Course Planning

M.Tech Course Organization and Planning • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

*Course Planning *Planning Process *Key Questions to Consider When Designing Courses Are you thinking of revising your courses by next year Curriculum Development Process *Depth vs. Breadth *Preparing course syllabi *Planning written assignments Content Coverage Consistency in Expectations Rethinking How Objectives are Met Making sure your students get the big picture from your class *Planning Courses to help students become intentional, responsible and enabled learners *Are your students realizing that learning in your subject should not end when the course does Setting expectations and welcoming your students *Plan and Teach to Foster success in your students Plan what kind of time schedule make the most sense for your courses now *Planning courses to help student become intentional, responsible and enable learners Helping students to succeed with changes you are making to your courses *Helping students to understand your syllabi or how you are teaching Planning for the functions of content coverage in your courses Setting the right tone for your class, getting to know your students *Still time to revise your syllabi Thinking about trying some thing different next semester? Looking at your policies Textbook selection Consistency of standards across instructors or courses *Helping students to feel like they have some control might raise course evaluations Insuring students get the big objectives for the course *Allowing students a little say over deadlines and getting them to get in the habit of using the Blackboard/Listserv for your course *Time to refresh your course Spend time thinking about the courses you are teaching now Excellent, free web-based instructional materials available for the sciences and health sciences *Helping our students to become self-directed learners *Planning for new courses or revising courses on the basis of program learning outcomes *Helping students to get the essential long-lasting lessons from your course *Getting students to read and have ownership over the syllabus *Helping to balance the power in your classes Getting mid-course feedback on your class Does the amount of content taught influence how well students understand the material

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How to plan time allotment for a course Being supportive of our students in their differences in the time they need to master skills Using a bingo card concept to increase student interaction with the content and decrease procrastination *Maximizing student learning Reviewing how the courses went as you finish the semester Developing prerequisite courses that meet the expectations of the instructors of advanced courses Making sense of students' complaints that the instructor or the course was unfair Getting meaningful feedback from your students that is separate from course evaluations Planning your course to help students acquire the thinking skills of the discipline Alignment of Skill Requirement. ppt Beginning to do scholarship on your teaching Making your course more aligned and more explicit to your students Teaching models to revise as you plan for next time you teach Essential aspects of course planning Making the implied more visible and constant in your syllabus and first day of class Getting students to understand the relationships among concepts Getting course-specific evaluation information from your students On the first day of class help your students to see the overall consistency in your course

Planning Process When you get to planning for your teaching use this planning process:

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First consider your learning goals for the course. What do you want your students to achieve at the end of the course? Next plan how you will assess your students and give them feedback. Assessment should be consistent with the goals of the course. Finally plan your teaching and learning activities to help the students reach these objectives.

It may sound backwards, but it is more consistent and leads to a better course.

Department vs. Breadth As you plan your courses, think of the curriculum to be learned as a rectangle, with the horizontal sides = breadth and the vertical sides = depth. In this image the area of the rectangle basically remains constant regardless of how you construct the rectangle. Which do you need for your course, greater breadth or greater depth? You cannot have it both ways. Mathematically inclined folks will remind us that the maximum area of a rectangle with the smallest parameter is a square. Perhaps you also need to make your curriculum more of a square than a very narrow, but long rectangle. (Adapted from John Biggs- Teaching for Quality Learning at University, What the student does), SHRE and Open Press, 1999

Preparing course syllabi The more explicit you make the course syllabus, the more you are communicating with your students about their course. This improves the chances that the students will succeed in the course. Here is a checklist of topics (not comprehensive, I'm sure) to include in an expanded course syllabus or course manual: 1. Why would a student want or need to take this course? 2. What are the course objectives? Where do they lead the student intellectually and practically? 3. What are the prerequisites for the course? This includes not just previously taken courses but major concepts that the students are assumed to know and be able to use in the course. How will students acquire necessary, but missing skills or concepts? 4. Why do the parts of the course come in the order they do? 5. What instructional formats (lectures, labs, discussions, student presentations, group work, etc.) will be used, when? 6. What does the faculty member expect from the students in day to day classes, in assignments, on tests, etc.? 7. What is the purpose of assignments and exams? 8. What will be exams and assignments evaluate - memory, understanding, ability to synthesize, application, presenting evidence logically, writing skills, problem solving, etc.? 9. Why have the books been chosen? What is their relative importance in the course and in the discipline? 10. What other resources should the students obtain/access. e.g., calculator, lab materials, professional attire, access to the Web, etc. 11. Include a detailed schedule of events, classes, assignments, exams, date due and your expectations regarding them. 12. Include your policies on lateness (both personal and for assignments), make-ups, absence, class participation, etc.

