In an article billed as a “field guide” to constructivism, three authors from the sciences focuses on cognitive constructivism and aims to equip faculty with what they need in order to determine how constructivist a learning activity is. The authors propose that constructivist activities can
I teach history and geography at a small college in rural Ohio, and like many in my profession, I’ve been watching the development of massive open online courses with some concern, particularly since MOOCs started being absorbed into curricula. In the office-door debates I engage
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.
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.
I started teaching three years ago. I was fresh out of graduate school, equally thrilled and terrified at the prospect of teaching my own classes. On paper it sounded straightforward: teach others the same material I just finished learning myself. I could do that, I
Being a college professor sometimes feels lonely. Yes, we have colleagues in our departments and elsewhere on campus, students in our classrooms, and administrators who support us, but we also spend a lot of time working by ourselves. As new faculty members, we decided that
Remember that article in the March issue describing how a sociologist used reflective writing to improve his teaching? Here’s another short testimony to add to that one. Matthew Liberatore explains in Chemical Engineering Education that a laboratory notebook holds an invaluable collection of procedures, measurements,
Sociologist David Purcell thinks he did. He shares his method and what he learned from it in a detailed article. Purcell writes for 10 to 15 minutes after every class. If he teaches back-to-back sections, he makes comments on his lecture notes, which he uses
“Error marks the place where education begins,” Mike Rose posits as one of the central themes of his book Lives on the Boundary. Error is a signal of stepping outside the confines of our comfortable knowledge base, of taking that risk and transcending what we
It seems that we are in a time—an educational crossroads of sorts—when teaching is overgeneralized to the point where it can be difficult for professionals to have meaningful conversations. Tired descriptors such as “sage on the stage” and “guide on the side” have permeated the
