Understanding Instructional Change and Teacher Growth

Credit: iStock.com/Isbjorn
Credit: iStock.com/Isbjorn
Why this article is worth discussing: For most teachers, change keeps their courses fresh and invigorated. It’s an antidote to all about teaching that doesn’t change: content fundamentals, courses taught, passive students, exams, assignments, and grading—a list we can polish off with committee work. Despite the importance of change, we don’t spend much time thinking about the processes associated with it: What makes teachers decide to change, do they make more than one change at once, do changes in one course migrate to another, does a pattern of change emerge across the teaching years? This article merits discussing because it explores what a faculty cohort said about why, how, and when they made changes and whether those changes fit into a trajectory of instructional growth. Reading their answers stimulates reflection on change and growth—that of oneself and one’s colleagues.

To continue reading, you must be a Teaching Professor Subscriber. Please log in or sign up for full access.

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Related Articles

I have two loves: teaching and learning. Although I love them for different reasons, I’ve been passionate about...
There are a myriad of answers to this seemingly simple question. Grading probably comes to mind for many...
Fears of disingenuous work, fraudulent and stolen information, and theft of intellectual property have been swirling around education...
Students often struggle academically due to an inability to organize their lives around achievable goals. Students beyond early...
Hey, you. Yes, you. When was the last time you told your students, colleagues, or (gulp) administrators how...

For online faculty, I think it’s more important than ever to be conspicuously human...

Back when I was an undergraduate, students were thought to drop out of college because either they failed...

Are you signed up for free weekly Teaching Professor updates?

You'll get notified of the newest articles.

The Teaching Professor Conference 2024

June 7-9, 2024 • New Orleans

Connect with Fellow Educators at The Teaching Professor Conference!