13. How will the final grade be determined - Will you curve the grades, allow students who are getting an A to be excused from the final, etc.? What weight does each assignment, exam, class participation, presentation, etc. have? 14. Who the instructors will be if more than one is used, and how the students can contact them. Take time to plan and develop detailed course syllabi, it will save you time later.

Planning written assignments As you plan your written assignments for next semester, take a tip from the faculty who teach writing. Ask your students to hand in a draft or a section of a major paper a few weeks before the deadline for the final paper. Then spend time making suggestions for improvement and comments throughout. This will force the students to work on the paper earlier and once they see what you want, they will hand in a better final copy. The writing faculty say that the time you spend with the rough drafts will be saved in the correcting of the final paper.

Content Coverage As you plan your courses, ask yourself the following questions about content coverage: 15. How much content are you expecting the students to learn? Is this reasonable? 16. Is the content covered in a context that will help the students to learn the material? 17. Am I assuming that content coverage (by the instructor in a lecture or in the readings)= student learning, mastery? 18. What can the faculty member do to promote students learning the material? It is better to thoroughly learn less material, than to superficially learn, but not understand more material. A quote from a very well respected educators says it very well, "The greatest enemy of understanding is coverage. If you're determined to cover a lot of things, you are guaranteeing that most kids will not understand, because they haven't had time enough to go into depth, to figure out what they requisite understanding, is, and be able to perform that understanding in different situations" (Gardner, 1993)

Consistency in expectations Are you writing low level objectives, yet expecting high level learning? Or are you writing high level objectives, and only examining for lower level learning? When you develop your materials for a course, be internally consistent. If you are expecting higher levels of learning, then make sure the students see that they will be examined/evaluated in a manner that is consistent with higher level learning. Higher level evaluations might include multiple choice questions involving problem solving based upon a scenario, student reports presentations asking student to graphically or pictorially represent a concept or develop a schema for organizing the major topics of the semester, essay questions, critique primary literature in the field, etc. Many of these techniques can be streamlined in the time required for correcting. The way you present material can also encourage higher level learning. Do you go over all the material, or expect the students to come prepared to class and ask questions? Give the students assignments or projects to do in class that encourage higher level learning.

Rethinking how Objectives are Met Before you begin actually planning the specifics of your course, take a fresh and critical look at your objective and goals. Ask yourself, are there other ways to meet these objectives than what you have been doing in the past? You might consider how technology might affect the nature and structure of the unit or course itself? These technologies may not have been available a few years ago when the course was first planned. For example, you might move a large part of the dissemination of information out of the classroom activities to self-paced or structured study through the use of mixed media, including print and electronic. This frees up classroom time for discussions, answering questions, exams (and not have to schedule them at 7:30AM), demonstrations, etc.

Making sure your students get the big picture from your class During the break from the regular routine of classes, take stock of what you are doing and what you are trying to achieve in your classes. Ask yourself the following questions: What really matters in this class? What major learning outcomes do you want the students to achieve? What are you really good at with the students? Are you doing enough of that with your students? What do you really want to accomplish with these students?

What are you doing to help your students reach these important goals? If you find that you are not concentrating on these answers, what can you let go of to help achieve what you really want to achieve?

Planning Courses to help students become intentional, responsible and enabled learners A national panel of educators has recommended that college graduates should be intentional, responsible and enable learners. 1. To meet the goal of an intention learner, we need to help our students to become integrative thinkers and see connections among disciplines, reflect on their acquired knowledge and their learning to learn skills. 2. Since responsibility to act as informed citizens is based on values, principles and commitments, we need to help students acquire these values and principles. Responsible citizens are active participants in their society and can see consequences of their own and others' actions and decisions. 3. Enabled learners can use their knowledge and skills to communicate their ideas, solve complex problems and manage practical situations. As you review, revise and plan your courses for next semester ask yourself how well or how much are you fostering these skills in our students. This thought process may allow you to incorporate these desirable outcome indicators without making huge changes to your course structure.

