WHAT TIPS WOULD YOU GIVE FOR BETTER TEACHING?

A few weeks ago, the goods folks at McGraw-Hill were kind enough to ask me to do a one-hour webinar titled “Tips for Becoming a Better Teacher.”  We assumed that a portion of the audience would be accounting professors since I am an accounting professor and the 15^th edition of the Advanced Accounting textbook that I coauthor is coming out in January.  Nevertheless, we wanted the webinar to be of interest to anyone who teaches in college whether they teach biology, psychology, accounting, or everything in between. 

For someone like myself who has taught a long time, it is an interesting challenge to consider what advice you would give to a person wanting to become a better teacher.  What is really important?  What actually can work?  After a long debate with myself, here is some of the advice that I chose to provide in this webinar.

--Every teacher should start out by acknowledging just how essentially important education is for each individual and for our society as a whole.  Investing the time and energy needed for success is much easier if you realize how important your role as a teacher is.  Every day, we have the opportunity to change lives for the better.  We need to take that role seriously.

--I like to begin each class throughout the semester with a mental vision of the “perfect class” at the end of the semester.  In other words, what type of class environment am I trying to create?  What should the last day of class look like?  What should the last day feel like?  If you don’t know that, then a class is just a random event without any guiding structure.

--Use technology but use it well and don’t feel a need to use all of the possible technology.  I think every teacher should keep track of the available technology and make use of what feels good to you.  Nevertheless, there is no necessity to make use of every new bell and whistle that comes out.  Think about your classes and be selective.  What technology can help you meet your goals?  For example, I think making videos is a great strategy for me and one that I use often.  Students today have grown up in the YouTube generation.  I like to take advantage of that.

--Help students focus on their class preparation.  Nothing improves a class more than having students arrive each day with an adequate amount of preparation.  Don’t be casual when it comes to preparation --- make that a real priority.  My experience is that virtually all students underprepare for class.  Change that and things will immediately get better.

--Help students focus on reviewing and organizing the new material right after every class.  Knowledge seeps out of the brain very quickly if techniques are not applied to help solidify what has been learned.  Have assignments set up to be done immediately after coverage to make the understanding both clear and permanent.  

--The better you test, the better the students will learn.  Spend serious time thinking about your testing process.  Make sure that your test questions are very well written.  In my mind, every test question should be (a) fair, (b) challenging, and (c) stress critical thinking.  Students learning is often affected by what they see on a test.  Don’t teach a student to think and then test them on memorization.

--Determine what percentage of the talking you want to do in class.  In my classes, I try to avoid doing more than half of the talking.  That is not easy.  That means that I have to figure out how to get the students to do the other half of the talking.  That is a tough challenge, but one that can turn a passive class into an engaged class.

--Realize that students cannot read your mind so work on developing good communication techniques.  I use emails.  I use a lot of emails.  I keep them short and to the point.  This allows me to inform students of what I need from them and why.  If I can get that message across, most students seem willing to put forth a better effort.  That’s a good start.

--We all tell ourselves stories about our jobs, our students, and our classes.  It is easy for those stories to be negative.  "Conditions are bad."  "Students are lazy."  "Students have not been taught how to learn."  If you want to be a better teacher, work very hard on telling yourself better stories.  "Most of the students were well prepared today."   "We had a great discussion in class."   "The students appear to be figuring out what I want from them."  I cannot possibly tell you how important I think those internal stories are for becoming a better teacher.  Listen to yourself and make sure your stories will lead to a stronger and better version of you.

If you would like to watch the actual webinar, here is the URL.  I hope it helps you make key steps as you seek to become a better teacher and eventually a great teacher. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7h1NfHprZrE&t=341s

 

HAVE A GREAT FIRST DAY

Last week, I posted an essay about an email that I sent to my students 17 days before the start of the fall semester.  I wanted to convince my students that the class was going to be worth the effort.  I just believe having students believe that there is a benefit to be gained is a great way to get them started.  And, I want to begin that “convincing” process before I meet them rather after we are into the semester.

Today, I wrote my students again but for an entirely different purpose.  I am a big believer in class transparency.  I want them to understand what I am trying to do by how I structure the class and why.  I do this by explaining one thing – how they should get ready for the first class.  I am not focusing on the semester.  I am focusing on that one class.  If that goes well, we are off to a great start.

I want that first class to be a real winner.  I want them to walk out at the end and say, “I expected this stuff to be boring but I was ready to learn and it was interesting because I was engaged in the class conversation.”

