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Some years back The Teaching Professor featured an article highlighting Mano Singham’s wonderful piece describing how he moved away from a very authoritarian, rule-centered syllabus (reference below). It’s one of my very favorite articles—I reference it regularly in presentations, and it appears on almost every bibliography I distribute.

Since its publication in 2005, Singham has continued to explore the role of the syllabus in his courses (and elsewhere) and has become even more convinced that many faculty are using the syllabus in ways that more effectively hinder than promote learning.

In a presentation at an International Society for Exploring Teaching and Learning (ISETL) conference, Singham described an activity he now undertakes on the first day of class. Instead of distributing the syllabus then, he passes out a list of readings, a tentative schedule for the readings and a proposed list of paper due dates. Then he asks students this question: “What do you expect from an instructor who is giving 100% to the course?”

Here’s the list students came up the first time he tried this approach:

• Give students their papers back in a timely way
• Give students lots of criticism and feedback on their work
• Have passion for the material
• Listen and respond to student concerns
• Care not only about academics but also about students as people
• Realize that students have a life outside of class and not make unreasonable demands on them
• Not stick only to the class readings for discussion
• Take all questions seriously and not fake answers
• Provide inspiration to students so that they will want to change their minds.

He followed that question with this one: “What would you expect to see your peers doing if they were giving 100% to the course?” And here’s that list:

• Doing the readings
• Listening to others and appreciating diverse opinions
• Learning from each other’s ideas
• Keeping things lighthearted
• Not putting down others if you disagree
• Showing up for every class and being on time
• Showing respect for everyone’s ideas
• Going beyond just academic conversation, bringing personal elements into the discussions too

Singham added three items to the students’ second list: responding thoughtfully to weekly journal prompts; being conscientious about sending weekly private emails to the instructor; and regularly checking the course website for information about the course. The activity confirmed for Singham that students do know what’s expected of them and have a good sense of what professors can do to support their efforts to learn in a course.

References: Singham, M. (2005). Moving away from the authoritarian classroom. Change, 37 (3), 51-57.

by Maryellen Weimer.

Read more @ http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/teaching-and-learning/what-students-expect-from-instructors-other-students/

As a marketing professor, I often found myself scouring publications, stores, and my cabinets prior to a lecture, to find real-world examples of concepts I was teaching. Although students seemed to appreciate and learn from these examples, it didn’t get them as actively involved in their learning as I’d like.

Several years ago, I modified my technique and now require students to read the chapter and bring in an example themselves, before I lecture on the material. Sometimes I give them a specific topic from the chapter to illustrate; other times I allow them to pick any topic from the chapter. I had two logistical issues to resolve in order to make the new technique viable:

• How could I allow all students to share their work without using too much class time? and
• How could I encourage students to complete this assignment?

To allow all students to share their work, I divide them into groups of four or five at the beginning of class. Once in their groups, students follow these rules:

1. Use six to seven minutes to have each group member share an example within the group;
2. Use another three to four minutes to pick the example that best illustrates the concept; and
3. Select someone other than the person whose example was picked to share that example with the class. Then one person from each group quickly shares the group’s “best example” with the whole class. Sometimes they’ll even pull up websites illustrating their examples or show the products themselves. In total, this exercise takes about 20 minutes.

The approach has several advantages.

• First, it allows students time to warm up and get focused on the day’s material.
• Second, somewhat surprising to me, students come to class proud of their examples and excited about sharing them. They are engaged in the learning.
• Third, I get some excellent examples of products and services of interest to students, and I don’t have to spend any time finding them.
• Finally, students have an opportunity to share and build relationships with classmates, creating a better learning environment.

To ensure that students do the assigned work prior to class, sometimes I require the students to bring properly formatted letters to class explaining why they think their examples are good ones. Early in the semester, I collect and grade these letters for content, writing skills, and format; however, after the initial expectation is set, I choose to collect and grade the letters randomly. Other times, students post their explanations to the course discussion board at least one hour before class. Students are not allowed to post an example already posted by another student. This way, if students don’t quite understand the concept, they can read and learn from other students before picking their selection. Again, I grade these postings the first couple of times during the semester and then only randomly thereafter.

A third approach, which involves even less grading, allows students to do the work for a maximum number of bonus points. I am continually amazed at how much time and effort students will put into bonus assignments for a minimal number of points. If students opt not to complete the assignment for bonus points, they can still participate in a group, learn from their classmates’ examples, help to pick the best one, and maybe even present it to class.

I most like this approach because it takes the responsibility for learning and places it where it belongs—with the student—in a fun, nonthreatening, and interesting way.

by Karen Welle Gore.

Read more @ http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/teaching-and-learning/putting-students-in-charge-of-finding-real-world-examples-makes-for-a-more-engaging-classroo

When I started teaching 27 years ago, like the scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz I believed that just having a brain would make me successful. And so each class session I would literally “take the stage” on a raised platform to deliver what was in my head and on my papers. Even though there were 60 students in the class, there could just as well have been none because I basically ignored the students. They were objects, sponges whose task was to absorb course content.

Over the years my approach has changed. I started making progress once I realized that a brain alone was not enough. To teach well I also needed a heart and courage. I learned to be comfortable just being myself. I no longer used the podium and came to class with a one-page plan. I lectured less and students talked more. I invested more of myself in teaching. Let me share how I reached this point.

As I’ve developed as teacher, my attention shifted from self to students. Although this is a natural progression for teachers, it is not automatic. Some teachers remain the focal point of the learning process. This transfer of focus has been the impetus for changing how I teach. In planning for classes now, I continually ask how I can get students out of the stands and onto the field. This means I design simulations to highlight important information and processes, create games to explain content, and use small-group activities to engage students. I want my students to grasp concepts, and being in an active role helps them do that.

