—the confusion Nicodemus experienced when Jesus told him he must be born again. “That didn’t make any sense to Nicodemus,” Dad would say. “He already had been born. He was alive and well. What in the world was this teacher trying to tell him?” Or, what was going through the mind of the prodigal son when he finally got near home—his fear, his hope, his shame. Or, how the smart, self-confident and always self-assured Paul felt after his encounter with Christ on the road to Damascus. “He could hardly think straight,” I hear Dad saying. “I expect he kept going over and over it in his mind. He felt so different, so changed and he couldn’t explain why. And I think Paul was a man used to having all the answers.”

During his 90s, he would ask to preach the gospel first on Sunday night. As the preacher at his funeral explained, “He would tell me he didn’t think he had much to say. But then he would tell the story and he would just be there, living its details. After the service, he would apologize for having taken more than his share of time.”

I come by my penchant for telling stories honestly. And I remember Dad’s view of what made them good. He was berating a fellow preacher who liked to be the hero of his stories. “Good stories aren’t about you. Look at the Gospels! Did the Lord ever tell stories about himself? And the stories he told changed peoples lives, then and now.”

There’s a lot of teaching in preaching and some preaching in teaching, even though I know that two are quite different, but a good story helps listeners to both. Dad used them to bring his listeners the message of salvation. I use them to rekindle the joy, power and passion good college teaching demands.

I love how this quote challenges the way we tend to think about teaching problems. It was written by Randy Bass and appears in an article available online at http://www.sportsperformance.org/electronic_portfolio/Docs/scholarship_of_teaching_whats_wrong-bass.pdf. Even though the article dates from 1998, most of us still haven’t changed the way we think about problems in teaching. First off, you aren’t the only teacher who has them; all teachers (if they are honest) have teaching problems. A lot of teaching problems result from the kind of students now attending college. That’s not to blame students or make them the problem, but simply to remind us that students have changed, and I think they’ve changed in ways that make them more challenging to teach.

Second, problems are there to be solved and most that teachers experience can be. But many of us struggle to find the objectivity necessary to reflect and analyze the problem without having some sort of mental meltdown. Yes, most teaching problems are frustrating, and they can make teachers feel like failures. But past those feelings is the need to seek out solutions—to work on the problem, to try various approaches and arrive at a solution that makes sense. Teaching problems are best solved intellectually, not emotionally.

And finally, chances are good you have colleagues working to solve the same problems. You can solve the problem on your own in the privacy of your classroom and be proud of the solution. But your colleague across the hall may have a better solution or may have figured out how that solution can be applied to other problems. Or, you and your colleague may be able to combine solutions and generate even more creative alternatives. Solving teaching problems, just like solving research questions, can be an intriguing and highly satisfying endeavor.

That’s one of seven research-based principles for smart teaching proposed by authors of the new book, How Learning Works. They make this observation: “Unfortunately, these metacognitive skills tend to fall outside the content area of most courses, and consequently they are often neglected in instruction.” (p. 191) Research also documents that these skills are developed much more efficiently by direct instruction than by happenstance.

Here are some suggestions for developing each of these important metacognitive skills. More are proposed and discussed in the book.

·        Help students assess the task by being more explicit than you may think necessary. Don’t assume that a basic description is enough. Fill in the details so that students know what they are being asked to do.

·        Help students evaluate how well they’re equipped to do the task by providing opportunities for self-assessment early and often. Show students how these kinds of assessments are helpful—how the self-knowledge they reveal enables students to better understand what the task requires.

·        Help students plan an appropriate approach by first implementing a plan you’ve provided and then by creating their own plans. It also helps if you make planning a central goal of the assignment. That means making time for it and letting it be a part of the assignment that counts.

·        Help students apply selected strategies and monitor progress by having students do guided self-assessments. Give them a set of criteria and help them apply those to what they’ve accomplished so far. Make reflection a part of the assignment by having students explain what they are doing and why. Peer review can also help students be realistic about their own progress and that of other students.

·        Help students adjust their strategies by encouraging them to analyze the effectiveness of what they’ve done. They need to reflect on their progress as they work on the task and on their performance once the task has been completed. They also need to know that there are multiple ways of tackling the task so that if what they tried did not work very well, they can use another approach next time.

Reference: Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, DiPietro, M., Lovett, M. C., Norman, M. K. How Learning Works: 7 Research-Based Principles for Smart Teaching. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2010.

For example, here are some of the queries included on an exam wrapper students completed after reviewing a graded physics exam.

–Approximately how much time did you spend preparing for this exam?

