January, 2009

The Teaching Professor - January, 2009 - Full Audio MP3
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The Teaching Professor - January, 2009 - Full Issue PDF
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Pre-Reading Strategies: Connecting Expert Understanding and Novice Learning
By Heather M. Bandeen, The Ohio State University
When used regularly, pre-reading strategies provide a great way for instructors to make their expert understanding accessible while encouraging students to gain a novice intellectual foothold within a new discipline. Next time you announce a reading assignment, try one of the following strategies to spark a discussion before your students read.

Dealing with the Interested but Noncompliant Student
By Carl B. Bridges, Johnson Bible College, TN
If you have been teaching for any time at all, I’ll bet you’ve encountered what I call the interested but noncompliant student (hereafter, the INC). Here are some examples encountered in my courses: In an ancient language course, one INC would not take the trouble to learn her noun forms and verb endings but, fascinated by the language, went online to find an inscription that she tried to decipher. Another INC read more than I have in a subdivision of my field. He wanted to talk about it endlessly before and after class, so much so that I had to chase him away to give other students a chance to talk to me. Still another INC turned every writing assignment into a paper on his pet subject about which he had read dozens of books. Am I describing student behaviors that sound familiar?

Scholarship on Teaching and Learning: A Status Report
Recent issues of the Journal of Management Education and Teaching of Psychology look at the status of scholarly work on teaching and learning in each of those disciplines. This kind of stocktaking is very necessary. I so wish it was happening in more fields. Gaining respect for scholarly work on teaching and learning is a struggle that has just begun. Those of us who care about college teaching, about having it respected as a profession, and about having a vibrant literature associated with its practice must advocate for its acceptance. To advocate effectively, we must be informed.

Student Feedback When It Helps the Most
By Neil Maltby, St. Francis Xavier University, Nova Scotia
Course evaluations are a regular component of most university courses. Students provide anonymous ratings along with written commentary about the course, its content, and the professor. Generally, the results arrive sometime after the semester has ended. Although this process can provide constructive feedback that the faculty member can use the next time he or she prepares and teaches that course, it does not benefit the students who provided the feedback, since they have already completed the course. The use of Web-based evaluations during a course can benefit students and the instructor. It allows students to offer suggestions that enable an instructor to act during the course.

Cramming for Exams
Do students cram for your exams? More pointedly, in the bygone days when you were a student, did you ever cram for an exam? It will probably not shock any instructor to learn that research does document that students still do cram. What may be a bit surprising is the percentage of students who do: somewhere between 25 percent and 50 percent, depending on the study. The problem with cramming has to do with retention and it is here that previous research, including the study referenced below, offers conclusive results. When students cram, the information is stored in short-term memory and information stored there doesn’t stay there long.

A Course Redesign that Contributed to Student Success
Required introductory courses, especially those in math and science, offer special teaching challenges. Frequently, these are courses that must be completed before students can proceed to their chosen majors. Many of today’s college students struggle with these courses. A recent article in Change describes an algebra course like this offered at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. In 2002, the success rate in this course (a C- or above) stood at 55 percent. Three years later, 75 percent of the students were succeeding in the course without any diminution of course standards, as measured by performance on a final exam that contained the same types of problems.