Placing students in the center of the teaching-learning environment requires that teachers have a different attitude and a new way of relating to students. Effective teachers are comfortable with both the cognitive and affective dimensions of teaching. Achieving more genuine relationships means being available to students, being glad to be in class with them, sharing with them what’s happening in our lives that is relevant, and investing the time it takes to prepare meaningful activities.

As a college teacher, I see my role as one of enabling others to become their best. I have come to realize that it is not so much what students know as what they can do. Likewise, teaching is not about what I know but what I enable others to do. Thus, I have changed the ways in which I teach to build students’ capacities. The critical question now is: “How can students show their understanding?” Finding ways to allow such student demonstrations influences my choice of course activities and assessments.

Finally, I want students to know that I reflect on what I do. I respond to their feedback; I talk about my mistakes in teaching. I agree with Parker Palmer when he says that “…teaching is a daily exercise in vulnerability.” Because of this personal exposure, teaching demands courage and honesty. It is vital to view the process of teaching as a developmental journey and to share the belief that we have not “arrived” in the practice of our craft. In this way we present ourselves as more approachable; our arrogance (perceived or real) thus declines. Students become more accepting of us.

One’s transformation as a teacher should not be a one-time event but a continual process that spans the career. Focusing on students, building their capabilities, and examining our own practice can transform our teaching and students’ learning. The evolving nature of becoming a teacher definitely makes the journey more enjoyable.

by Pathy H. Phelps.

Read more @ http://www.facultyfocus.com/articles/philosophy-of-teaching/transforming-your-teaching-style-a-student-centered-approach/

All students have had hundreds of teachers in their lifetimes. A very few of these teachers they remember as being exceptionally good. What are the qualities that combine to create an excellent, memorable teacher? Why do some teachers inspire students to work three times harder than they normally would, while others inspire students to skip class? Why do students learn more from some teachers than others?

If you are trying to become a better teacher, these are important questions. This issue of “Emphasis on Teaching” focuses on the four essential qualities that distinguish exceptional teachers: knowledge, communication skills, interest, and respect for students.

An Experiment

Here’s an experiment I have done in a number of my classes. The results may surprise you. Go into one of the classes you are teaching and have your students take out a sheet of paper. Ask them to list for you the qualities they feel are important in a good teacher. Ask them to identify the qualities they admire in the best teachers they have had. Then give the students enough time to think about it and write something down. Five minutes is good, but ten might be better. Let them answer the questions anonymously if they desire.

What you will get if you combine all of the responses is a fascinating collage of ideas. I have found that most of the responses fall into two specific categories: 1) a set of “core qualities” that students recognize in good teachers, and 2) a set of specific skills that are developed by good teachers.

“Core qualities” are the essential characteristics needed to be a good teacher. I would like to concentrate on the core qualities in this issue, and in the future discuss specific techniques that can be used to improve your classroom environment.

Knowledge

In every survey I have given, students consistently and clearly target as the number one quality of a good teacher exactly what you would expect: knowledge of the subject. You must be an expert in your field if you are going to be a good teacher at a university. This is a prerequisite.

Communication

The second core quality that good teachers possess is the ability to communicate their knowledge and expertise to their students. You may be the greatest expert ever in your field, but what would happen if you lectured in Latin? How much would your students learn?

It is a common misconception at the university level that knowledge of a subject is all that’s required to be a good teacher; that the students should be willing and able to extract the meat from what you say regardless of how it is delivered (even if it is delivered in Latin). This might be true at the upper graduate level, but elsewhere it is definitely untrue. It is especially untrue at the undergraduate level. The teacher’s job is to take advanced knowledge and make it accessible to the students. A good teacher allows students to understand the material, and to understand what it means (because it is one thing to understand how nuclear bombs work, but quite another to understand what nuclear bombs mean).

A good teacher can take a subject and help make it crystal clear to the students. A bad teacher can take that same material and make it impenetrable. Or a bad teacher can devote so little time and effort to preparation that the material presented is intrinsically confusing and disorganized. A good teacher is willing to expend the effort needed to find innovative and creative ways to make complicated ideas understandable to their students, and to fit new ideas into the context available to the student. A good teacher can explain complicated material in a way that students can understand and use.

There is a saying, “Give me a fish and I eat for a day, teach me to fish and I eat for a lifetime.” This is the philosophy of a good teacher. Give your students an answer and they can solve one problem, but show students the techniques needed to find the answer for themselves and they can become self-sufficient in the field. Students need to be shown how to apply the new techniques you teach to problem solving.

Interest

A good teacher starts with a firm knowledge of the subject, and builds on that with a clarity and understanding designed to help students master the material. The best teachers then go one step further. Because good teachers are interested in the material being taught, they make the class interesting and relevant to the students. Knowledge is worthless unless it is delivered to the students in a form they can understand. But the effort expended making the material understandable is wasted if the students are asleep when it is delivered, or if the students can see no point in learning the material.

Good teachers recognize this, and work hard to make their material relevant. They show students how the material will apply to their lives and their careers. Bad teachers make material “relevant” by threatening students with failure on a test. Good teachers go far beyond this: they make students want to learn the material by making it interesting.

This is one of the things that makes research so important and vital to a university: research makes the ideas discussed in class exciting and important to the teacher, as well as to the students. If the teacher isn’t interested in what’s being taught, then why should the students be?