I know exactly what I want.  Therefore, I need to explain what I want to my students and convince them that it is purely for their benefit.  In 8 days, when they walk in and class starts, we will see how well I have done getting them ready to succeed.

Email to My Students:

Class starts in 8 days.  I hope you are as excited by that prospect as I am. 

Yesterday, I took a couple of my grandchildren to the Richmond Science Museum.  Inscribed on one of the walls was a thought from Benjamin Franklin, “Tell me and I forget.  Teach me and I may remember.  Involve me and I learn.”  I realize that Franklin was a truly brilliant person but I cannot believe he ever wrote anything that was wiser than those words.

You have been in school a long time.  You probably have had a number of “tell me” teachers and some “teach me” teachers.  And, unless you have been unlucky, you have had some “involve me” teachers.  Which would you prefer?  You are an adult now.  Which type of teacher will have the most positive effect on you? 

I heard a great teacher speak last Tuesday and he talked about education as a transformative experience.  That is what I want for you. 

The problem with “tell me” professors and “teach me” professors is that the responsibility is 100 percent on the professor.  Students show up and sit and take notes or daydream or try to sneak peaks at their phone.   That is not in-depth learning.  Unmotivated students will always pray for a “tell me” teacher. 

The challenge in creating an “involve me” class is that the professor only has half of the responsibility while the students have the other half.  If the students prefer to stay uneducated, they can shut down the process.  I will teach you using an “involve me” type class.  That means that you must do two things.  First, you must be willing to prepare adequately for EACH class.  You cannot be involved if you have not done the work needed in advance.  You cannot just make it up on the spot (I’m sure you know students who try that).  You cannot talk about nuclear fusion unless you have spent some time getting ready for the conversation.  That is the problem that makes a lot of education so darn poor.

Second, you must be willing to try.  I am not seeking perfection or brilliance.  I just want to have a conversation with you.   You must be willing to try.

The key to this class being one where you will learn (one that will be a truly great class):  a willingness to prepare and a willingness to try.  Bingo. 

A day or so ago I emailed you the handout that we will begin covering on Monday, August 26, after we run through the course outline.  You will receive a handout like this for all classes.  There are many types of questions we will explore this semester but ones on the Day One handout are pretty good examples.

Here are four important suggestions as you look at each of the problems on that first sheet.  The better you "prepare" the more likely it is that you will "try" in class and then you will be able to "learn" the material. 

(1) – Read each question and write down the facts provided.  Don’t underline or highlight because that just allows you to turn off your brain.   Problems typically have several key facts presented – a time period, a cost or sacrifice, a method, a theory, a goal, and the like.  Write them down to ensure you know the basic facts before you get too far into the maze.  I always want to bang my head on a wall when a student tries to work a question without even knowing the facts.  That simply will not work.  This is how I often start each question, “Give me the facts.”  Be ready for that.

(2) – Write down what the question is asking you to do.  Most questions have a fairly specific “Ask.”   For example, is this a theoretical or a practical question?   Is the question talking about a past action or a future possibility?  What exactly is the teacher asking for you to answer?  Again, it is almost guaranteed that you will struggle unless you have a good handle on what the “Ask” is.  What are the facts?  What is the ask?

(2a) – Have I asked you to do anything in (1) or (2) that you are not capable of doing?  Heck, no.

(3) – Visualize the following scenario.  I look you in the eye and say, in a calm and friendly voice, “Student A has given us the facts.  Student B has identified the question we are being asked to resolve.  Now, how do we go about sorting through that information to arrive at a logical, reasonable answer?”  What are you going to say?  This is not a dream.  This is going to happen to you.  You need to have an answer ready, not vague mumbling.  My recommendation is that you write down the first two sentences that you will give me if I ask you that question.  Not three words but two complete sentences.  You can write out the whole answer if you want but I will be satisfied if you just write down the first two sentences because that does three things. 

---First, it forces you to think about the answer in real and not vague terms.  It makes the idea of your having an answer a reality which I think is good.  The answer is not simply going to be baloney made up on the spot. 

---Second, by having the first two sentences written down, you are pushing your thinking in a logical direction.  That is a great first step in the solution process.  You are heading off toward an answer. 

---Third, rather than panic, you can read the sentences to me, which will get your brain moving and show that you have thought about the question.  There is a great security in having that first two sentences written down.  With two sentences written down, this is a fun class.