Are your students realizing that learning in your subject should not end when the course does As the weeks roll on through the semester are your students coming to realize that their learning in your subject should continue after the course ends? What are you doing to help students continue learning when the course in over? Think about trying to do some of the following. Here are a few ideas to foster the idea that learning this discipline can continue after the formal class end: 4. Are you showing how interesting the subject is and how much you still enjoy learning about it?

5. Have you made it clear that you will still be accessible to the students as they continue to learn? 6. you fostered intellectual curiosity in this subject matter? 7. Have you helped students to develop these learning to learn skills in this discipline:  ability to ask good questions in this discipline  knowledge of print, electronic, human resources that are available to them  ability to evaluate the appropriateness of these resources for their continued learning  ability to read the primary or secondary literature on this topic If we can get our students to achieve this lifelong learning in a subject, we and they will have succeeded.

Setting expectations and welcoming your students If you are completely changing your course over the way it was taught in previous years, or if you are teaching a brand new course to advance students, you might consider sending these students a letter or email to their homes explaining the course and outlining some of your expectation of the course. You might also want to welcome them into the course and tell them how excited you are that they will be in the course. This letter should only be used in special cases and not for routine courses or course changes. It might work best for the students that you have already taught and have some expectations about what your course will be like.

Plan and Teach to Foster success in your students As you plan your courses and teach them, remember three 3 important goals to foster success in your students: 8. acquisition of knowledge that can be used and applied 9. development of self confidence 10. learning to take responsibility for their own learning and professional development Thanks to Lois Peck and Diane Morel for making these student success goals so clear.

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Plan what kind of time schedule make the most sense for your courses now We will be doing zero-based scheduling next year. This means that the registrar will be planning all of the courses from scratch and not using this year's schedule to plan next year's schedule. Thus, we are in a window of opportunity to really think about what makes sense for our courses in terms of scheduling. For example, would larger blocks of time (but meeting less frequently) meet your needs better than 50 minute classes. Literature from both adult education and secondary education indicates that longer blocks of time promote more interactive learning activities and seem to support increased learning. However, you need to really re-think or perhaps learn about how to use all time effectively. Once you make these decisions, please convey your rationale to the person in your department who is responsible for making the scheduling request for next year. back to top

*Planning courses to help students become intentional, responsible and enabled learners A national panel of educators has recommended that college graduates should be intentional, responsible and enable learners. 11. To meet the goal of an intention learner, we need to help our students to become integrative thinkers and see connections among disciplines, reflect on their acquired knowledge and their learning to learn skills. 12. Since responsibility to act as informed citizens is based on values, principles and commitments, we need to help students acquire these values and principles. Responsible citizens are active participants in their society and can see consequences of their own and others' actions and decision. 13. Enable learners can use their knowledge and skills to communicate their ideas, solve complex problems and manage practical situations. As you review, revise and plan your courses for next semester ask yourself how well or how much are you fostering these skills in our students. This thought process may allow you to incorporate these desirable outcome indicators without making huge changes to your course structure.

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Helping students to succeed with changes you are making to your courses Are you planning to change the way you run your courses next semester? Perhaps you want to incorporate more learning-centered teaching, a different evaluation scheme, or requiring students to hand in drafts or parts of a project before the final copy is due, but are afraid that the student will not accept the changes or will not be able to do well with them. For any of these changes, you need to build in enough structure and guidelines to help the students overcome their resistance or learn how to succeed. You might want to write a rationale in your syllabi and go over the rationale repeatedly in class. You need to spend time convincing the students why they need to move from their current, perhaps overly dependent state, to becoming autonomous learners. back to top

*Helping students to understand your syllabi or how you are teaching If you are innovating how your course is being run, using a different assessment process than usually done by others or if you have a complicated series of events for the students, make sure all of this is spelled out in the syllabus. To get the students to read and understand these directions, assessments, events, etc. tell the students they will be responsible for the material on the syllabi for the second class. Then in that class play a short quiz game on the way your course will be run to insure student understanding.