Respect

Good teachers always possess these three core qualities: knowledge, the ability to convey to students an understanding of that knowledge, and the ability to make the material interesting and relevant to students. Complementing these three is a fourth quality: good teachers have a deep-seated concern and respect for the students in the classroom. Why else would a teacher put in the time and effort needed to create a high quality class?

The creation of a good class requires an immense amount of work. You don’t simply come up with clear explanations and examples and experiments for class off the top of your head. You don’t create fair, consistent, high quality tests and homework assignments (read “learning experiences”) five minutes before you hand them out. You don’t figure out ways to integrate new materials and research into a class in an understandable way on the drive in one morning. You work at this sort of quality all the time. You spend time with your students so you can learn about holes in their understanding. You read and write and create to build an exciting and interesting class every day. The only thing that would drive you to do that is a concern and respect for the adults in your classroom.

Conclusion

When you strive and work to become a good teacher and to create a good class, the four core qualities are essential: knowledge, the skills to convey that knowledge, the ability to make the material you are teaching interesting and relevant, and a deep-seated respect for the student. Without these four qualities, good teaching will not exist.

by Marshell Brain.

Read more @ http://www.bygpub.com/eot/eot1.htm

Experiential learning is also referred to to as experiential teaching, or experiential training and development, or experiential activities, and other variations of these terms.

However the word learning is significant, since it emphasises the learner’s perspective, which is crucial to the experiential learning concept.

Conversely, the words training and teaching significantly reflect the teacher or training perspective (on behalf of the teaching or training organisation – e.g., a school or employer).

Experiential learning is therefore the most meaningful name for this concept.

The word experiential essentially means that learning and development are achieved through personally determined experience and involvement, rather than on received teaching or training, typically in group, by observation, listening, study of theory or hypothesis, or some other transfer of skills or knowledge.

The expression ‘hands-on’ is commonly used to describe types of learning and teaching which are to a lesser or greater extent forms of experiential learning.

The expression ‘chalk-and-talk’ (the teacher writes on a board and speaks while learners listen and look and try to absorb facts) refers to a style of teaching or training which contains no experiential learning aspect whatsoever.

We might also regard experiential learning as growing a person from the inside, whereas conventional teaching and training is the transfer of capability into a person from the outside.

Experiential learning is determined and controlled by the individual for the purpose of achieving personal development and growth, whereas conventional training and teaching tend to be designed and delivered by an organisation for the purpose of developing the capabilities (usually knowledge and/or skills) of a group of people, necessary to meet organisational needs or to achieve a known measurable standard or qualification.

There is a place for many types of learning and teaching/training, and specifically these two types:

• conventional prescribed teaching/training – the transfer of pre-determined knowledge/skills – ‘from the outside, usually for an external purpose’.
• experiential learning – development of people as individuals – ‘from the inside, usually for an internal purpose’.

People need certain prescribed skills and knowledge for their education and their work. But they also need to be helped to develop as individuals too, which interestingly also carries many benefits for external purposes.

In work and society most problems stem from people feeling unhappy or being unfulfilled. Conventional skills/knowledge transfer training/teaching does little to counter these effects. Individual growth – via experiential learning – most certainly offers ways to address personal feelings of confidence, fulfilment, sense of purpose, etc.

In conventional teaching and training the needs of the ‘organisation’ (which might be an employer or school or college, etc) are the primary driver of the learning content, design, delivery and assessment. In experiential learning the starting point is quite different – the starting point is the person, and the primary driver is to help the individual grow and learn and develop in their own direction and in their own way.

Unfortunately the notion of developing people as individuals is regarded by many employers (and much of the educational establishment) as less efficient and effective than conventional training and teaching.

This is because employers and educational policy-makers tend to see training and teaching in terms of organisational or bureaucratic requirements, or in terms of qualifications and standards, or in terms of short-term costs and efficiencies; and given this basic assumption it’s easy to see why so much training and teaching avoids the costs and time in developing individuals, when the priority is so strongly to manage and achieve organisational or systemic requirements.

The benefits however of developing people as individuals (in addition of course to transferring capabilities necessary to pass exams and contribute to organisational activities) are huge. By developing people as individuals – rather than simply transferring arbitrary capabilities – we develop people’s confidence, self-esteem, personal strengths, and crucially a rounded sense of purpose and fulfilment which fundamentally improve attitude, life-balance and emotional well-being. These immensely important outcomes are just as important for sustainable productive work and a healthy society as the essential skills and knowledge typically represented in conventional education and work-related training.

Developing people as individuals, which is at the heart of experiential learning, also implicitly enables learning methods to fit each person’s own preferred learning styles and natural preferences, because learners are encouraged and helped to learn and develop in their own ways, using methods which they find most comfortable and therefore enjoyable.

When people can be helped to discover that learning and development itself can be fun and emotionally rewarding, then we provide a platform for all sorts of learning and development in the future. Conversely, when we subject people to inappropriate teaching or training, which does not interest them or fit their preferred learning style, we put people off learning and development, sometimes permanently.

Experiential learning, especially used at the beginning of a person’s new phase of learning, can help to provide a positive emotional platform which will respond positively and confidently to future learning, even for areas of learning which initially would have been considered uncomfortable or unnecessary.

Experiential learning also brings into play the concept of multiple intelligences – the fact that people should not be limited by the ‘three Rs’ and a method of teaching based primarily on reading and writing.

Experiential learning is a way to break out of the received conditioned training and teaching practices which so constrain people’s development in schools and work.