After writing down the first two sentences, just outline the rest of your answer.  Where will you go from the first two sentences?  What is important?  What leads you to a resolution?  The first two sentences and a brief outline for the rest of the answer should get you ready for each question in class.

In my thinking, that clears our two hurdles:  You have prepared and you are ready to try.  That will get us into what I like to call “involved education.”  After that, we will just be solving puzzles and that is always fun.

(4) – Within 8 hours of class being over, organize your notes.  Do it quickly or you will start to lose track of things.  Take each question that we covered in class and write out or outline how to get to a logical answer.  If we covered a question in class and you cannot write out an answer within 8 hours after that, then either you or I (or both of us) have failed.  Again, visualize my asking you to solve the problem and think about how you would respond.  I’m a big believer in the benefit of that type of “visualization.”  Way too many students just say, “Oh, I saw how that was done so I am okay now.  There is no reason to do any further work.”  That is a path that will lead to a C or D.  After class, you should be able to visualize getting to the correct answer or you really have not learned the material yet and probably need to come chat with me. 

**

If I can get you to do those four steps for every class, I think YOU will be amazed by your own brilliance.  One of my favorite parts of this course comes about halfway through the semester when students start realizing that they really can learn very complicated stuff and do well.  Once that happens then nothing can stop those students.  That feeling is what I want for you.   True learning is wonderfully exhilarating. 

HERE IS SOME ADVICE YOU NEVER REQUESTED

Over the years, I have written occasionally about the role of being a mentor for my students versus being a pure teacher.   Personally, I prefer to be open to mentoring for those students who might want it.   I think many of them like knowing that there is some rather disinterested person available that they can go to and simply say “I need some advice.”  For example, a former student wandered into my office a few days ago who was interested in talking about Teach for America.   This was a decision that had stressed her out and she began to cry.   We chatted for 10-15 minutes.   She didn’t leave dancing or singing but at least she wasn’t crying.  I did not mind listening and giving my opinion.

But, at other times, I want to be a mentor to my students without even being asked.   I want to butt into their lives just a little bit—especially as it deals with college and their education.   Without any request, I sent out the following email yesterday.   Will any of my 61 students follow my advice?   My guess would be that 10-15 percent will actually reconsider their course schedules.   If that is true, I will have had an impact on their lives over and beyond teaching them accounting.   I love teaching accounting (it is truly a great way to teach critical thinking) but I would like to be more of an influence, more of a mentor—at least to some.  That is how I want my career to be.

I do this occasionally.  Do you?  Are your courses all about subject matter or do you try to have more influence than that?  I prefer more influence.  But, that is a personal decision.  It is your career.   What do you want it to be?  That’s a personal decision but one you should consider.

**

To my students:  (slightly edited)

I realize registration is over for the fall semester but, of course, there is always drop-add.  

Students occasionally come by my office and chat with me about what courses (other than accounting) they should take.   I have mixed emotions about my own college experience – it was a lot of ups and downs (but part of that was because I expected to wind up going to Vietnam to try to kill people – that puts an odd spin on reading books, writing papers, and taking tests).   However, if I have one special regret, it is the courses I chose to take outside of my major.   I don’t think I quite realized how much those courses would influence the person I became.   I am sure that if I had better judged the impact on me I would have chosen those courses more carefully.

So, what courses should you take if you have an open slot?  Here’s some advice you didn’t ask for.

--I don’t think you can ever take enough math and computer science.  Think how the world is going to change over the next 30 years.   The people who are positioned to do well are those who are ready for all those changes.  I suspect that math and computer science will be the two areas that make you most ready for the world to come in 30 years.  But, for goodness' sake, don’t take just any course – ask around and find out who is the best, most inspiring teacher.  

--For a fulfilled life, you need to be able to find beauty in life.   Take an art appreciation course or a course in great literature.   Your adult life will be so much more wonderful if you appreciate beauty and there is nothing that teaches us more about beauty than art and literature.   And, if you now tell me, “Oh, I find that kind of stuff boring,” I’m going to give you my worst possible insult:   You are reacting like a teenager and not like an adult.  I’m convinced that art and literature become more beautiful as you study them more deeply.   But, for goodness' sake, don’t take just any course – ask around and find out who is the best, most inspiring teacher.

 

--We live in wonderfully interesting times.   Take a political science course.  How does Congress work?   Why do we only have two political parties?   How have politics evolved over the last few decades?   Heck, it is hard to read the newspapers without some basic understanding of politics.  How could any class be more relevant to your life than political science?   But, for goodness' sake, don’t take just any course – ask around and find out who is the best, most inspiring teacher.

