Action Research Summer Institute

CETL SUMMER INSTITUTE 2008 - RESEARCH ON TEACHING Title: Is It Working? Making Teaching more Time-Efficient and More Effective for Learning Goal: Each participant will plan a classroom research project that addresses his/her own questions about how to improve student learning and be more time-efficient Dates: August 11 and 12, 2008, WSSU Facilitator: Dr. Barbara Walvoord, PhD. Description: A faculty member teaching general-education humanities discovered how to increase student learning, reduce her own time investment, and get high student evaluations. A physics faculty member discovered how to make homework assignments more effective for students and less time-consuming for him. A psychology faculty member learned how to use peer response more effectively for student learning. The workshop will help participants in any discipline to define and meet goals for student learning, teacher time-efficiency, and student evaluations. The workshop will lead participants through a process of examining model projects, identifying their own questions/goals, designing the research, and preparing to gather and interpret data that will suggest how they can reach their goals. Day 1: Overview: What is classroom research? How Will It Help Me? What about issues of validity and reliability? What about time requirements? Examination of some models of successful classroom research Step 1: Identifying your questions and goals Step 2: Designing the research project: what kinds of data do I need to address my question/goals? When and how shall I collect the data? How shall I analyze the data? What about issues of confidentiality and privacy? Do I need Human Subjects Review Board approval? Day 2: Step 2 continued as needed Step 3: Writing rubrics, student questionnaires, and other tools for the research Step 4: Writing a research proposal Step 5: Establishing ongoing exchange and support

Barbara E. Walvoord, Ph.D. Chair of Assessment Committee, Fellow of the Institute for Educational Initiatives, and Concurrent Professor of English, University of Notre Dame, Indiana. • •

•

• •

Coordinated Notre Dame’s self-study and re-accreditation visit by the North Central Association’s Higher Learning Commission, 2004. Have consulted or led workshops at more than 250 institutions of higher education throughout the U.S., on topics of assessment, teaching and learning, and writing across the curriculum. Founding director of four faculty-development programs at research and liberal arts institutions (Central College in Iowa, Loyola College in Maryland, University of Cincinnati, University of Notre Dame). Each program has won national recognition. 1987 Maryland English Teacher of the Year for Higher Education. Currently principle investigator for a three-year, $160,000 Lilly grant to study the teaching practices of fifty outstanding teachers of introductory theology and religion.

Selected publications on assessment, teaching, and learning: Assessment Clear and Simple: A Practical Guide for Institutions, Departments, and General Education. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2004. “New Modes of Productivity for Student Learning.” In J. E. King, E. L. Anderson, and M. E. Corrigan (eds.), Changing Student Attendance Patterns: Challenges for Policy and Practice. New Directions for Higher Education, no. 121. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003. “Assessment in Accelerated Learning Programs: A Practical Guide.” In R. J. Wlodkowski and C. E. Kasworm (eds.), Accelerated Learning for Adults: The Promise and Practice of Intensive Educational Formats. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, no. 97. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003. Academic Departments: How They Work, How They Change. B. E. Walvoord, A. K. Carey, H. L. Smith, S. W. Soled, P. K. Way, and D. Zorn. ASHE ERIC Higher Education Reports, vol. 27, no. 8. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2000. Effective Grading: A Tool for Learning and Assessment. B. E. Walvoord and V. J. Anderson. Jossey-Bass, 1998. Thinking and Writing in College: A Naturalistic Study of Students in Four Disciplines. B. E. Walvoord and L. P. McCarthy, with contributions by V. J. Anderson, J. R. Breihan, S. M. Robison, and A. K. Sherman. Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English, 1991.