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Month: November 2017

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Published on 3 Comments on My (short) Take on “Ban the Laptops”

This might be shorter post than usual (and it is not as nuanced as many who have written on this topic), as I am still recovering from an illness. But I was inspired to write today after this weekend another riff against laptops in the classroom was circulating on social media after Susan Dynarski posted this op ed in The New York Times.

If you look at the image above ^ you will **gasp** see actual laptops in the classroom. You will also see students not looking at me, but at the laptop and each other, as they engage in an activity meant to get them looking and conversing and analyzing and interpreting in my art history class from last spring. This particular day they were asked to analyze Etruscan tombs - only the images in  Powerpoint - on their laptops and offer commentary to the whole class after some time to view their images. It was a great class that could not have been done if I banned laptops from the classroom.

The face-to-face time we get with students is precious. It should be valued and used as effectively as possible. I believe that using your entire time in the classroom to lecture at students is squandering that precious time.  I do not believe that with the technology that we now have available that this precious time should ONLY be used to tell students things.

That is NOT to say that all lecturing is bad. It is not.  I have always believed that SOME lecturing is ok, if also balanced with efforts to enhance the living, vibrant, face-to-face learning situations, that precious time when we have students with us in the same space that we occupy. I do not believe in "ban all lectures!" nor do I believe in "ban all technology!" What I do believe is engaging students. It is our responsibility to do so as educators. I know that is a dangerous, even contentious statement. I don't understand how it could be. We are educators. We educate. Students learn best when they are engaged in the material.

So, shouldn't we work, in all ways, to educate ourselves in how to best engage our students? There are so many options. Flipped class? Hybrid class? Discussion prompts? Twitter or other online questioning tools? Spend time experimenting and finding ways to engage your students. If you're honest with them about a new experiment you are trying, they will most likely work with you.

But don't blame them if they open up a laptop because you are doing nothing but reciting material that they could get elsewhere. Be honest: don't you do that yourself in meetings in which someone is professing to you about something or other?

A reminder that I give workshops and speak about active learning and this blog posts is all about active learning in higher education settings.

Published on Leave a comment on Active Learning Example: Diocletian’s Tetrarchy

Today I’d like to write about a specific activity in hopes that it might encourage other faculty members to think about how to present material to students that get them actively engaged in the topic, rather than passively listening to a lecture. This is not to say that lecturing is bad; only that there are other ways to present material to engage students and keep them at the edge of their seat.

In my Roman Art and Architecture class, we must cover the Tetrarchy, which was a “Rule of Four,” instituted by the Emperor Diocletian when the Empire was divided in half and two rulers were chosen to rule both halves.  Diocletian built a palace in modern-day Croatia, Split, and it reflected the idea of the Tetrarchy’s rule by four.

Instead of showing the palace and telling them about it, I introduce the idea of the Tetrarchy as a political system, and we talk about how equality and similarity were two important concepts that had to be embraced in order for the rule by four to work. This all comes from a wonderful book Art Forms and Civic Life in the Late Roman Empire by L’Orange that I still remember – and use – from my graduate school days. But I have adapted that book and the ideas engendered in it for my current students and active engagement.

After this brief introduction, the students are sorted into groups. They are given a sheet that describes the Tetrarchy briefly and then they are given this charge:

You are architects for the Emperor Diocletian who desires a new palace to be built that will express the ideas of the Tetrarchy. You must design a plan for a palace, sketch it out onto a large piece of paper, and present your plan to the emperor (the class), explaining how your plan represents the ideas of the Tetrarchy.

It is interesting to me that each time I use this assignment, which I have run about three times since I developed it, the plans are very different. I suppose it should not be surprising, since the students are different and all bring their own notions and ideas to the table when they meet over this in-class assignment. It is not meant to be a research assignment, but rather one in which they are applying information to demonstrate to me that they are grappling with or understanding the concepts. Sometimes the plans don’t adhere to the concepts at all – and we talk about that when the plans are presented at the end of the class period. But often some come close to the idea of equality and similarity in the palace itself, a photo of which is here:

During their final exam period in which the students are asked in part to reflect on their experience and learning in the course, I ask them this question: “I tried to offer you a multitude of learning activities this semester. Which one or ones do you think helped you learn the most? Why? Please explain.” Two students chose this day’s activity as the one that helped them the most after I used it this past spring 2017 semester. My guess is they’ll likely remember it a lot longer, too.

What class you could turn over to students to figure out, rather than just telling them the answer?