It does this because it is centred on the individual – not the training or the surrounding system. It works on the basis that people can and should be developed from the inside out, not the other way around. In merely transferring and conveying knowledge to a person we do very little to help them grow as individuals, and when we starve this need most people quickly begin to lose confidence and hopes of becoming someone special in life.

Differences between experiential learning and conventional training and teaching might be represented simply as:

While mainly focused on organised experiential activities, games, events and exercises, etc, the principles below can be adapted for other forms of experiential learning and development, for example job secondments and specially delegated projects, for which the techniques below offer an immensely helpful alternative approach compared with conventional methods of task-based review, which tend to ignore many valuable individual learner opportunities and lessons.

The essence of effective experiential learning is that the entire process is centred on the learner – not the task, not the organisational objective, not the qualification standard, not the group, and certainly not the trainer’s or the teacher’s personal opinions. In this respect the underpinning philosophy of well executed experiential learning has much in common with the principles of good modern life coaching, and also interestingly in facilitative decision-making methodology, both of which place the other person at the centre of the issue, not the coach, seller, or organisation.

Experiential Learning Activities – Concepts and Principles:

The conceptual basis of the process of experiential learning is commonly related to Kolb’s Learning Cycle  (Kolb and Fry 1975). This model can be developed for experiential learning and summarised in the diagram below.

Diagram adapted from Kolb’s learning styles and process theory as it might be applied to experiential learning.

This ‘Learning Cycle’ provides a helpful simple diagram of the process of experiential learning, which is broadly:

1. do
2. review
3. develop and implement ideas for improvement.

Here follow the principles of experiential learning on greater detail, especially as they relate to organised activities, events and games, etc.

1 - Learner is central:

The learner is central to the process throughout, the facilitator provides the learner with a service. The principle that the success of the experiential approach to learning depends on the learners is fundamental. Therefore the facilitator must understand that learners can only make best use of their opportunities if they are ready, willing and able to become personally involved in the learning process: learners have to be prepared to actively develop their understanding, critique and evaluate the messages in their context and then work hard to apply appropriate learning.

2 – Facilitation must be Light and Subtle.

Principle 2: Individuals can and do learn without facilitation. Learners learn experientially by reflecting on their experiences, developing personal insights and understandings through involvement in intellectual, emotional and physical activity. This can be (and often is) done by an individual without any external help. A facilitator is not a prerequisite. Experiential learning involves people in working things through for themselves and developing their own understanding, so facilitators should always be seeking ways to enable this to happen. Although effective facilitation can add tremendous value, facilitators should remember that inappropriate facilitation can hinder, rather than help learning; they should not instruct, proffer knowledge, proscribe or offer personal wisdom.

3 – Find / Create Experiential Learning Opportunities:

A facilitator should help create learning opportunities and enable others to recognise and make good use of these opportunities. The facilitator can provide help during each element of the learning cycle by creating an appropriate learning environment, providing an activity that will initiate the learning process, creating an atmosphere and framework conducive to constructively critical review, (guiding thinking and challenging to developing understanding) ensuring that any conceptual thinking is progressed to meaningful conclusions and opportunities for improvement identified. Facilitation is a complex and skilled process.

4 – Reactions to Experiences vary so don’t pre – judge:

You cannot predict the learning an individual will take from an activity. Because individuals are personally involved in experiential learning individuals can take very different messages from a single event. An obvious example is one where a person fails to listen to another. If they are to learn, both individuals need to understand their part in their failure to communicate, but the causes could be numerous and therefore each persons learning very different. So for example, behaviours seen in an individual who isn’t heard could be; doesn’t express ideas clearly, doesn’t check the ‘listener has understood’, speaks when the other person isn’t ready to listen, doesn’t help the listener understand the significance of the information, fails to develop the idea, backs down when challenged, etc. Similarly example reasons why a ‘listener’ doesn’t listen could be; doesn’t see the issue as being important, had prejudged the issue, is distracted by personal thoughts, doesn’t respect the other person (and or their views). Therefore one event can provide the individuals involved with quite different or even diametrically opposed learning.

5 – Single Events can enable several Different Learning Effects:

There is potential for the learning to be at several levels. In the example used in note 4 above I gave behaviours for not being heard, but reasons for not listening. Typically addressing and developing behavioural change is less challenging than addressing the reasons. Taking the example from above, it can be seen that there is a hierarchy of challenge that the facilitator can encourage the learner to address: realising the need (e.g. I won’t be listened to if the other person is speaking) developing the skill (e.g. speaking clearly and concisely) developing the confidence or self esteem (e.g. believing that I and my views are of value) challenging personal attitudes (e.g. questioning personal drivers and belief systems).

6 – Build Confidence before addressing Attitudes and Behaviour:

Developing basic skills in a supportive environment is relatively simple, changing day to day behaviour is another matter. After having read this note it might be tempting to go straight to the fundamentals and target attitudes first. (If you have a positive attitude and personal confidence it is easier to implement personal change.) However remembering that the learner has to want to learn, it is far safer to build the learners confidence through success with skill development and behavioural change in simple or superficial areas first. When some progress has been made you can consider raising and tackling more fundamental issues like personal confidence and attitudes to others. It’s worth being aware however, that a knock on effect of individuals beginning to use new skills and realise their benefits can be a growth in self esteem and personal confidence.

7 – The Activity must be real and engaging – not based on Artificial Impact:

A learning activity is a means to an end, not an end in itself. The purpose of an experiential learning activity is to create an opportunity for valuable and memorable personal leaning. The ideal activity will engage, stimulate and challenge with individuals becoming absorbed in the task as themselves. It will not involve role play in a conventional artificial sense. All activities must be designed, managed and facilitated carefully so that the activity has impact, but it isn’t so memorable that these ‘activity memories’ override the impact and memory of the learning. If this happens the lasting memory may be an aspect of the activity, not the learning that was realised.

