Notes from “Making ‘Group Work’ Work” roundtable

On April 14, Bonnie Klentz (Psychology) and Jim Lee (Business Administration) anchored a discussion on the benefits and challenges of doing group work in class as part of the Teaching Roundtable series.

Those in attendance included faculty as well as administrators curious to learn more about improving group work among college employees.  Notes from the session are below and you can also download copies of Bonnie’s handout and Jim’s slide presentation.

Jim Lee began the discussion by drawing a distinction between “groups” and “teams.” Groups offer a number of pedagogical advantages: they are effective in drawing out quiet students; they offer opportunities for peer sharing of insights, viewpoints, and perceptions; and they provide opportunities for students to test out leadership strategies.

Teaching Roundtable: Pedagogy of Golf

THE PEDAGOGY OF GOLF

Lee McGinnis & Brian Glibkowski
Tuesday, May 3, 10:00 – 11:00

To wrap up this year’s Teaching Roundtable series, we turn to a somewhat unexpected source of insight into teaching and pedagogy: the world of golf. Lee McGinnis and Brian Glibkowski (Business Administration) recently concluded a research project that examined expert golf instructors (most research participants were rated to be one of the 100 best in their profession as rated by Golf Magazine and/or Golf Digest).

The research examines communication and teaching approaches used by these golf instructors. The results hold interesting connections to our own teaching environment. Profs. McGinnis and Glibkowski will share their research and then lead a conversation about how their findings might inform our own classroom practices.

Find the full Teaching Roundtable Schedule here.

Teaching Roundtable: Unlocking the Potential of Rubrics

Unlocking the Potential of Rubrics

Stacy Grooters & Jan Harrison

Wednesday, April 27, 1:00 – 2:00

Rubics aren’t a magic bullet, but they can be incredibly useful tools for clarifying our grading processes to ourselves and to our students. For this roundtable, Stacy Grooters (Center for Teaching and Learning) will give an overview of some of the different kinds of rubrics that faculty use–with specific examples from Stonehill faculty–as well as lead a discussion about the various ways they can be used.

Jan Harrison (Information Technology) will also present briefly on the ways faculty have been taking advantage of the rubric options offered through eLearn.

Find the full Teaching Roundtable Schedule here.

Teaching Roundtable: Making “Group Work” Work

 

Making “Group Work” Work

Bonnie Klentz & Jim Lee

Thursday, April 14, 2:30 – 3:30

We’ve all likely been encouraged to incorporate collaborative assignments into our courses, whether through small group in-class activities or long-term projects. Learning can be enhanced when students are given opportunities to learn together. However, the complex factors that influence group operations can mean that the potential benefits of collaborative learning can be overshadowed by the frustrations that students and faculty alike can share when group work just isn’t working.

For this roundtable, Bonnie Klentz (Psychology) and Jim Lee (Business Administration) will share their own experiences assigning group projects, discuss some of the research on group dynamics, and lead a conversation about how we can all make “group work” work.

Find the full Teaching Roundtable Schedule here.

Notes from “Student Autonomy” roundtable

Last week’s roundtable on “Encouraging Student Autonomy” featured reflections by Anna Ohanyan (Political Science) and John Lanci (Religious Studies) on the positive impacts that giving students a bit more freedom has had in their classes.

Ohanyan quoted Maryellen Weimer’s argument in Learner-Centered Teaching: Five Key Changes to Practice — that “the more structure we provide [students], the more they need” — as well as her reading of Donald Finkel’s Teaching with your Mouth Shut, as inspiring her decision to create more student-led spaces in her classroom.

Teaching Roundtable: Encouraging Student Autonomy

Encouraging Student Autonomy
Friday, April 8, 11:30am-12:30pm

For many of us, a primary goal of higher education is to empower our students as independent thinkers and self-motivated learners. Yet structuring our courses so that students can take some responsibility for their own learning can be a challenge-for faculty and students alike.

In this roundtable, Anna Ohanyan (Political Science) and John Lanci (Religious Studies) will lead a discussion about the possible benefits and challenges of introducing more student autonomy into our courses, as well as practical strategies for better structuring student-led assignments and activities.

Find the full Teaching Roundtable Schedule here.

Notes from “Information Literacy” roundtable

Last week’s roundtable, led by librarians Patricia McPherson and Heather Perry, discussed their research on the impact of library instruction on students’ information literacy skills.

Working specifically with students in history, McPherson and Perry found that after a more traditional library instruction session — what they term a “one-shot session” — students still struggled with some of the basics of research literacy (for example, crafting a focused research question).

In order to address this lack, the two have been experimenting in their library instruction sessions with active learning pedagogies focused on course-specific topics and texts.  Preliminary results have shown particular success with problem-based learning strategies using course-specific cases.

To see an example of one of these problem-based approaches, you can download their full powerpoint presentation.

Notes from “Course Preparation Assignments” roundtable

In a July 2006 article in Teaching Sociology, David Yamane proposed the idea of “Course Preparation Assignments: A Strategy for Creating Discussion-Based Courses.”

Profs. William Ewell and Robert Rodgers (Political Science) have since expanded on Yamane’s work and have been researching its effectiveness in their own teaching.  They presented on the basics of Course Preparation Assignments (or CPAs) at last week’s Teaching Roundtable.

Basically, a CPA is a short (“snappy”), low-stakes assignment that asks students to engage with the reading before coming to class.  Often asking them to apply what they’ve learned to a real world problem or current event, CPAs encourage students to engage in higher level thinking and to take ownership of the material.  Furthermore, they prepare students to engage more actively in class discussions and other class activities.

Teaching Roundtable: Course Preparation Assignments

Course Preparation Assignments
part of the CTL’s Teaching Roundtable Series

Wednesday, March 9, 2011
1:00 – 2:15 PM
Duffy 114 Conference Room

A common challenge faculty face is motivating students to do the work they need to do outside of class so that they are prepared to participate in class. Yet the options we have for encouraging preparation–reflection papers, quizzes, impassioned pleas–sometimes fall short. To provide a constructive perspective on this question, William Ewell and Rob Rodgers (Political Science) will share their experiments with a pedagogical technique known as “course preparation assignments” (CPAs).

This instructional tool provides students opportunities for significant guided learning beyond the classroom through low stakes writing assignments that emphasize critical thinking and analysis of assigned primary or secondary source materials. Profs. Rodgers and Ewell will explain the basics of CPAs and invite conversation about how they can be utilized in specific courses across the disciplines.

Find the full Teaching Roundtable schedule here.

Notes from “Learning Theories and Technology” Roundtable

Last week’s roundtable on “Learning Theories and Technology,” led by Prof. Brian Glibkowski (Business Administration) raised interesting questions about the relationship between pedagogy, content, and technology.

Working from interviews with Stonehill faculty, Prof. Glibkowski presented a model for thinking about the different ways technology can intersect with learning in the classroom.

He argued for an integrated approach that recognizes the potential of technology to improve efficiency and pedagogy in the classroom — and is flexible enough to allow for customization across multiple disciplines.

Go here to download the slides from the full presentation, including examples of specific classroom technologies and the kinds of pedagogical problems they can address.

Find the full Spring 2011 Teaching Roundtable schedule here.