tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post1011251573637608576..comments2023-05-22T03:04:42.242-05:00Comments on Dame Eleanor Hull: Teaching, heresy, and logicDame Eleanor Hullhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06512884104691200975noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-38740844169615646532011-11-13T20:43:25.040-06:002011-11-13T20:43:25.040-06:00P.S. to profacero: introverts can be quite good le...P.S. to profacero: introverts can be quite good lecturers, since good lecturing depends more on good preparation *before* the lecture (a solitary activity) than on interaction with students *during* the lecture (though obviously the latter can play a part, too). It's leading discussions that we (or at least I) find exhausting. Mind you, plenty of us can lead discussions very well, but, unlike our more extroverted colleagues, we come away more exhausted than energized (or, to be more precise, at least in my case, both exhausted and keyed up -- not a good combination, especially if repeated 4 times in the course of a day).Contingent Cassandrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08161652083031423415noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-22742448669013589212011-11-13T20:38:16.033-06:002011-11-13T20:38:16.033-06:00My undergrad classes were a combination of big lec...My undergrad classes were a combination of big lectures with once-a-week discussion sections run by grad students and seminars that were all discussion (plus -- quite vital -- junior and senior independent work, with one-on-one supervision). I also did a *lot* of reading, writing, and synthesizing outside class, which was probably more valuable for me, since I don't absorb aural information all that well. <br /><br />Since I teach a skills class (writing in the disciplines), I'm not in a position to teach primarily by lecturing (but I do of course provide 5-15 minute presentations on various subjects, often as prelude to an individual- or group-based exercise). But I'd be happy to try teaching a more content-focused course primarily as a lecture, punctuated by occasional exercises in which I ask students to take an interpretation I've suggested further or otherwise practice a relevant interpretive skill. <br /><br />However, I believe the key issue is not so much what kind of teaching works best (or what kind students prefer) as that students, at least in my experience, are doing very, very little work of any kind outside of the classroom. That means that, increasingly, all the kinds of activities that promote learning -- information transfer (through reading or listening), analysis of examples/texts, writing, etc. -- need to take place *in* the classroom if they're going to take place in any meaningful way at all. And the fact that teachers are just as overburdened as students means that we're increasingly tempted to employ methods -- e.g. group work -- that produce less student work for us to evaluate. <br /><br />In short, though I'm sure those promoting group work, in or out of class, and similar exercises, are sincere in their belief that these activities promote "engagement," and, through it, learning, I strongly suspect that other forces, especially the fact that individual students and professors have less and less time to devote to any individual student's learning in any one class, play a significant role.Contingent Cassandrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08161652083031423415noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-5763486922733045162011-11-13T19:40:33.384-06:002011-11-13T19:40:33.384-06:00Oh yes - another type of group work I was once exp...Oh yes - another type of group work I was once expected to do - joint publications with the instructors, some of whom had been promoted to assistant professor because that was the title of tenured instructors. It meant they were supposed to come up with a project that sounded good to them, like a translation of something plus introduction, and I was supposed to do it and get it published in some place for us all. Real exercise in diplomacy getting out of that.<br /><br />It is what I think of when students beg me not to put them in a group, as they have already been in too many groups today.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-11503705610153976572011-11-13T19:35:42.248-06:002011-11-13T19:35:42.248-06:00ADM works at a fancier school than I do! What the ...ADM works at a fancier school than I do! What the freshmen and sophomore need is not "group work" but tutoring and office hours. Levels are far too disparate and most students equipped to learn from group work end up having to teach the rest of the group because they are *so* much further behind. Also I hate to use class time for this: I've always had reports from committees but now we're supposed to use class time for committee meetings; it's ridiculous since these can be held virtually if students can't get together in person. <br /><br />On the other hand I like to show whole films in classes, because as one student pointed out, "you can't watch these alone, you need a support group" ... so I guess that's why I'm sort of jealous about the rest of class time.