8 – Ensure Activities allow adequate and meaningful reviews:

An effective activity provides the opportunities for learning with as few distractions as possible. It can be great fun to run ‘big activities’ (although some people hate them) and there is no doubt that ‘ropes’ courses (as ‘outward bound’ activities are referred to in some parts of the world) and outdoor team challenges can generate real learning opportunities, but take care. Besides the risk of big events overpowering their intended lessons, the duration of these activities often means that many learning opportunities are lost; valuable incidents can get forgotten or overlooked or submerged in the complexity of the task. Although less memorable in themselves, running several short activities (10-30 minutes) each followed by its own review will often have far greater long term impact that one big activity.

9 – Carefully Reviews of Activities are Crucial:

The learning review is a vital stage of every activity. It should be planned as part of the design, not left to chance. Reviews can take many forms but all must engage the learners. The ideal review will involve the learner in personal thought, challenge and discussion before coming to some form of conclusion. It is often useful if a period of individual reflection, guided by open-ended or tick-box questionnaires, is followed by a facilitated discussion. If it is to be of real benefit, the review must be an honest critique of what happened and the contributions of each individual. Real issues should not be swept under the carpet, but equally criticism must be constructive.

10 – Accentuate the Positives:

Concentrate learning and reviews on the positives more than the negatives. It is all too easy to focus on the negatives but this can seriously undermine confidence in the whole idea of learning and development if the negatives are over-emphasised, especially for people who are not especially robust. It’s obvious that if something goes wrong, or just doesn’t go as well as we hoped, there will be benefit in review and change. It can, however, be equally beneficial to review what’s gone well. It’s not only motivating to recognise and focus on success, but finding out what caused the success and seeking ways to make greater or wider use of it can reap tangible rewards.

11 – Use Stimulating Questions in Reviews, especially for Groups Discussions:

A review discussion is an opportunity for learners, helped by the facilitator, to develop their own understanding and draw their own conclusions. The role of the facilitator is to enable others to learn by drawing out the issues and developing the learning that is relevant to the individuals. The facilitator should ask questions that will stimulate thought about relevant issues and enable the group to use answers given to develop further thought and learning.

12 – Resist Temptation to give answers – ask questions only:

Don’t tell people what they should learn. An observer is in a privileged position, often seeing aspects that are not obvious to others. If you observe a point that isn’t raised during a review it is legitimate to raise it, but only through questioning. If, despite questioning, individuals don’t relate to the point, there is no benefit in pursuing as any ‘learning’ will not be theirs. A better option is for you to run another activity designed to focus more attention on this specific point. Whatever happens, don’t be tempted to provide a ‘professional analysis’ as this approach takes the ownership of the learning away from the individual.

13 – Have faith in people’s ability to learn for themselves:

Believe in the learners: they can and will make experiential learning opportunities work for them. To be an effective facilitator of experiential learning you have to believe, really believe, in others. You have to believe that they have the potential to make progress and be committed to the fact that your role is to provide opportunities for others to learn and progress.

14 – It’s about them not you:

Forget your ego. Your success is individuals capitalising on their personal learning. As an effective facilitator you have to be satisfied with the knowledge that you offer and develop opportunities for others to learn, many of which will go unused or undervalued. You have to accept that you are not offering ‘tangible and technical’ contributions and therefore will not be able to look back and say ‘I taught this person x or y’. If you’re lucky however, every now and again in the years to come you will hear of some far-reaching consequences that will go way beyond what you might have hoped or imagined.

15 – Getting Started:

Perhaps not surprisingly the best way to start is to experience facilitating – actually have a go at it: experience the process. Find a group of people who are happy to be ‘guinea pigs’ and just try a simple activity that is tried and tested. Think about the activities you’ve experienced yourself in the past. Talk to other people. Ask the potential delegates if they have ideas and preferences or recommendations.

Note:

Concept and principles of experiential learning activities article is © Martin Thompson MTA International, 2008-10.

© Alan Chapman 2008-2010.

Source:

http://www.businessballs.com/experiential_learning.htm

With an open mind and the right attitude, teachers can work together continuously improve lessons in the classroom.

HOW do we improve our daily teaching?As teachers, we work hard to prepare our lessons. We hope that every lesson will be effective and interesting, and that all our students will learn well and do well in their examinations.

We want to try out new teaching approaches, the latest technologies and the most interesting teaching aids. We want the best of everything for our students.

However, in a typical Malaysian school scenario, teachers are not just busy with teaching, but plenty of other administrative and non-teaching responsibilities. For most teachers, time is the biggest challenge.

The majority of our teachers work full time, but not everyone has the “full time” to prepare and to teach.

On top of that, it is not possible for every teacher to be competent in his content knowledge or pedagogical content knowledge for every subject that they teach, though ideally that should be the case.

Is there a platform or venue that encourages collaboration among teachers?

Lesson Study

The first time I heard about the concept of “Lesson Study” was when I attended the 9th International Congress of Mathematics Education (ICME) in Tokyo in 2000.

As part of the conference programme, all the participants were invited to observe an open lesson in some Japanese schools who were practising Lesson Study.

The open class teaching was observed by more than 50 teachers and conference participants.

It was a Primary One class with about 30 pupils. Although the whole classroom was packed with foreigner participants and local teachers, both the teacher and his pupils went as usual, undisturbed by the presence of the observers.