--When I talk with former students who have graduated in the last 2-5 years, it is absolutely amazing how many of them tell me “I’m shocked by how much I have to write and how important it is to write clearly.   I never realized that grammar was so essential to a career.  Writing has turned out to be more important to my success than anything else.”   How can a person learn to write clearly?   I have had several students over the years take Copy Editing from the Richmond Journalism Department and they have always raved that they have finally learned how to write.   Here at Richmond, the copy editing professor is fabulous.   He will teach you something you probably do not know—how to write a clear sentence.  

--Find something you have a passion for learning.   Surely, there is something at this university (other than accounting) that you have a passion to learn.  Oh, I hope so.  It would be incredibly sad if you said that you have no passion for any learning.  If that is the case, you might as well spend your life planting potatoes.  Pick something that you really have an interest in and then go for it.  But, for goodness' sake, don’t take just any course – ask around and find out who is the best, most inspiring teacher.

If I had my college career to live over again, I would have chosen a course or two differently each year.   And, if I had done that, I would be a different person now.   More importantly, I suspect I would have been a better person.   Pick wisely.

Want to Teach Better – Here’s My Ultimate Piece of Advice

My good friend C. J. Skender is an outstanding teacher at UNC (and genuinely nice guy).  He recently sent me a sheet of “Forever” stamps for my birthday that celebrated the work of Jaime Escalante.  You might already know about Jaime Escalante but, if not, I’ll talk a bit about him at the end of this blog posting.

I often have people ask for advice about teaching and I try my best to say something that might be insightful and helpful.   Unfortunately, it is often hit or miss.  But there is one piece of advice that I really think is the ultimate piece of advice that every teacher needs to consider if they truly want to grow in their work with students.

I was reminded of this by several things I read recently.

Story One:  Carole Bayer Sager has been a well-known writer of popular songs since the 1970s.  Her hits include “Don’t Say You Love Me,” “Arthur’s Theme,” “Groovy Kind of Love,” and “That’s What Friends Are For.”   She recently published an autobiography (They’re Playing Our Song) that was reviewed a few weeks ago in the Wall Street Journal.   

While having lunch at my favorite deli that day, I came across the following story in that book review:

“In high school, she and a classmate, Sherry Harway, made a dash for the piano every day after school and tried to emulate the words and melodies they were listening to up and down the AM dial. ‘I began to study every song I heard on the radio, dissecting each one to find out what was that special thing that made it a hit,’ she writes. ‘What wasn’t I doing yet?’

Story Two:  Somehow, I have recently gotten on a list where I receive regular emails full of teaching advice.  They are pretty good.   I try to read them as often as I can.  On October 24, I received one titled “Teaching Critical Thinking: Some Practical Points” by Linda B. Nilson.  It opened with these words.

“We all endorse it and we all want our students to do it. We also claim to teach it. ‘It’ is critical thinking, and very few of us actually teach it or even understand what it is (Paul & Elder, 2013). Research tells us that our students learn critical thinking only after we receive training in how to teach it and design our courses explicitly and intentionally to foster critical thinking skills (Abrami, Bernard, Borokhovski, Wade, Surkes, Tamim, & Zhang, 2008). We have to start by formulating assessable critical thinking learning outcomes and building our courses around them.”

For those of you who might want to read further:  Here are the two works cited.

Abrami, P. C., Bernard, R. M., Borokhovski, E., Wade, A., Surkes, M. A., Tamim, R., & Zhang, D. (2008). Instructional interventions affecting critical thinking skills and dispositions: A stage 1 meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 78(4), 1102-1134.

Paul, R., & Elder, L. (2013). Study of 38 public universities and 28 private universities to determine faculty emphasis on critical thinking in instruction. Available at http://www.criticalthinking.org/pages/study-of-38-public-universities-and-28-private-universities-to-determine-faculty-emphasis-on-critical-thinking-in-instruction/598

Story Three:   A few years back, I wanted to get a better understanding of self-publishing so I wrote a book on success (Don’t Just Dream About Success—Stack the Odds in Your Favor) that I self-published.   It was a fun, learning experience for me.  In this book, I related (and discussed) a lot of stories that had influenced me over the past decades.   Here is one of my true favorites.

“Mark Rothko was a celebrated artist who worked during the middle part of the 20th century.  The website for the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, provides this assessment of his influence on the world of art.