<br /><br />Worst group work I ever had was when a chair decided we had to have equality with instructors by having them approve the content of our seminars. A real time waster that was. Not the same as consulting with someone who knows something about the topic or about teaching at that level, not at all the same. Even if technically the instructors and we were all in the same "class" (same discipline, teaching in same program).<br /><br />See what I mean?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-31775804876391692342011-11-13T15:35:59.460-06:002011-11-13T15:35:59.460-06:00I think the common thread, here, is that whether o...I think the common thread, here, is that whether one does group work as a prelude to a teacher led activity or one lectures before discussion or whether one lectures all the time, the professor as expert is the center of the classroom. So it's really all the same.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-18758007928945204132011-11-13T09:27:25.819-06:002011-11-13T09:27:25.819-06:00I have to disagree on group work. If it's well...I have to disagree on group work. If it's well designed, it can be great. Here's the thing:<br /><br />Students don't know how to talk about scholarly things in a way that helps them learn. <br /><br />We do it all the time. We may sit in bars or coffee shops, but we run ideas by each other all the time (except when we work in sucky places where our colleagues aren't sharers). Group work is how we do a lot.<br /><br />Good group work can be a way to teach some of what we do naturally to our students. It just needs to be done in ways that they understand it's a kind of prep for something else that the "expert" is leading. <br /><br />Same with peer review. If you can get students to understand that peer review helps their own writing, and is also part of academic culture, then it works far better than when the students think you're just getting them to do your work.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-52812098677967209522011-11-12T22:56:21.851-06:002011-11-12T22:56:21.851-06:00My students dislike group work intensely. They lik...My students dislike group work intensely. They like it outside of class with some teacher type person in charge, so they learn how to study, but not in class. <br /><br />I think it was invented on the theory that the instructor wouldn't be an expert, and also for the sake of introverted professors with poor presentation skills.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-56324354445645346682011-11-12T17:03:04.072-06:002011-11-12T17:03:04.072-06:00As a former academic and now professional governme...As a former academic and now professional government employee, I can say the thing that still makes me cringe the most is the group activity in a training class. I'm not naturally gregarious and I want to learn at my own pace, not being left on the side of the road while someone who knows the material better dominates the exercise, or having to hold the hands of group members who are absolutely clueless about what they're doing. In a worst case scenario, the group exercise becomes an exercise in managing difficult team members who don't care, want to be the boss, etc. If we were actually coworkers on a project, I can see the value of a group environment in training, but I will never work with most of the people in my classes, let alone see them, ever again. Just let me get through the class on my own!aepvanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-87715887577397111932011-11-12T16:08:07.063-06:002011-11-12T16:08:07.063-06:00I'm with you. The boring lecturer talking in a...I'm with you. The boring lecturer talking in a monotone from yellowed notes is, I've concluded, the Bigfoot of the academic world. As you point out, lectures give them a framework for experiential learning that would be difficult to replicate in any other way. <br /><br />A short lecture settles and centers them for the discussion that follows.undinehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05589384016564587214noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-90681270178025364142011-11-12T09:31:52.179-06:002011-11-12T09:31:52.179-06:00One of the things I'm toying with is to make p...One of the things I'm toying with is to make podcasts to set up classes. Sort of 5-10 minute mini-lectures that the students can listen to (and maybe watch), so that they can be better prepared for class without me having to spend that class time on formal lectures. Because my students want more lectures.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-24641231453330516722011-11-12T04:15:25.043-06:002011-11-12T04:15:25.043-06:00In an odd place where I hear from a lot of adult a...In an odd place where I hear from a lot of adult and motivated learners, the one thing they hate, hate, hate, is any form with the word 'GROUP' - group discussion, group work, teaching each other, blah. HATE IT. <br /><br />Why?<br /><br />Because they know why they are there: to learn. They assume the person teaching either knows what they need to learn or will be replaced by someone who does and so, 'give it to me as quickly and as effectively as possible'. <br /><br />For the unmotivated learner - take a year off. I've taught enough grade 12 students who hold jobs, cars, apartment and relationships and still do the 'oh, I blah, blah blah' - they drove me into teaching at university where I assumed humans would be responsible for themselves.