If you’re like me, you have lots of e-mail to sort through every morning. Some e-mails bring good news, some bring additional work. We may not, however, get many e-mails that focus directly on our jobs as teachers. To remedy that situation, today I’m going to suggest a couple of on-line subscriptions to teach us new ways of reaching our students and give us something to think about.
The first resource is Faculty Focus. This newsletter is published three times a week and has a variety of topics for those in higher education. Some of the topics that are discussed are educational assessment, learning styles, distance learning, online education and more. The articles are archived on the site. The only problem with this site is that there isn’t enough time to read all of the articles that sound interesting!
The second resource is On Course. The e-mails from Skip Downing always include a teaching strategy or activity. At the main webpage, move down to the On Course Newsletter. The annual conference is highly publicized in the e-mail, too, but if you’re not interested, just move down to the activity. (The conference, by the way, is one of the best I’ve ever attended.) The activities are archived on the On Course website. They are divided into the topics of getting on course (being a good teacher and student); self-responsibility, self-motivation, self-management, interdependence, self-awareness, lifelong learning, emotional intelligence, self-esteem, and staying on course. The activities vary in complexity and effectiveness, but they will get you thinking about what you can do to engage students in the class.
If you sign up for these resources, you’ll have something to look forward to. If you find you just don’t have the time or interest in them, you can always unsubscribe.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
The Wide World of MERLOT
The online website MERLOT offers a great deal of food for the teaching (and learning) soul. MERLOT, which stands for Multimedia Educational Resource for Learning and Online Teaching, is a user-centered, peer-reviewed website that has was created to share academic technological needs. What started as a small consortium has grown into one of the best online resources for educators.
Different areas are showcased on the MERLOT website. The Pedagogy Portal and its categories of learners and learning, course design, teaching strategies, teaching challenges, and assessments all contain case studies, research, and tips for becoming a better instructor. Each category offers a great deal of information. The Online/Hybrid Courses section of the Teaching Strategies strand, for example, has links to sites that discuss how to structure effective online discussions, chats, and general tips for success.
MERLOT’s Journal of Online Learning and Teaching (JOLT) advertises that it’s had over 90,000 visits in the past year. The journal, which is a free publication, is a great resource, especially for those teaching online. Research papers, case studies, and position papers are part of the quarterly journal in addition to the themed articles. The deadline for the Fall 2010 edition is in May, so if you’re interested in sharing your experiences or research, check out JOLT.
While the showcased areas and journal provide a plethora of information for higher education instructors, the main attraction of MERLOT is the depth of information in the discipline communities. Each discipline community has links that take the educator to a site showing tutorials, collections, reference material, tips for online teaching of the subject, and more. Some of the linked websites have been reviewed by peers. Having many (455 in the English community) available links in one area can be a great timesaver when looking for new ideas.
It will take you more than one sitting to get through all of the material in MERLOT, but it is time well spent.
Different areas are showcased on the MERLOT website. The Pedagogy Portal and its categories of learners and learning, course design, teaching strategies, teaching challenges, and assessments all contain case studies, research, and tips for becoming a better instructor. Each category offers a great deal of information. The Online/Hybrid Courses section of the Teaching Strategies strand, for example, has links to sites that discuss how to structure effective online discussions, chats, and general tips for success.
MERLOT’s Journal of Online Learning and Teaching (JOLT) advertises that it’s had over 90,000 visits in the past year. The journal, which is a free publication, is a great resource, especially for those teaching online. Research papers, case studies, and position papers are part of the quarterly journal in addition to the themed articles. The deadline for the Fall 2010 edition is in May, so if you’re interested in sharing your experiences or research, check out JOLT.
While the showcased areas and journal provide a plethora of information for higher education instructors, the main attraction of MERLOT is the depth of information in the discipline communities. Each discipline community has links that take the educator to a site showing tutorials, collections, reference material, tips for online teaching of the subject, and more. Some of the linked websites have been reviewed by peers. Having many (455 in the English community) available links in one area can be a great timesaver when looking for new ideas.
It will take you more than one sitting to get through all of the material in MERLOT, but it is time well spent.
Friday, February 12, 2010
Online Lectures
I never get tired of web surfing. Some sites are time wasters, some give you new ideas, and some teach. I’d like to share some of the sites that provide lectures and instruction for different topics.
Many universities across the country have free online courses or lectures. These are usually licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution, which allows you to share and adapt the content if you attribute it the way the author has specified. The topics are varied. Do you want to learn French? You might want to sign up for an open course through the Open Learning Initiative at Carnegie Mellon. Need a little extra money? Why not design an application for the iPhone? The course from Stanford includes the video lectures, PowerPoint slides, and PDFs. It, as well as many other courses can be found on iTunes. (C-language and programming experience are prerequisites for the iPhone Apps class, but there isn’t a shortage of other, less technology-related courses!) Other universities providing entire courses or lectures include Yale, MIT (1900 courses from which to choose), UC Berkeley, and many more. Most of the videos for these courses or lectures can be downloaded from YouTube.