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Planning for the functions of content coverage in your courses Currently many faculty see the function of content is to build strong knowledge foundations. While we all agree this is important, the more comprehensive functions of

content should be to develop learning skills and learner self-awareness as well as to build knowledge. As you are planning your specific teaching and learning transactions for next semester (this is not just what you will cover, but how you will get the students to learn the content) think of approaches that do not separate learning strategies from content. The implication of this is that teachers cover less, but students learn more. back to top

Setting the right tone for your class, getting to know your students Early on in the semester, have a discussion with the students (can be in small groups, with summaries reported back to you) about what they expect in a class. What have they liked or disliked about classes in the past? Ask whose responsibilities is it to establish or maintain such a climate or a policy? This short discussion can give you insights into how to improve your class and promotes learning centered teaching. back to top

*Still time to revise your syllabi As the first week of the semester draws to a close, it is a good time to make a few changes in your syllabi. Before doing so gather some data from your students. Perhaps they would like to see the test dates or due dates for assignments modified a little bit to ease their overly heavy days. Do the students understand what is expected of them? Perhaps you need to elaborate on what you want them to do. After seeing who is registered for the class, do you need to modify the schedule a little? Perhaps you need to spend more or less time on the introductory material at the beginning of the semester. Did enough copies of the textbook arrive at the book store or do you need to modify some early assignments? These are the types of minor modifications that you can make now and go a long way to improving student learning and satisfaction in your course. back to top

Thinking about trying some thing different next semester Are you thinking of trying something different in your courses next semester? Perhaps you are thinking of trying a different way to assess students, a new policy, or trying a different teaching and learning transaction. If you are ready, pilot test this new strategy in one of your courses this semester for the next few weeks. Then gather feedback from the

students as to how you can improve it and did it lead to greater learning, student satisfaction, engagement with the subject matter, etc. back to top

Looking at your policies As you preplan your courses, or educational programs, please take a close look at all of your policies. As you review each policy ask yourself, "How does this policy help students to take responsibility for their own learning?" Alternatively ask yourself, "how much does this policy encourage students' dependence on us for their learning and their decision making?" back to top

Textbook selection When you are considering textbooks to use in connection with your courses, first consider what and how the content is taught. If you find several textbooks that are consistent with what you plan to teach, then look at the additional instructional materials that you and the students can us that go along with this textbook. Publishers of large sellers are developing excellent electronic cartridges that have many presentation software for the figures in the book, self-instructional materials, self-assessments, web links, 3rd demonstrations, etc. Some of these cartridges can also get you started with Blackboard very easily.

back to top Consistency of standards across instructors or courses Students often feel that they have been unfairly treated if they think that their peers had it better with another teacher or if another instructor in the same course was easier. As we have multiple sections of various courses or multiple instructors for a course, we should strive for consistency among instructors within the same course or different sections of a course. Departmental meetings might be an appropriate place to discuss the level of expectation that we want to achieve with our students as well as expected content to be covered. For example, what should the pass cut off point or standard be or how much should a student have to do to pass a course? What is the expected item difficulty that we are striving for? Do we want most of our students to get an item right or only 50%.

These discussions will show how different we are now and what we can do to strive for more consistency. They might even lower the complaints of our students. back to top

*Helping students to feel like they have some control might raise course evaluations All people, but especially adolescents, like to feel that they have some control over their lives and thus their courses. If you allow students to have some say in de terming course policies (such as expected course behavior like attendance, lateness, etc,) they probably will come up with the same rules you would impose, but now they feel they made the rules themselves. Further if you allow them as a group to help you determine deadlines for assignments (within general guidelines), or dates within a week for tests, you might make their lives more manageable. Students might not resent the deadlines or dates as much if they helped to select them. back to top

Insuring students get the big objectives for the course About half way through the semester it is a good idea to reflect and take stock on the progress being made in your courses. For each course ask yourself if the students are realizing the overall objectives, not just the day to day content objectives. Are you preparing students for the more advanced courses that follow this course? Are you spending enough time with students or emphasis to help them gain the thinking skills, values, learning to learn skills, etc. that are important for this domain? If you need to make mid-course corrections, you can do so. back to top