“’One of the preeminent artists of his generation, Mark Rothko is closely identified with the New York School, a circle of painters that emerged during the 1940s as a new collective voice in American art.  During a career that spanned five decades, he created a new and impassioned form of abstract painting.’

“In 2009, the play Red opened in London before eventually moving to Broadway in New York City and then throughout the United States.  The action is set in Rothko’s studio and consists of conversations between the artist and his young assistant.  Red was recently staged here in Richmond, Virginia.  I am no theater expert, but found the play funny, interesting, and insightful.  Although the entire production is a fascinating look at Rothko’s ideas and personality, one short monologue about a painting by Henri Matisse really caught my attention.  Those few lines have reverberated through my brain numerous times since that evening.

“In this particular scene, Rothko is describing the evolution of the unique style that made his art both famous and influential.  At a critical point early in his development as an artist, he discovered a work that truly intrigued him:  Matisse’s The Red Studio at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.  Initially, he was baffled by how Matisse managed to create the painting’s stunning effect.   Unlike most people, Rothko could not let go of the need to understand what he was seeing.  How did the artist produce such a powerful impact?  What caused this mix of oils to be so mesmerizing?  Returning to the museum each day, he stood in front of the painting for hours analyzing Matisse’s techniques and talent.  According to the play, the daily pilgrimage continued until Rothko was able to unravel the mystery to his satisfaction.  He had a tenacious need to see more deeply—a characteristic that enabled him to grow artistically as he began to comprehend the secrets that made this painting great.

“He did not buy a book about Matisse and fall in line with some expert’s opinion.

“He did not take a class on Matisse so that a teacher could describe various theories about the work.

“He did not call Matisse on the telephone and ask for an explanation.

“He did not go online and pull up Matisse’s resume to discover the school where the artist had studied.

“No.  Rothko went back day after day, hour after hour, and stared obsessively at The Red Studio working to penetrate the wonder of its composition.  He was witnessing a work of genius which inspired him so completely that he was unable to rest until he mentally captured that essence.  Only then could those secrets be assimilated into his own artistic talent.  You cannot implement what you do not understand.”

Okay, what is the point of these three stories.   For me, the point is that becoming good at something does not happen by accident.  That’s the ultimate advice I can give to a person who wants to be a better teacher:   Being good doesn’t happen by accident.

--Carole Bayer Sager dissected the hit songs to try to determine what was special about them.

--Linda B. Nilson asserts that you cannot teach critical thinking simply because you say that you want to do it.   If that is the goal, then you have to learn how to do it and build the course entirely around that idea.

--Mark Rothko became one of the most influential artists of the last century because, at least in part, he obsessively spent hours coming to understand what made one painting so very magical.

Story Four:   Anyone who has read this blog knows by now that in 1991 (after about 20 years as a college professor) I switched from being a lecture style teacher to using the Socratic method exclusively.   I have told that story so often that people tell it back to me.  What I don’t tell people is that I spent the summer of 1991 breaking my teaching down into its smallest possible components:   how did I communicate with the students, how did I call on them in class, how often did I call on each one, how did I ask them to prepare for class, what did I ask them to do after class, how did I react to a missed question or a lack of effort, how did I test them, what did I do if I was unhappy with them (individually or specifically), how did I grade them, how available was I to mentor them, how did I motivate them, etc.   I tried to consider every aspect of my teaching.   Then, I tried to figure out which of those components was working and which were not working.   The parts that were working, I kept.   The parts that were not working, I tried to figure out how to fix.

If I became a better teacher after that, it was never because I switched to the Socratic Method.  It was because I invested a few months one summer thinking about every aspect of my teaching.

Story Five:   Okay, who is Jaime Escalante?  For 17 years, he was a high school math teacher in Los Angeles and the subject of the fabulous movie Stand and Deliver.  

I do not remember every detail of Stand and Deliver but Escalante becomes a teacher at a high school that is truly struggling.  In a very tough environment, the students seem lost and hopeless.   But, Escalante convinces several of these students to try preparing for the AP Calculus examination even though everyone else thought that was a useless idea for these students.   It seemed like a totally hopeless goal but, somehow, he managed to succeed, not just with a few students but with virtually all of his students.  I love that concept -- he succeeded with virtually all of his students.

According to Wikipedia, “In 1982, Escalante came into the national spotlight when 18 of his students passed the challenging Advanced Placement Calculus exam. The Educational Testing Service found these scores to be suspicious, because all of the students made exactly the same math error on problem #6, and also used the same unusual variable names. Fourteen of those who passed were asked to take the exam again. Twelve of the fourteen agreed to retake the test and all twelve did well enough to have their scores reinstated. In 1983, the number of students enrolling and passing the A.P. calculus test more than doubled. That year 33 students took the exam and 30 passed.”