–What percentage of your test-preparation time was spent on each of these activities? (A list follows, which includes the following items:  reading the textbook, rereading the textbook, reviewing homework problems and solutions, solving practice problems, reviewing notes, and looking at material on the course website, among others.)

–After looking over your exam, estimate the percentage of points lost due to each of the following. (Another list follows: actual content, algebra or arithmetic errors, lacking of understanding of the concept, not knowing how to approach the problem, careless mistakes, and the option for students to identify something else.)

–Based on your responses to the questions above, name at least three things you plan to do differently in preparing for the next exam. (This is followed by advice on how named items need to be specific and illustrated with examples.)

–What can we do to help support your learning and your preparation for the next exam?

The completed wrappers are collected and reviewed by the course instructor (and in this case, TAs). Those teaching the course use them to look for student approaches and patterns that produced good results and those that did not. These are then shared with students.

Most effective of all, the wrappers are returned to students a week or so before the next exam. After reviewing them, students can be engaged in a discussion during which various study strategies are shared and analyzed.

This great idea appears in a new book: How Learning Works: 7 Research-Based Principles for Smart Teaching by Susan Ambrose, Michael W. Bridges, Marsha C. Lovett, Michele DiPietro, and Marie K. Norma. It is published and offered for sale by Jossey-Bass (www.josseybass.com)

The Meier quote is an interesting one. Ricky commented that he once used it in a faculty workshop, and it generated some push back—some faculty thought it was too simplistic. It is a very short quote but powerful, I think, because it so starkly contrasts with the teaching as telling paradigm.

What might the “teaching is listening” part of the quote mean? Could it be about listening as students talk or write through to understanding? Could it mean asking the kind of questions that allow students to figure things out for themselves? (Yes, that was a point made in the last blog entry). Could it mean listening to ascertain what students do and do not yet know or listening so that feedback can be in response to their understanding? I had a surly exchange with my hubby yesterday. I was complaining that one of the burners on the gas stove is slow to light. He immediately launched into an explanation about how to light the burners, which I already know how to do and do successfully on a daily basis. It seemed to me a perfect example of where there should have been more listening and less teaching.

The “learning is talking” part of the quote is easier. It rounds back to teaching in a nice sort of way. How often have we discovered that our own understanding of something is deepened and enriched when we try to explain it to someone else? So, students need opportunities to talk (and write) because articulating understandings clarifies them both in terms of what does and does not make sense to the learner.

I don’t think the Meier quote should be interpreted literally. Isn’t the author just trying to make a point? And some points do finally penetrate when they are stated starkly. Of course, teaching is not exclusively listening. By its very nature it involves talking, but as Ricky points out in his blog and as the Markert principle asserts, most teachers (I am tempted to write “all”) talk too much. More learning would occur if we talked less, listened more, and let learning be about students talking.

For example, adult educators recommend that teachers offer students plenty of opportunity for critical reflection—that teachers put students in belief-confronting situations. Critical reflection doesn’t always involve fancy new techniques: questions can effectively raise issues and help “people figure things out for themselves,” so writes Patricia Cranton (p. 138). But the questions that force reflection aren’t usually the easy ones with straightforward answers. More often they are questions the teacher can’t answer, at least in any definitive way. And I can hear my good colleague Spence reminding me that it isn’t just the questions teachers ask—it’s teachers encouraging students to ask questions and helping them frame their questions so that they inquire about things that are relevant, profound, and worthy of contemplation.

Cranton also writes about the power of a consciousness-raising experience to promote insights and learning that is transformative. Service-learning experiences often do this for students as do travel and study abroad. But it can also be an activity that occurs in the classroom—one that uncovers flawed thinking or alternative perspectives in direct and compelling ways.

Sometimes transformative learning occurs when students must write about an experience. Journal assignments can accomplish this effectively. Here too, having students respond to a thoughtful and provocative question can stimulate the kind of analysis that leads to insights.

Finally, Cranton writes (in this book and elsewhere) about the role of teacher authenticity in creating climates supportive of transformative learning. Authenticity conveys the kind of support learners need—confronting long-held beliefs, asking questions about has been long been taken for granted can be frightening. Cranton notes that there is no one “correct” way to be genuine in our relations with students. Teachers can be authentic without being all warm and fuzzy and they can be authentic at the same time they are professional. Authenticity is about personal honesty and being just as open to transformative learning experiences as students are expected to be.

Reference

Cranton, P. Understanding and Promoting Transformative Learning. 2^nd Ed. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2006.