*Allowing students a little say over deadlines and getting them to get in the

habit of using the Blackboard/Listserv for your course When you give out your syllabi on the first day of class, tell students that you are willing to take their feedback on the due dates of some or all assignments (within a limited time period), or the actual dates of exams (if you have flexibility) electronically between the first and second class. Then pose the relevant feedback questions on your chat room, discussion board or class list serve. Tell students they can only respond electronically until the second class and you might want to limit how many times they can respond to the question. Asking for feedback and the possibility of making minor changes (based on the voice of the majority) to the schedule helps students to feel part of the decision making in the class and may cut down on complaints or excuses later. Make sure you tell them it is majority rule with your ability to overrule them. Giving students a very early assignments (and one they might want to do) on Blackboard or other electronic discussion format you will be using insures that they know how to access it, sign in and might get them in the habit of using this non-class discussion venue frequently. If you find the technology is not working you will know about very early in the course.

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*Time to refresh your course Before offering a course again, it is time to refresh it. Consider the following: Have you included the recent developments in this discipline? Does your textbook now offer a course pack that has many worthwhile self-instructional and self-assessment activities? You might want to include some of them in your course requirement. Look at what your students really need to know to succeed in more advanced courses or careers that follow from this course and make sure it is emphasized. How are you fostering student learning? What learning activities would help students to master the difficult concepts and skills of the course.

Remember you can not continue to add without taking out or reducing emphasis. back to top

Spend time thinking about the courses you are teaching now Before you get involved with the grading of exams and final papers and before you are thinking about next semester's courses, spend time reflecting and writing about this semester's courses. Go through all of the material you gave students especially the syllabus, assignments, etc. Think about timing - should you have moved things around, emphasized 1 topic more and another less. Were your directions clear or did you have to explain something to many different students? If so, re-read them now and make changes based upon the students' questions. Did your evaluations (exams or projects) meet your expectations and the objectives for the course? Write your reflections on how to improve or change the course now and put these notes along with the folder and computer files you keep for this courses. back to top

Excellent, free web-based instructional materials available for the sciences and health sciences I found out about an excellent collection of free, web-based instructional resources in anatomy, on various diseases, organisms, chemical and drugs, analytical, diagnoses and treatment techniques, biological sciences, psychology, physical sciences, and health care. As the collection is continuing to grow, you will need to recheck the site over time. Check http://www.healcentral.org or http://www.healcentral.org/index.jsp Let me know if you use anything from this national digital library and how it worked. back to top

*Helping our students to become selfdirected learners

As teachers we all now that the subject matter has more content than we can possibly fit into the time available for the course and what makes it worse is that the content is growing daily. How can we solve this problem? One option is that we all could talk faster, but that probably won't do it. A real solution involves the following: Learn how to restrict the content we expect our students to learn and provide the scaffolding to allow for further learning Help our students keep on learning the subject after the course is over. The is the only real chance we have to go beyond the basics with the students. Have to find ways to make this subject interesting and inspiring so they will want to keep on learning Thanks to Dee and Arletta Fink for helping with this tip. back to top

*Planning for new courses or revising courses on the basis of program learning outcomes Many programs have developed or revised learning outcomes. This was done before looking at course learning outcomes intentionally. Now that the program learning outcomes are completed it is a good time to look at where there are holes or duplications in where these outcomes are met. It is probably appropriate for all of the faculty within a program together to review the program and course learning outcomes to see where changes should be made to courses. Revised courses or new courses should flow from areas identified as needing more or less focus on the learning outcome identified by the program. back to top

*Helping students to get the essential long-lasting lessons from your course As the semester winds down, help students to emerge from the day-to-day aspects of the course to see the essentials, long-lasting lessons from your course. Help student to see what you want them to always remember from your course by developing a handout, including such a discussion at the end of the course, giving them a directed assignment or

questions on the final relating to these essential lessons. Once you have decided what are these essential long-lasting lessons, check for consistency of what you are saying now and the goals of the course. If they are not aligned, redo your goals for the next time you teach this course.