After the lesson, a panel made up of the teacher and four other local teachers were set up to discuss and critique the lesson taught.

I thought the lesson was well organised and effective, but most of all I was impressed by the open attitude of the teachers and the commentators.

Later, we were told that this kind of observation and sharing has become part of the Japanese school culture, and this is part of the teacher professional development process called “Lesson Study”.

There are generally five main steps in a Lesson Study cycle:

Step 1: Identify and Formulate goals

This step involves setting up a lesson study group with four to six teachers who are teaching the same subject and/or at the same level.

The main aim of the first discussion is to identify and formulate the goals that they want to achieve in the lesson study cycle.

Ideally, the group would come to a consensus with regard to the best strategies to use in order to enhance the students’ learning.

Step 2: Plan Lesson Together

The group agrees on a common agenda with regard to drawing out teachers’ knowledge and ideas of an effective lesson based on their experiences, observations of students’ abilities, as well as resources and textbooks to use.

The group meets at least three times discuss teaching ideas and problems, to draft out the lesson plan and to appoint a teacher in the group to carry out the teaching.

Subsequently, the teacher who teaches the lesson would consolidate the lesson plan, particularly the content’s coherence.

Step 3: Teach and Observe the Lesson

During this step, the teacher would carry out the actual teaching in the classroom while being observed by the members of the Lesson Study group.

The observers are there to reflect on the weaknesses of the lesson plan and should avoid helping the students.

Step 4: Reflect and Revise the Lesson Plan

After the lesson, the group would come together to reflect on the lesson that was taught in the classroom.

Such reflective collaborations are aimed at helping to overcome weaknesses of the lesson taught and to suggest alternatives solutions to tackle the problems faced.

Subsequently, the group revises the lesson plan collaboratively.

Step 5: Teaching the Revised Lesson Plan

In this step, another teacher from the group is assigned to teach the revised lesson plan in another classroom. The process of carrying out steps three and four are thus repeated.

The short term product of the Lesson Study cycle is to develop an effective and meaningful lesson plan to cater for the needs of students’ learning, while the long term goal is to help to develop teachers’ learning and their professional development.

Benefits of collaboration

Analysis and observations from the above lesson study projects in Malaysia show positive feedbacks from the participating teachers.

For example:

• Lesson study encourages the sharing of knowledge and skills and reduces the workload of lesson preparation;
• strengthens collegial support;
• encourages reflective practices;
• and enhances teachers’ content and pedagogical content knowledge through group discussions and reflections on peer teaching. Their teaching thus becomes more student centered and less teacher centered.

However, despite the enormous benefits, there remain several issues and challenges that constraint the implementation of Lesson Study. These are mainly time, commitment and administrative support.

In conclusion, Lesson Study could be an effective model of teacher professional development that provides a systematic structure which encourages collaboration and cooperation among teachers.

Through this type of collaboration, teachers are encouraged to research further their students’ thinking and the curriculum of the subject they are teaching.

Consequently, this would enhance teachers’ content and pedagogical content knowledge which eventually improves the quality of their teaching practice, which would contribute toward better student achievement.

In fact, the approach could be applied to any subject or skills that the teachers are not familiar or have difficulties with.

Despite the various issues and challenges which are inevitable with any introduction of new innovation, I strongly promote the setting up of lesson study groups as an alternative tool for teacher professional development. I hope that the collaborative culture of Lesson Study will soon become part of our Malaysian school culture.

by Assoc Prof Lim Chap Sum from The School of Educational Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia. She can be contacted through theva@usm.my.

http://thestar.com.my/education/story.asp?file=/2010/6/13/education/6400286&sec=education

Here are techniques, theory and ideas for designing and using your own role playing games, exercises and activities. Role playing games, exercises and activities help build teams, develop employee motivation, improve communications and are fun – for corporate organizations, groups of all sorts, and even children’s development. Role playing games, exercises and activities improve training, learning development, and liven up conferences and workshops. This article about role playing ideas and rules has been provided by Edward Harbour and Jill Connick of AIM Associates (Drama) Limited, a London-based specialist consultancy using drama in learning and development; will help you design and use games and exercises for training sessions, meetings, workshops, seminars or conferences, for adults, young people and children, in work, education or for clubs and social activities. Role playing games, exercises and activities can also enhance business projects, giving specific business outputs and organizational benefits. Always ensure that you exercise caution and sensitivity when using any role playing games or activities which might disturb or upset people, and take extra care when working with younger people and children.

Effective use of Role Playing in Learning.

Role playing has been around as a learning tool for a long time. Without defining it as such, many of us use role play as a basic tool of life. Whenever we project into the future in a kind of ‘what if’ scenario we are indulging in a role play of some sort, we are projecting ourselves into an imaginary situation where, though we cannot control the outcome, we can anticipate some or all of the conditions and ‘rehearse’ our performance in order to influence the outcome. Much of the time we are better for it. By way of example, you might wish to speak to your garage to raise the fact that they have still not cured the oil leak. Before doing so you might well rehearse to yourself what you intend to say. This would be a mini role play – we do it all the time because it helps.

In a learning environment role play can be a very flexible and effective tool. The tenet ‘I hear and I forget, I see and I remember, I do and I understand’ is very applicable here. Role play is often used as a way of making sense of the theory, of gathering together concepts into a practical experience. And yet, it often goes wrong. Why? Because like so many things which are simple on concept, it can become awfully complicated. If used badly in a training environment the role play tool can be ineffective and sometimes even damaging. One of the main complicating factors surrounding role play is the attitude or emotional state of the people taking part. Quite frankly, many people are nervous, even terrified, at the prospect of participating in a role play; not surprising when you hear about some people’s unfortunate role play experiences.