<br /><br />The lectures I hate=UK lectures in halls of 100+ students where they do speak in a monotone, often never actually turn to check if anyone is there as they write nonstop on the board and if you have a question, ask your tutor group on thursday.<br /><br />Lectures I love=crazy geniuses who relish questions. Our geology professor taught us the periodic table by telling us we were elements and then lighting a match and asking us what happens. The Canadian History prof (over 300 people) was an exchange genuis, who was up at the front showing the JCPC giving the federal government a 'good f*cking' because they used a semicolon. These things, even years later, are hard to forget, as the teacher falls to the floor wailing and bemoaning in the role of 'Province of Sask' in the 'Potash Cartel' (only in two places in North America, and they decided to do an OPEC with it...until the Feds stepped in). <br /><br />Seriously ask yourself, do you want a lecture from the most brilliant and engaging minds OR a lecture from your less motivated and 'I was about to drop this class anyway' classmates? Because that is what group activies says to motivated students: that someone who knows nothing about the course is going to be as valuable a resource as you.<br /><br />One exception: in an educational anthropology course, getting the motivation of the students, getting them to speak, to have them become the examples of what you are trying to do in the field is useful. How that might be done in your field, um, well, guys still like butt jokes and people are still scared of death - I am not sure if that is what you want them to take from medieval lit.Elizabeth McClunghttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03627373214555333537noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-28836259344481164662011-11-11T20:54:59.068-06:002011-11-11T20:54:59.068-06:00I'm still finishing my Phd, but the first clas...I'm still finishing my Phd, but the first class I taught was a History of the British Isles from 1066 to 1603. My area of expertise begins with the Reformation, so knowing a whopping hundred years of history I was supposed to teach was scary, to say the least. To make it even more of a challenge, my class had 120 students.<br /><br />I'm not sure how you cover 600 years (or more) of history in a semester without lecturing. I knew going in that my lectures would be weaker in some parts of the class than others. I can go on and on about religion, even before the Reformation, but social history? Forget it. The Hundred Years War? Um, no.<br /><br />Fortunately, I had a night class and it was 3 hours long, so I could and did break up my lectures with "culture breaks" where we discussed art, architecture, music, etc. We also had group activities, like flytings, every class to break things up. These were obviously the students' (and mine, too) favorite parts of the class, but I still just don't see how you can get away from lecturing, particularly when texts never cover everything you want them to cover and students don't do all of the readings anyway.<br /><br />This really scares me as I'm heading into the job market now and my teaching statement, I feel, is a bit of an exaggeration because I say I emphasize engagement and all and really downplay my love of lecturing.Jodi A. Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04049368949080807185noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-48536787450407182562011-11-11T20:35:25.091-06:002011-11-11T20:35:25.091-06:00Interesting . . . I can't imagine lecturing in...Interesting . . . I can't imagine lecturing in what I teach (modern foreign language) but I always thought the anti-lecturing stuff was to prevent ONLY lecture and nothing else, not to prevent entirely. After all, what are conferences, where we theoretically go to learn stuff?Shedding Khawatirhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04643490050277557885noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7188858439852729115.post-70413019205481498152011-11-11T17:37:13.376-06:002011-11-11T17:37:13.376-06:00I said in my teaching philosophy that I primarily ...I said in my teaching philosophy that I primarily lecture (thought I am engaging and interactive in doing so) and that I expect students to learn facts. By rote. Three guesses how many teaching oriented institutions wanted to interview me. Give up? ZERO. And the one interview I had didn't ask for a teaching philosophy and looked aghast when I said I enjoy lecturing. So yeah.<br /><br />But so here's the thing. I lecture in big classes where I can't connect well with students relationally and where most of my audience is not engaged. I think lecturing is the best option under those circumstances. I do very little of the talking in my classes at my current position and my kids get it. Oh, they get it. And I still expect them to learn and know facts cold.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com