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*Getting students to read and have ownership over the syllabus I have often heard faculty complain that students do not read their syllabi and they ask questions that are contained in the document. To get the students to read and take ownership over the syllabus hand out a draft syllabus with certain points left for the students to decide. Students can have a say over deadlines for projects, dates for tests within a few days, or even how much weight, within a range, specific assessments will count. Students can be asked to modify or add policies, but you still get the final veto. Class time during the first class can be devoted to discussing some of these points and the discussion can be continued after the class period ends. If you are using Blackboard, students can have a discussion between the first and second class of the decision they have to make. Without an electronic discussion system that all can read, they can communicate with you by email. Before the second class you should determine the consensus. You can also give a bonus point or 2 if the students correct mistakes in the document, or if they identify areas that need further clarification.

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*Helping to balance the power in your classes To achieve learning-centered teaching the instructor needs to look at the balance of power between themselves and the students. Some possible ways to do is to consider: Faculty can share power with students to determine how individual classes are conducted, how material is learned (not what material) is learned). What opinions are expressed, etc. Yet we cannot give up power as to how an entire course is run. Faculty power comes from the authority our university has given us as the instructor. We can share power but we can never share authority.

The idea of the distinction between power and authority comes from D. Fink's book, Teaching with your mouth shut, 2000 Heinemann Publishers. back to top

Getting mid-course feedback on your class About half way through the semester it is a good idea to get a read on what the students think of your course. Ask your students to write their answers to a few questions on topics that you can change or make mid-course corrections. You might consider asking about how fair (in terms of aligned with objectives or what you say will be on the test is on the test) your tests are (not how difficult are your tests), your pacing in your classes, clarification of difficulty concepts, availability to answer questions, etc. Once you get their feedback address their concerns in class or on Blackboard and indicate if you will be making any changes as a result of what they told you. Some things you may not be able to change or want to change, bit it still worth letting your students know you recognize their concerns. Students will appreciate you more as a teacher and value your class more because you showed them you care about them. back to top

Does the amount of content taught influence how well students understand the material Thirty years of research strongly indicates that the more content taught in a course, the more students rely on memorization and the less they learn with understanding or acquire deep learning in the discipline. Decide hat is the essential content that you need for the students to learn, and cut the rest out of your course. Then work with students to learn to use the content and not for you to cover the content. back to top

How to plan time allotment for a course Most of us plan courses in terms of how many hours the students spend in class. However, the unit that we should be using is learning time, not class time. The general

wisdom is that for e very hour spent in class students in undergraduate courses are supposed to spend 3 hours out of class and perhaps more for graduate classes. Therefore, for a three hour per week of classroom time, the students really should have 9 hours of learning time per week for that class. Now divide the 9 hours into what students can do on their own (often learn material), what should be done with others (such as discussions), what a teacher is needed for (such as answering questions or doing demonstrations or modeling problem solving or learning to learn in the discipline). Plan your weekly schedule based upon the total learning time and the type of activities needed to learn the course objectives and where they should be done. This might lead you to plan class time very differently. Students should be made aware of this change in thinking and oriented to the concept of learning time. This might help them to spend more time on your course outside of class. Chris Knapper of the UK and now in Canada introduced me to the concept of learning time. back to top

Being supportive of our students in their differences in the time they need to master skills If you are assessing students on their skills, give the students several opportunities during the semester to demonstrate these skills, provided they are independent skills and not ones that build on each other. Some students take longer than others to learn skills and others may not more than one attempt to demonstrate mastery. This tip come from Margie Roos in PT and was mentioned at the last TableTalk on being supportive of our students. Many other good ideas also come out, so attend the next discussion on Tuesday, January 18th. back to top

*Using a bingo card concept to increase student interaction with the content and decrease procrastination This is a more complex tip than usual, but I think it is worth trying.

Create a bingo card with cells giving the types of additional activities you want the student to do to help them engage in the regular and consistent interaction with the content necessary to really retain it. Examples for the cells might include: • • • •

you might ask the students to create a 20 item crossword puzzle, with the answer provided, on the terms used in a chapter ask five intelligent questions pertaining to the class material during a class have > 95% class attendance find a website that is accurate about a concept discussed in the textbook etc.