Another interesting source for lectures is TED, which is a nonprofit organization which focuses on Ideas Worth Spreading. Their annual conference is a bit pricey ($6,000), but you can watch many of the lectures that are inspiring, funny, informative, and worth watching. You can also subscribe to TED Talks. For those of you unfamiliar with subscribing, keep watching this blog for more information!
If you want your students to review their calculus, be inspired by a lecture, or just see what it’s like to go to MIT, you might want to guide them to one of these online lectures or courses. For those of us who never tire of learning, these courses and lectures are just what we need.
Many universities across the country have free online courses or lectures. These are usually licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution, which allows you to share and adapt the content if you attribute it the way the author has specified. The topics are varied. Do you want to learn French? You might want to sign up for an open course through the Open Learning Initiative at Carnegie Mellon. Need a little extra money? Why not design an application for the iPhone? The course from Stanford includes the video lectures, PowerPoint slides, and PDFs. It, as well as many other courses can be found on iTunes. (C-language and programming experience are prerequisites for the iPhone Apps class, but there isn’t a shortage of other, less technology-related courses!) Other universities providing entire courses or lectures include Yale, MIT (1900 courses from which to choose), UC Berkeley, and many more. Most of the videos for these courses or lectures can be downloaded from YouTube.
Another interesting source for lectures is TED, which is a nonprofit organization which focuses on Ideas Worth Spreading. Their annual conference is a bit pricey ($6,000), but you can watch many of the lectures that are inspiring, funny, informative, and worth watching. You can also subscribe to TED Talks. For those of you unfamiliar with subscribing, keep watching this blog for more information!
If you want your students to review their calculus, be inspired by a lecture, or just see what it’s like to go to MIT, you might want to guide them to one of these online lectures or courses. For those of us who never tire of learning, these courses and lectures are just what we need.
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Learning Styles: The Debate Begins
There have been many discussions about learning styles. Information about different styles and can easily be found on the Internet. Some of the learning styles include Howard Gardner’s Theory of Multiple Intelligence, the Myers-Briggs Type Inventory, and Dunn & Dunn’s Learning Style Assessment. Although the specifics of each type of learning style assessment differ, the basic idea is that there are basic differences in the ways people perceive and learn.
According to Terry O’Connor in the article “Using Learning Styles to Adapt Technology for Higher Education,” although the theories differ somewhat, there are five conclusions that seem to be constant:
• Students will learn better when using preferences in which
they're successful
• Students will be better learners when they can expand
their preferences
• When teaching accommodates various preferences, more
students will be successful.
• Teachers can construct activities that include specific
(& multiple) learning preferences
• This can be done by adding alternatives or, completing
learning cycles that incorporate all styles or, by
utilizing wholistic, complex tasks.
So do we change the way we teach? Do we need to change the way we teach? According to Daniel T Willingham, in the article “Do Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic Learners Need Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic Instruction?” in the online publication of American Educator, instruction in the various learning styles is not necessary for the following reason:
Because the vast majority of educational content is stored in
terms of meaning and does not rely on visual, auditory,
or kinesthetic memory, it is not surprising that researchers
have found very little support for the idea that offering
instruction in a child’s best modality will have a
positive effect on his learning.
I have always tried to get my students to adapt their own learning to their Intelligence, often without success. I also try to change the way I teach, and have succeeded to some extent some days, but have failed miserably on others. I think we tend to be a lecture-listen society, reverting back to the way we were taught. We as college instructors may find it difficult to change our approaches to meet the style of our students.
We may also believe that changing our style to fit our students' learning styles is not necessary.
What’s your opinion? Let’s discuss this issue either in the comments area below, or on the EPCC Faculty Development Facebook page.
See you next week!
According to Terry O’Connor in the article “Using Learning Styles to Adapt Technology for Higher Education,” although the theories differ somewhat, there are five conclusions that seem to be constant:
• Students will learn better when using preferences in which
they're successful
• Students will be better learners when they can expand
their preferences
• When teaching accommodates various preferences, more
students will be successful.
• Teachers can construct activities that include specific
(& multiple) learning preferences
• This can be done by adding alternatives or, completing
learning cycles that incorporate all styles or, by
utilizing wholistic, complex tasks.
So do we change the way we teach? Do we need to change the way we teach? According to Daniel T Willingham, in the article “Do Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic Learners Need Visual, Auditory, and Kinesthetic Instruction?” in the online publication of American Educator, instruction in the various learning styles is not necessary for the following reason:
Because the vast majority of educational content is stored in
terms of meaning and does not rely on visual, auditory,
or kinesthetic memory, it is not surprising that researchers
have found very little support for the idea that offering
instruction in a child’s best modality will have a
positive effect on his learning.
I have always tried to get my students to adapt their own learning to their Intelligence, often without success. I also try to change the way I teach, and have succeeded to some extent some days, but have failed miserably on others. I think we tend to be a lecture-listen society, reverting back to the way we were taught. We as college instructors may find it difficult to change our approaches to meet the style of our students.
We may also believe that changing our style to fit our students' learning styles is not necessary.
What’s your opinion? Let’s discuss this issue either in the comments area below, or on the EPCC Faculty Development Facebook page.
See you next week!
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