For the purpose of this article, role play is defined as an experience around a specific situation which contains two or more different viewpoints or perspectives. The situation is usually written as a prepared brief and the different perspectives on the same situation are handed out to the different people who will come together to discuss the situation. Each person will have a particular objective, or objectives they want to fulfil which may well be in conflict with their fellow role player or role players. It is how each role player handles the situation that forms the basis of skills practice, assessment and development. The situations will be realistic and relevant to the role players and the most successful ones will be focused on developing a particular skill or skill set. If you consider a musical analogy, each ‘player’ is involved in the same ’symphony’ but has a different score – their perspective and objective(s) – for their own ‘instrument’ – themselves as individuals – their histories.

So, how can we take the fear out of the role play experience?

Here are some guidelines that you might like to think about when planning your next session.

Role Play Objectives:

• Be very clear about what you want people to get out of the role playing experience. Muddy thinking at the outset will result in muddy outcomes. Clear thinking and role play preparation result in clear outcomes.
• Are you assessing skills or are you developing them? If you are assessing people, they need to know the competency level expected of them and the brief needs to have measurable outcomes. People also need to trust that the role play will have the same level of challenge for them and their peers. So, don’t put people through an assessment role play until you know they have reached a certain standard (through development activities and role plays).
• Are you giving everyone the same level of challenge, or are you flexing according to the level of skill demonstrated by each individual? The former is more recommended for assessment, the latter for development (see above).

Role Playing Placement – Where in the Agenda?

• In skills development programmes, trainers and facilitators often schedule a role play exercise at the end of a course, to gather in the learning, and to assess how well the participants have understood the training. Leaving it until last can cause ‘the dreaded role play’ to loom large in people’s minds, causing a negative distraction throughout the course. So instead, introduce people to the role play experience gently by holding mini role plays earlier and throughout the training. This serves a double purpose: it de-mystifies the experience so that people become more comfortable with the idea of ‘performing’ in public; and, it more fairly shows role playing to be a very good tool for rehearsing life, which is its main function.
• To illustrate the important value of role playing, here is a theatre analogy: actors spend hours rehearsing a twenty minute scene. They do it again and again to get it right; to get the behaviours and the relationships right, to make sense of the scene and to understand the issues. They get feedback in the form of notes from the director, which they will immediately apply to the work in hand. They carry on in this way until it’s perfect and the scene becomes part of them. This is not to suggest that people in learning and development situations should become actors and rehearse their life scenarios for hours on end, but the principle is the same.
• Be realistic in your ambitions for the role play. For instance, if you are teaching a complex behavioural model, break it down, rather than have people role play it in one huge chunk. Just as actors don’t rehearse a play in one huge lump, they break it down into (sometimes) tiny micro-units and rehearse until they really feel confident with each bit, so the same principles apply to any complex new skill to be learned. Being over-ambitious causes people to lose confidence in themselves and in role playing as a tool. Like any tool, role playing must be used properly or it won’t work. If you don’t have time to eventually get the participants doing the whole thing properly, in depth, with plenty of rehearsal and revisiting, then just do a part of it.

Role Play Briefing:

• Role playing can become ineffective if people are unclear about what they are supposed to do. The briefs for all sides of the role play should be unambiguous and totally in line with the objectives. Here again, any muddy thinking will have consequences. Be clear about the purpose. If you are assessing skills in a certain situation then the brief must reflect this. If you are assessing or developing behaviour, keep technicalities out of the brief. Generally, remove technical content except for the very basic information needed to particularise the culture. Otherwise, lots of technical detail provides a bolt hole for people who are skilled or pre-occupied in technicalities, when they should be focusing on structure, or process or behaviour. The exercise will keep its point and value if it avoids technical distractions.
• Role playing briefs should contain enough information for both parties to engage in a believable and relevant conversation, which should be in line with the objectives. Give as much detail as is necessary – too little and there won’t be enough to sustain a conversation, too much and people will be swamped with information, most of which they either won’t need or won’t remember.
• Avoid giving people the task of role playing attitudes alone. If you want somebody to role play an angry customer give them something to be angry about. Behaviour, like acting, is all about specifics. If you are angry with your garage about a specific oil leak and their inability to cure it, there will have been a specific chain of events that has led to your picking the phone up and complaining. It is not a general anger at everything. Role players can forget this in the heat of the moment if given open licence to just ‘be angry’; there needs to be a reason for it. A well written brief will help to keep the role play focused and on track.
• Adequate preparation time may seem obvious, but it is often overlooked in the belief that it is best to get on with it. People can be encouraged to share what they are trying to achieve with observers, so it becomes a shared, facilitative exercise rather than a battle – this will also defuse fear and tension. Again, sharing objectives will help and not ’spoil’ the role play.
• In developmental role play, the option can be given to press the pause button where people feel they are getting into difficulty. Although building up a flow in a role play has advantages, it is not a scene from a TV soap, it is a rehearsal tool. And in rehearsals, people stop and start. No-one should be expected to give a ‘performance’. Emphasising this too will dissipate people’s fear and concern.