Distribute the bingo card at the beginning of the semester and let the students know that this is an optional assignment. When a student shows proof that (s) he completes the activity the instructor marks the box. Prizes are given when people complete a line or several lines. Prizes can be to drop the lowest quiz grade, can bring a study sheet with information to the final exam or adding 5 points to the final exam score. The irony is that students who get the most lines probably will not need the prizes because the extra work they did helped them to master the material. However, the motivation to earn the prize may have helped them to engage in the content more and to decrease their procrastination. This tip was adapted from Amy Jo Sutterluety, Bingo Games Decreases Procrastination, Increase Interaction with Content. The Teaching Professor, Nov. 2002: 16 (9) 5-6. back to top

*Maximizing student learning As you are preparing or revising syllabi, prioritize what you do, what you ask students to do and especially what you do while with the students (i.e., in the classroom) to maximize student learning. Here are a few things to consider: •

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Information can be disseminated many ways beside through a lecture, consider posting material to read, giving students access to websites or course auxiliary materials to illustrate concepts While students are in the classroom, have them engage in the material by solving problems, asking you questions, or answering questions. You can use the time to check on their mastery of the material, to help them to learn better or clarify misconceptions Ask students to check each other's homework, discuss their differences and then have an opportunity to redo their improved/corrected solutions (have them hand in both versions). This might be done out of class. Use blackboard to give self-assessment quizzes with the answers explained after the deadline for doing it

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Give students assignments that prepare them to come to class ready to engage in the material. Use class to reinforce or apply content not to go over what was covered in the assignment Give students explicit criteria on how you will grade papers, projects, etc. in advance of when they complete the assignment. o Give students opportunities to give each other formative feedback either prior to or instead of you reviewing every product (especially homework problems). o Allow students to give feedback using your criteria on drafts and they you will receive better papers

If you incorporate some of these ideas, you might need to adjust the balance in your syllabus or consider the total picture of what you are doing in the course. back to top

Reviewing how the courses went as you finish the semester As you hand in grades, take a little time to review how your courses went and write some notes to yourself. Try to analyze where the students had difficulty-identify the concepts they had trouble learning, the assignments or activities they seemed to have a hard time understanding or doing, etc. Look at the directions you gave students for exams or assignments and check that they were clear. Finally record what went especially well. As you revise your courses for the next time you offer these courses, these notes will help jog your memory. back to top

Developing prerequisite courses that meet the expectations of the instructors of advanced courses If you are teaching a course that is a prerequisite for more advanced courses, talk to the instructors of these courses. Find out the essential knowledge (topics or concepts), skills and attitudes that they want your students to acquire in your course. You might find that you are covering material that they do not care about or some topics might need further emphasis. Then plan your course to be a good match with what they want without and what you think should be covered. Barbara Tewsbury of Hamilton College suggested this idea. back to top

Making sense of students' complaints that the instructor or the course was unfair Research shows that students complain that a course or an instructor was unfair when there is a disconnect among the goals or objectives of the class, such as how the students were taught, what the students were expected to do and how they were assessed. Courses that are aligned or consistent in all of these areas are more likely to be perceived as fair. Students might think they they are too difficult or too challenging, but fair if they are aligned. back to top

Getting meaningful feedback from your students that is separate from course evaluations If you want to gather some individualized feedback at the end of a course, ask the students to complete a couple of questions that you would like to know more about. Leslie Bowman suggests the following questions: • • •

What did you find most useful in the course? What is the most valuable lesson or content you learned from this course? Is there something that the instructor should be informed about concerning his/her teaching style?

Keep these questions separate from the course evaluation forms that students need to complete. This should be formative feedback just for you. back to top

Planning your course to help students acquire the thinking skills of the discipline The nature of the discipline, the process of critical thinking in a discipline is just as important as the material and concepts in your discipline. However, we often tend to give these skills and processes less emphasis in our day to day teaching. So now that you are planning or revising your courses, plan time within the schedule to go over how you think in this discipline. Role model what you do by thinking out loud as you solve problems. Students don't get the thinking process naturally if they just hear about the content or see experts solving problems easily;

however, once they understand the thinking process within the discipline, the content will come much easier to them. This emphasis on role modeling critical thinking skills applies at all levels of courses as the critical thinking skills required varies with the complexity of the material. back to top

Alignment of Skill Requirement.ppt Best educational practice models say that students learn more when a course is aligned. Alignment means that the objectives, teaching-learning methods and assessment methods are consistent and coherent. Roger Ideishi developed a beautiful series of graphics to show when a course is aligned and when it is not aligned. He is using these slides in conjunction with the workshops on general education. However, they apply to all courses and not just those with skills. His slides are attached. back to top

