What should we study and how?
As I was reading the assigned reading, I was reminded of all that I had learned in my previous educational research classes. Our reading addressed the issue of finding the right “topic” or “question” to research, otherwise you will not have a clear starting point for your research. Yet, when you pose these questions you need to make sure that your topic is not too broad, so that you are able to gather your data in a clear defined fashion. Though the research design of your study will vary depending on the topic/questions to be researched, all “good” theories (as per McKinney) need to fit the data, are logically consistent, are testable, and are easily generalizable. These four characteristics should hold true in both a quantitative and qualitative research design. McKinney then discusses the reasoning for a literature review with regards to research, and gives some basic parameters for completing the review and what can be considered a good or reliable source for inclusion.
One thing that really resonated for me with regards to this weeks’ reading was from the Bass text. He stated, “As with many people, my heightened attention to teaching was occasioned by a crisis.” This I have seen with some of my former colleagues in education. There are teachers who will keep with the same teaching style and teaching components until something drastic happens, and this is how our field becomes stagnant. You should not as an educator wait until you have an educational “train wreck” to look and evaluate your teaching style or to update the components of your course(s). You should look at your course with a fresh pair of eyes every semester and see if you can update even one part of your course, you do not have to overhaul the whole thing at once! I try to do this every semester, since I know I will be interacting with a new group of students, do I change everything…no, but there is always at least a few things that are new and fresh. As Bass states: “As with scholarship or research, you cannot investigate everything at once.” but as educators and scholars, we should find time to at least focus on a small area of improvement or research… it is only then that our field will reach new heights.
Teddy’s Reading Log 01.25.10
Teddy’s Reading Log 01.25.2010
Scholars around the world would probably agree that there is a need for a standard definition of scholarship of teaching and learning. With so many people trying to define the scholarship of teaching, I am not surprised that we are confused concerning this topic. Someone once said to me, “we are all part of the problem or the solution”. In the text Enhancing Learning Through The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, scholars are seeking ways to resolve the many challenges that colleges and universities face in determining how we learn, how we are taught and how learning and teaching should be assessed. Chapters 1& 2 gives a great overview of what scholarship and teaching is all about. McKinney (2004), states that the phrase “scholarship of teaching has only been around for about fifteen years, but the SoTL has been around longer. SoTL is connected to organizations like the Carnegie Foundation, AAHE and the CSTL Foundation. Also, it states that Ernest Boyer coined the phrase scholarship of teaching (Carnegie Report 1990) and Shulman phrased what we know as the pedagogical content knowledge.
Over time, a host of great minds have defined the scholarship of teaching. From the Carnegie Foundation, AAHE, Richlin Benjamin, Prosser and Triwell to Belmont University, we have a mixing bowl of criteria. Personally, I give preference to the article “Course Anatomy” which states that teaching is an extended process that unfolds over time and has five key parts: vision, design, interactions, outcomes and analysis. Shulman suggests that scholarship should be public, susceptible to critical review and evaluation and accessible for exchange and use by society. Many scholars have struggled to formulate a conclusive and definitive meaning including Rice (1991) who suggested that the scholarship of teaching is three-fold. Synoptic capacity, pedagogical content and what we know about learning. Others such as Kreber (2005) stated that the scholarship of teaching is intellectual, practical and critical work done by college and university teachers. So many others have shared similar theories; however, no common approach has thoroughly been adopted. I think they all should co-exist!
The article continues on the topic of course design. Course design can take form as a course syllabus, course outline an argument for the development of a class. A collaborative inquiry is needed to clearly stabilize the terminology. Chapter 2 discusses the rationales for advocating the scholarship of teaching and learning. A list of great reasons, including the revitalization of older faculty is mentioned. Value and rewards become the center piece and I found myself biased in this regard. Without reward structures colleges and universities will not attract the best and brightest. There must be a balance in the scholarship of teaching and learning. Teachers and students must have equated access to research data and possess the means to share, assess and interpret the data for proper use in the context needed. Even though teaching is a private act, I believe learning is most effective when we’re amongst like minds. We tend to be more excited and motivated when we can engage and attach ourselves to others with differing pedagogies. I am not sold on one definition of the scholarship of teaching and learning, but feel that there are as many criteria as there are scenarios in life to define the scholarship of teaching and learning. Therefore, we should explore them all!
1/24/10 How do we measure “Hard Data”
Hey Everyone,
The first idea that I found very interesting was from the “course anatomy” article. As the title foreshadows, the article describes each part of a course as its anatomy. I thought this was a great analogy! Making sure that a course’s readings, activities, discussions, assignments, etc. all fit together is vital. I also like the idea of thinking about teaching a class as a research experiment. It just makes sense to me. You design it, you expose students to it, you check to see if you are meeting learning objectives (which is the tricky part for me), you modify the course, and you repeat it.
I also agree that teaching needs to be public. However, it still seems to be mostly private. In my field we have the journal “teaching sociology” which is an attempt to go more public with techniques shown to work. I’ve picked up some really useful activities from it. It would be great if it included entire course designs, or more examples of quality assessment techniques. I loved the quote “An account of teaching without reference to learning is like a research report with no results.” But I still struggle with how to best measure “learning”.
The “Learning that Lasts a Lifetime” article dealt with this on a theoretical level. I agree that we need to stop reinforcing “shallow types of learning that cannot be used in life”, but I am still searching to find a way to measure “deep learning that can be used in life”. We tend to measure memorization because it’s cheap and easy. The author calls it “leaving out the hard data”. But that hard data is what we need to measure, because it is the goal of education.
Carrie Ann’s Reading Log 1/24
As I began reading the assigned texts and articles for the class I was surprised at how many definitions there were of what the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning truly is. It was consistent in that each author or scholar agreed that the definition is divided into three parts, but they were named slightly different as seen in the McKinney text. Noted in the McKinney text, in 1991, Rice listed the three parts as synoptic capacity, pedagogical content knowledge, and what we know about learning. Then in 1999 another group of scholars stated that the three areas are 1) engagement with the existing knowledge of teaching and learning, 2) self-reflection, and 3) public sharing. Yet in the Shulman Course Anatomy article the three parts are listed as 1) Public, 2) Susceptible to critical review and evaluation, and 3) accessible for change and use. The one idea that struck a chord with me with the three parts of SoTL is that Shulman makes a statement in that these parts are generally absent with respect to teaching, in that teaching tends to be a “private act” (between student and teacher). I do tend to disagree with this statement. Teaching is public in that your classroom in higher education can be open to the general population should you choose to do so. You are susceptible to critical review by your peers and even your students and your teaching is accessible for change if you self evaluate and grow as an educator. Teaching is accessible for use and this is due to technology, you can podcast or webcast and this is available for anyone to use. So, I do not entirely agree with Shulman’s statement and I know some might not agree with me either.
Another idea that struck a chord with me as I read also came from the Shulman article, in that part of the anatomy of your course is investigation. I agree with Shulman in that every time you design or redesign your course you are engaged in an experiment. This is true, I tend to try new things with my students every semester and it is trial and error to see if the assignment works and resonates with the students. By this process you can learn from your successes and failures and that helps you grow as an educator.
Though there are many ways to explain the foundation of SoTL as seen from this weeks reading, I look forward to adding my own definition and characteristics and we have only just begun to scratch the surface of this topic.