Okay, you say you want to be a better teacher.  Great goal.   Watch Stand and Deliver and then write and tell me exactly how he did it.  Dissect the movie (to use Sager’s term).   Watch it a couple of times to see what you can catch.  You are not trying to become Escalante.  You are trying to understand teaching at its most fundamental level.  This guy is a true genius at teaching – heck, he has his portrait on a postage stamp.  You are not trying to become Escalante.  Rothko did not become Matisse.  Rothko used the Matisse work as his guide post – so that he could see how the magic was done?   My email address is jhoyle@richmond.edu.  If you truly want to get better, watch Stand and Deliver and then write and tell me (point by point), how he created that miracle.

SIX QUESTIONS TO THINK ABOUT AS YOU START A NEW YEAR

This will be my 201^st entry on this blog.  That is roughly 190 more than I expected to write when I first began.   Over the years, the blog has had 130,000 page views and was recently named one of the top 50 blogs in accounting for 2014.   (http://www.accounting-degree.org/50-best-accounting-blogs-of-2014/)    Unfortunately, it was the only blog on the list that dealt with education.   I would honestly love to be reading 50 different blogs about teaching and learning.    At that point, I think college education could really begin to improve.   So, start a blog.   Share your opinions.   Share your questions.   Share your doubts.   Share your frustrations.   We need more of that.   You will never be able to estimate how much the blogging process can improve your own teaching until you start typing and posting.

As always, I want to pass along my great appreciation to everyone who forwards messages to colleagues about my various thoughts and ideas on this blog.   Any success here is dependent entirely on the many kind people who read these essays and discuss them around their own faculty coffee rooms. 

**

Some years ago when I first began to write about teaching, I received an email from a stranger in England.   That email has long since been lost but it said something like “You don’t know me but I have read several of your essays on teaching and believe you will appreciate the attached quote.”    How very correct he was.   Sadly, I don’t know who sent the email or even the origin of the quote.   But, I cannot possibly describe how much the following words have influenced me over the intervening years.  

   "Teaching does not come from years of doing it.  It actually comes from thinking about it." 

As I get older, I am ever more convinced that we teachers don’t invest sufficient time thinking deeply enough about our classes, our students, and the learning process.   It is easy to get stuck on autopilot.    Every year is like the last one.   We understand when certain aspects of the experience are not going well but we avoid delving into those problems with the thought necessary to arrive at creative and effective improvements.   More and deeper thinking might just be the cure.

As we move toward the beginning of another year and the opening of a new semester, I want to urge all of us (you and me both) to spend some hours over the winter break just thinking about teaching.   Focused meditation can help us consider how we can make 2015 the greatest year of our teaching careers.

That is a reasonable and upbeat goal:  2015 the greatest year of our teaching careers.   Can we do the thinking that is necessary to make that goal a reality?   When I give presentations to educators and make such a bold suggestion, I often get a frustrated query in response:   “What am I supposed to think about?”

That is not a dumb question.   In fact, it might well be the real key – what should we think about?   “Go out and do some thinking” is so vague that it provides little helpful advice.   To help direct this thinking, I want to throw out 6 specific questions that you might ponder over the winter break.   Just some questions to bat around inside your head.  You are not looking for a right answer in general but rather the answer that makes the most sense for you.

Maybe most importantly, you are not trying to justify what you are currently doing but rather trying to figure out how your current practice might be improved ever so slightly.

(1) – How do you want your students to be different on the last day of class from what they are at the beginning of the semester?   Surely, there has to be some anticipated growth in each student or the class simply has no purpose.  For you, what should that change be?   Try to avoid giving a vague response.   To help faculty determine their goals, I like to ask the “fly-on-the-wall-question:”   If you were a fly sitting on the back wall of the classroom on the last day of the semester, what would you want your students to say about your class as they exit?   That will tell you a lot about the change that you want to see in your students as a result of your class.   Be careful how you answer this question because it should then become the guiding point for how you structure every aspect of your teaching.  If you want your students to learn to distinguish the music of Mozart from that of Bach by the end of the semester, then you build your class to create that outcome.   So, what outcomes are you seeking?   How should your students be different at the end of the semester as a result of your class?   If you want to become a master teacher, be bold when you set your goals.   If you have never considered this, I think you have missed one of the great questions in teaching.