Published on Leave a comment on For the Coaches

I have wanted to write a piece for McDaniel College Green Terror Football team coaches for awhile. Now that the season is over, I think it’s a good time to do so.

I am amazed at how hard all of them work: the head coach, the position coaches, the assistant coaches. I don’t fully understand the hierarchy there, but I do know they all work super hard to get the best out of the students on the field, while they simultaneously emphasize the need to keep to the books and graduate.

Our record this year was 3-7, which was the record as last season. But don’t let that record fool you: they are not the same team.

They are much more poised and focused. They play very much more as a unit than I saw in any game in the 2016 season. Their Twitter hashtag, #AsOne, is felt and expressed by all. The refrain I heard at training camp: “Do Your Job!” was taken to heart by the players and they did that for the most part.

There were some key injuries. But there always are.

Yet, the Coaches kept getting them back into it, keeping student/players’ eyes both on the next game as well as reminding them about classes. It’s a really tough balancing act, and one I would have no idea how to achieve.

That is why when some of my colleagues and friends jokingly call me “Coach McKay,” I wince.

Because I am not a coach. I do not know the first thing about coaching. I am still smarting over the loss at Franklin and Marshall, and that was Week 3!! I am still learning the mentoring gig; coach I am not.

Now the Coaches go onto the next phase of their operation: recruiting. The amount of time and commitment this part of their job requires is immense, which hardly anyone understands, particularly faculty. Last year, I contacted the Coach after the last game of the season, naively thinking that he would have all the time in the world now that the season was over. How wrong I was! He and the other coaches will now be on the road until the winter break. In January, they host busloads of potential student/players on campus, many of whom they saw in high school games every Friday night of the regular season. They then have a bit of a lull before March and “spring ball” starts. Then prepare for camp to start in August! It took me awhile, but now I get the drill.

So, this post is for the Green Terror Coaches. Their support of me has been wonderful and I want to send the same to them.  Go get us some great players, and thank you for all you do! I will be holding down the fort, meeting with the guys to make sure they finish the semester strong.

From a grateful faculty mentor, thank you, coaches, for all that you do!

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Published on 4 Comments on So, You Don’t Want To Look Stupid?

This summer there was an article in Inside Higher Ed about an anthropological study about why faculty do not always want to embrace innovative teaching methods: they do not want to appear to look stupid in front of their students.

I can understand this. Of course I don’t want to look stupid in front of my students, either. I have posted on this blog before about being wrong and how to handle questions I don't know.

But I think there is a way to re-frame this. If something goes wrong in the classroom - if we do try something new - and it doesn't work out, can't we explain the failure as part of the risk of growing? That things don’t always go right? That, to me, is modeling what I want my students to do: Take Risks! Try that new course you know nothing about!

Last fall, I tried a completely new experiment by taking my introductory survey course and making it a blended class, half online and half face to face. I spent the first day of the class explaining why I was doing it: what I have learned from study of literature on technology and education, on student pressures to graduate on time, and my own experiences teaching in an online environment. They listened and were glad I tried something new. There was a point mid-semester where one part of the course was NOT going well and we had to have a conversation and a correction. They appreciated that, too. Did that make me look stupid? I don’t think so.

Shouldn’t we work to model those very traits that we want students to embrace?

I hear all the time that our students at my college aren’t “risk-takers.” They are not “gritty” enough. They need more “resilience.” We need to have them try new things. I posted about the grit and resilience factor about the college football players that I teach, mentor and watch on the field. They definitely take risks every day.

How often do we as faculty try new things and risk?

I take risks often because I also have discovered through talking to my students, having focus groups with them, and reading the scholarship of teaching and learning, that my students learn more through active learning. The minority of students, I find, learn from lecture-only note-taking. I’m not bashing that method; I am just not content to know that only about 8-10% of my class (if that) learns well that way. If I can get more people learning more consistently and deeply if I change my methods, then I am going to do that. Because it makes for better classrooms and learning. And that is my job: to teach students.

As a result, might I look stupid in front of my students? Maybe. But even if I do, I seem to earn more respect from them because when I explain why I am doing it, they know I’m changing things up for them.

But that makes me human, too. And since one of my goals in every class is to make my class a community, I will continue to take risks in front of my students, letting them know I am doing it, so when I tell them to do it, I can say: I’ve done it, too.

For faculty reading this, why not leave a comment, telling us about the last time you took a risk in the classroom. Or, if you're reticent to do so, why?

 

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