Beginning to do scholarship on your teaching If you have innovated or find a part of your teaching interesting, you can begin to do some scholarship on your teaching. Start with a question you would like to find the answer to, or think or a way to show that the improvements you mace in your courses have been worth making . Then gather data on it. back to top

Making your course more aligned and more explicit to your students As you finish off the semester, review your course to make sure that your objectives, teaching/learning activities, and assessments are consistent. Alignment means that if you have evaluation or problem solving as a goal for the course, you give students opportunities to practice these skills and that you assess the students on these skills. A lack of alignment would be is the assessments did not match the level of the goals. At the end of the course review what actually happened compared to what you hoped would happen. Note where you need to make further alignment. Perhaps you need to change how you assess the students toward more projects using authentic assessment (mimics what practitioners do). Then the next time you teach this course discuss on the first day how your course is aligned. You might want to show your students that the course is aligned in the syllabus. Students will accept why you are asking them to do something if they see is as congruent with the goals of the course.

Aligned courses lead to more learning. back to to

Teaching models to revise as you plan for next time you teach Many faculty use a hub and spoke model of course management without even thinking of it. The instructor is the hub because students look to the instructor guidance, feedback, information, assessment. They even answer questions just directed to you and make presentations to you. When you plan your course the next time try not to use the hub and spoke model. Instead diffuse the center by having student look to each for information, for assessment, feedback. Discussions need not be directed by you. As you plan your course, ask yourself, would a hub and spoke diagram work for what I am doing or asking students to do. back to top

Essential aspects of course planning When you are planning your course, think of the most important aspects/concepts/values of what you want to cover in the course. One way to do this is to think what you would cover, do or ask the students to do if they only had 3 hours to devote to this topic. This usually gives you the real essential aspects. Then plan your course around this theme. back to top

Making the implied more visible and constant in your syllabus and first day of class When we develop our syllabi and our grading policies they make sense to us and often follow from what we believe to be the correct way to teach this course. However, we may not make our logic clear to the students. We might need to elaborate on the implications of our policies. For example: •

If a professor's grading policy puts a heavy emphasis on class participation, group work, or written assignments, then that professor probably wants students to be creative, to engage in dialogue, and to interpret texts freely Students may not realize this unless you tell them. However, some times we can give the wrong message by our grading policies. for example.

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If the grading system is simply an average of two of three test scores, with no emphasis on participation or interactivity, then some students might assume that the professor would almost rather the students not show up for class and get the notes from a friend. So we need to be sure we are being consistent with our messages and our goals. Justin Everett set me this idea which comes fror "If your Syllabus Could Talk," By Monica D'Antonio in_Chronicle Careers_at http://chronicle.com/jobs/news/2007/07/2007071901c/careers.html

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Getting students to understand the relationships among concepts While experts often see relationships among objects, novices often fail to see these relationships. One reason why novices do not see these relationships is they do not know what should be compared. We often summarize relationships into compare and contrast type tables. In order for students to understand what we mean by compare and contrast, we need to explicitly explain what we mean. We need to help students to understand what are the appropriate criteria that they can use for valid comparison and help students see the big picture. Some of these ideas come from Virginia Anderson of Townsend University. back to top

Getting course-specific evaluation information from your students If you are interested in learning about how your students felt about course-specific activities, such as a unique assignment or a different method of assessment, ask your students to complete a brief survey on these points. This semester you will have to ask your students to complete this survey separate from the university wide course evaluation form. We will be using online, standard course evaluation forms this semester and you will not be able to ask additional questions on these forms this semester (we hope to be able to do so in the future). Also you might remind your students to complete the online course evaluation form since it will not be given out in class. back to top

On the first day of class help your students to see the overall consistency in your course When you plan your course you want to align your objectives with the teaching/learning activities and with what and how you assess your students. This is considered a best practice in education because it leads to increased learning. While you may align your course or make it internally consistent, students may not see this overall integration or alignment. Therefore, you want to make this alignment explicit to the students. You should explain how the course is aligned to the students on the first day and describe it in the syllabus. You might put a table in to show your alignment of objectives, teaching/learning activities and assessment.