(2) – How do you communicate with your students?   Most of us only meet with our students two or three times per week in a hectic classroom setting.    Those classes are often 4 or 5 days apart.   If you want to influence students, there has to be some method of conversing with students in a more efficient and timely manner.  How effective would any business be if the employer could only converse with employees for a few minutes 2 or 3 times each week?   In my classes, I use a lot of email.   I start sending emails about 6 weeks before the semester begins and do so on almost a daily basis once the semester gets going.   I ask questions, I direct students to interesting newspaper articles, I create puzzles for them to solve, I talk about what we covered in class, I give them review hints.   I tell the students that I will only send what I consider to be important emails but I do expect them to be read.   I cannot guarantee that they read every word but, at least, I have a way to provide direction and motivation on a daily basis instead of only 150 minutes each week.

(3) – How do you get your students to prepare for class?   I have always argued that the secret to an effective classroom environment is student preparation.   If students are prepared, they can participate in a meaningful way.   There is no limit to what can be accomplished in class.   If students are not prepared, all they can really do is take notes that they subsequently memorize.   They are just observers.   They cannot participate.   The quickest (although not easiest) way to improve your class is to convince your students of the wisdom of walking into class prepared.   Most students (and, by that, I mean virtually all students) go through a middle school and high school system that puts little or no emphasis on class preparation.   Therefore, in college, you face a group of students who have little idea as to why they should prepare for each class and how to go about doing that.   I guarantee that if you can increase student preparation in your classes, you will be amazed by the improvement in the learning process.

(4) – How do you test to avoid memorization and, instead, emphasize the development of critical thinking?   Often, in this blog, I have stated that students will learn based on how they are tested.   If you want to develop critical thinking skills, you have to convince the students that such skills are necessary for success on their tests.   As most of you probably know, I am not a big fan of student evaluations.   However, the one question that I look at religiously is number 8 (at the University of Richmond) which is something like:    Compared to other college-level courses you have taken, how well did this course call upon your ability to think critically and analytically?   I would bet that the results of that question are highly influenced by how well my tests emphasize critical thinking skills.   Over the past decade, I have worked more diligently on my testing than on any other part of my teaching.

(5) – What do you do after class to help students solidify the knowledge that they have obtained in class?   I am always amazed by how quickly understanding leaks out of the minds of my students.   I am currently reading an excellent book titled Make It Stick – The Science of Successful Learning (by Brown, Roediger, and McDaniel).   One of the earliest things I marked in this book was the line:   “One of the best habits a learner can instill in herself is regular self-quizzing to recalibrate her understanding of what she does and does not know.”   How can you help students do that self-quizzing so that they can jumpstart the amount they know and understand?   How can you help them build on what they learn in class rather than have it leak out of their minds?   How much direction and assistance do you give students after they leave your classroom?

(6) – How do you convince your students that they are capable of learning the material in your class and that this knowledge is worth the effort?   In life, attitude is everything.  If your students are convinced that they are stupid or if they believe the material has no positive value for their lives, a quality educational experience is going to be impossible to achieve.   Conversely, if you can instill a high level of confidence, every student can become a star.   It would be wonderful if all students walked into our classes with a deep curiosity and an openness for learning and a huge belief in themselves.   That works great in theory but not in practice.   Many students appear on the first day fully expecting to feel stupid and bored.   That cycle needs to be broken if the class is going to be a success for every student on the roll.

Six questions and no real answers.   But they are well worth considering before you walk back into the classroom in January.   Can you come up with a new and improved answer for one or more of these over the next few weeks?   Remember that teaching should always be about “experimentation” and “evolution.”

Do that and I am convinced that 2015 really can be the greatest year of your teaching career.

 

Happy holidays!!!

What Stands Between You and Greatness

In my previous blog on this site, I provided some tips for becoming a great teacher. Not surprisingly, the question came up as to what constitutes great teaching. I think most of us probably have some fairly firm definition of “good teaching” but what is the next step up the ladder? What exactly do we mean by“great teaching?” If you describe someone as a great teacher, what characteristics are you describing?

Do we know what great teaching is? As I sometimes tell my students, “if you don’t know where you are going, then a road map won’t be of any help.”

One possibility is that we are all satisfied with being good teachers so we have no real reason to consider what comes next. There is no urgency. In your dreams, do you seek to be a good teacher or a great teacher? If you say“great teacher,” then you must have some definition in mind as to what that means.