Role Play Observation and Feedback:

• Allow the other participants to observe the role play and give their comments afterwards. Observers are hugely beneficial to the participants’ learning. How often in life do we get the opportunity to gain from such focused attention? We not only have our own response to the role play; we can also benefit from our fellow role players’ observations, and tutor’s point of view, and the feedback from the observers.
• For the observers, explain clearly what you want them to look out for. Again this should be in line with your objectives. The language of feedback is also very important. Feedback should broadly follow SMART principles (Specific, Measurable, Agreed, Realistic, Time-bound). Role play feedback should describe specific things that the observer saw and heard, relevant to the exercise and to the person(s) doing the role playing. Role play feedback should not contain subjective judgements or comments based on personal knowledge or assumptions. Feedback should be meaningful and specific – something that the role player can act on. Role play feedback isn’t helpful if it suggests that the role player should ‘get a new personality’ or ‘be nicer’. Remind participants that the purpose of the role play is for the development of the person or people doing the role play. Objectivity facilitates learning.
• The order of feedback should be participant or participants first (that way it’s untainted by others’ views; it also recruits them into their own learning experience – people ‘buy in’ more if they are themselves expressing what happened and why). If others give feedback and participant(s), wait till the end, they may feel they’ve been bombarded by a lot of ‘tell’, without initial space to compose their expression of what it was like to be inside the experience. It’s best to hear from them without the pressure of someone else’s views first which may then colour their own. It’s worth asking what went well for them and why.
• If there are professional role players involved, the role player(s) can make their comments after the participant and observers have expressed their observations. It often happens organically anyway (once you have set it up) that once the participant has formulated out loud what happened for them, the observers will start to offer their feedback and in the process will include the professional role player. It is important though that the (non-professional role player) person or persons involved in the role play go first.

Role play rules are basically simple: role plays must be focused; the objectives must be clear and understood; instructions must be clear and understood; feedback needs to be specific, relevant, achievable and given immediately. Crucial to learning and developing options of behaviour – knowing what works, what doesn’t work, the range of behaviour available to an individual – is the opportunity to go back and have another go or several goes at bits of the role play and/or the whole role play. This flexibility needs judging and managing on each occasion, so as to provide a more comfortable experience, and to double the learning value. Aside from which, when you plan and run proper role play sessions, participants will often tell you they actually enjoyed the experience; that they forgot it was a role play, and found it the most powerful learning they’ve ever experienced!

This article is provided by Edward Harbour and Jill Connick of AIM Associates (Drama) Limited, a London-based specialist consultancy using drama in learning and development, and its contribution is gratefully acknowledged. Please give similar acknowledgement when you use or pass on their methods.

Source:

http://www.businessballs.com/roleplayinggames.htm

The following are the 18 principles that every great teacher knows:

A.  Thinking and Experience:

The principles in this section are intended to help teachers (and principals) explore the understanding of thinking and experience that underlies thoughtful and democratic teaching.

1. Every great teacher makes the cultivation of thinking in a decent and humane environment the primary goal of teaching.
2. Every great teacher values and encourages student questioning because questions encourage student and teacher thought.
3. Every great teacher understands that he/she cannot afford to underestimate what is involved in “knowing something” well.
4. Every great teacher realizes that productive experience results from doing something with foresight, with a purpose in mind, then reflecting on the consequences.
5. Every great teacher recognizes that thinking is not separated from doing something with a purpose in mind; that mind in in the doing, not outside it.

B.  Teaching Objectives:

The principles below apply to the goals for student learning set by administrators, teachers, and students.

1. Every great teacher knows that the learning objectives suggest the kind of environment needed to increase the capacities of the learner.
2. Every great teacher knows that the objectives value both what is to be learned and how it is to be learned. The quality of learning is critically dependent on how the objectives is achieved.
3. Every great teacher knows that the immediate classroom objectives are made with larger, overarching aims in mind, that they free the student to attain the larger aims.
4. Every great teacher knows that most teaching objectives ought to make sense to the learner at the time of learning and that future learning is built best on what the student has already learned.

C.  Subject Matter:

The following principles pertain to the content, the subject matter, considered here apart from method for clarity.

1. Every great teacher knows that essential content is knowledge of general social significance that is relevant to all students whatever their abilities or interests.
2. Every great teacher knows that content must be related to the needs of the local and regional community. It is intended to improve the quality of future living for both the community and the individual. Content must illuminate significant social issues.
3. Every great teacher knows that content does not consist exclusively in information or data readily available in books, computers, or other media. Rather, good content is subject matter that assists learners in their inquiry and their attempt to create meaning.

D.  Teaching Method:

The principles in this section encourage teachers and principals to consider some generic indicators of quality for professional and thoughtful teaching.

1. Every great teacher recognizes that good methods means the creation of a total school/classroom environment for learning that cultivates the intelligence and sensitivities of learners ,teachers and administrators.
2. Every great teacher understands that direct attention to results for their own sake through rote learning short-circuits meaningful experience and closes down the growth of intelligence. Neither ends nor means can be hurried if one wishes to provoke thoughtful learning.
3. Every great teacher selects problems for thought and meaningful analysis that are within the experience of the learner at the learning, related to the problems of ordinary life, and require thought or reflection about the consequences of actions taken to solve the problem.
4. Every great teacher allows students to try out ideas from the curriculum in their present experience because, without this “trying out”,  ideas  do not move from the realm of the abstract or “school” to the student, personal and community life.
5. Every great teacher knows that individuals must have an opportunity to consider and shape group ends. Learning activities should support educative group work, shared experience, conversation, and individual work.
6. Every great teacher understands where a series of lessons is heading, sees the logical order of he content, and tries to relate that content to the learner’s more fluid, partial view of it.

Source: What Every Great Teacher Knows: Practical Principles for Effective Teaching, by Richard A. Gibboney and Clark D. Webb.

http://www.great-ideas.org/18prin.htm