As I often mention here, I teach at the Robins School of Business at the University of Richmond. My colleagues take teaching very seriously. So, I went to several of them recently and asked: “To you, what does ‘great teaching’ really mean?” I wanted to get some different ideas to mull over.

Below are some of the responses that I received. Look them over – consider what they have to say. (In case you are interested, my response is the last one on the list.)

Then, ask yourself: “For me, what does great teaching mean?” This question can take some thinking. Avoid a quick, flippant answer. Once you have identified what you believe constitutes great teaching, what would you have to do to achieve that level?

In teaching, what stands between you and greatness?

Here’s what I heard from several of my fellow teachers:

(1) - Great teaching accomplishes or exceeds instructor and institutional objectives, which ideally would focus on what students learn.

(2) - Great teaching is grounded in a thorough knowledge of a discipline, but it doesn't stop there. It calls that knowledge into question, and gives the students the tools to do the same.

Great teaching is transformative. It meets students where they are, but then it helps guide them to a place where they can take their education into their own hands, to where they become independent thinkers and seekers after knowledge. It gives them the tools to become life-long learners, rather than ending when the semester ends.

Great teaching is clear and focused, with achievable outcomes that are fairly assessed. That said, it may not bear fruit during the semester or even the college career of the student. (See "transformative," above.)

(3) - I don't know if I will actually answer your question, but I will share with you what I believe good teaching involves. Good teaching involves passion, creativity, and listening. It requires substance, an ability to challenge one to think, and the ability to motivate one to apply knowledge gained. The key element to good teaching is a motivated teacher. I am convinced that unmotivated teachers cultivate unmotivated students.

What's interesting is that I find it easier to tell you what bad teaching is. Hmmm, why is that?

(4) - A setting where students become actively engaged, probing, challenged, and at the end of the day, more interested in the subject than when they began. Great teaching would also include activities and outcomes that allow the Professor to clearly delineate the A, B, C, D, and F students. We could say that not all students have the same ability, but at a school like ours that is not necessarily the case. It is more likely not all students are motivated equally.

(5) - Great teaching creates great learning. I realize that's an inelegant sentence but it conveys what I believe. The best teacher inspires and helps a student to maximize their comprehension of a subject. The focus should always be on the student's learning.

(6) - My first thought to your question is, when I had a teacher who connected with me as a student, I had the joy of learning the topic AND I was inspired to learn more and more on my own. It made me have a desire to be inquisitive and want to dig and explore the topic even more. One of my best teachers was my 7th grade Earth Science teacher. She made studying rocks fascinating and to this day, I still want to pick up rocks, study them, and figure out how they were made. I think her joy in her topic was contagious. Obviously, my experience was at an earlier level, but I think it applies to all levels of schooling and all subjects.

(7) - First, let’s get rid of the “romanticized gentle mentor” image that constantly gets conjured up in the media. Further, let’s also admit that there is no one method of teaching that is best for all students nor for all teachers. Many of the people who I consider to be great teachers are not “cuddly” nor have a single style in which they teach.

Great teaching, in my opinion, gets the best results out of the students. These results are not simply test scores, but a greater maturity in the process of how to think about and solve problems possibly beyond the subject area. Great teachers/teaching make students better people. The difficult part about it is that great teaching may not be recognized by a student for a number of years and possibly only if the student is introspective enough to realize it. This is part of what makes teaching evaluations a flawed process. Your best teacher is not necessarily the one you enjoyed the most, but the one who got the most out of you.

(8) - Great teaching = Learning + Assessment = Convincing students to value (at least) the broad topic + convincing the instructor that the gained knowledge will provide some benefit to the students and the wellness of the world.

(9) What is a great teacher? At the end of the day, all teachers have to make that decision for themselves.

I have not thought about this for long so I might change my mind but my definition would be that a great teacher is one who assists most of his or her students in gaining a significantly deeper understanding of the subject matter. Accordingly, a teacher who got 100 percent of the students to learn a little might be a good teacher but not a great one. A teacher who gets a few students to gain a much deeper understanding might be a good teacher but not a great one. You have to influence a high percentage of the students and the increase in understanding must be eye-catching.

Popularity is not part of that definition.

Someone might ask how I measure the number who improve and the depth of improvement. Right now, I am not sure that I care. I am trying to set a theoretical goal for myself, not document a tenure decision.

Okay – now it is your turn. You have read all of these and they are quite interesting. How would you define Great Teaching? That’s what I would like to know.