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[concerned_parent]

As a new contributor to the forum, I received several suggestions for my personal improvement. Many studies are also available on high performance teaching, balance between teaching & research, and how communities want the colleges to deliver. My questions are:

How do professors uncover their areas of improvement? How does a new faculty find out what is norm?

[big_giant_head]

CP, since this seems like it might be a genuine question, and may God forgive me for any kittens who lose their lives due to my answer,

New faculty usually learn about teaching during their graduate school careers.  Some people are have the kind of Teaching Assistantships wherein they run discussion or lab sections, some serve as paper graders, and others have full responsibility for designing and teaching their own classes (in English departments, the latter is the norm). 

We learn what is expected of us by attending classes called "colloquia" in which a faculty mentor provides instruction (and in my case, a massive reading list) on writing syllabi, setting up course policies, designing assignments, classroom management, etc.  We learn far, far more about teaching by sitting in pubs late into the night and bouncing ideas and anecdotes off of each other.

As time passes, we get better at it.  We share the responsibilities for mentoring new grad students.  We begin to develop the kind of judgment and experience that lets us know what kinds of teaching strategies work for us, for our particular fields, and for our types of students.

Where I work now, the Dean comes to observe us in the classroom one time each semester for our first three years.  One time, each semester.  We do get feedback, and some of it is helpful.  For those first three years, we also have students evaluate every single course we teach.  Some of what they say is helpful.  Much of it is not. 

Just about every college instructor and professor I know is constantly, constantly working on improving his or her teaching methods.  We tinker with our assignments all the time.  We try out different strategies in our classrooms.  We do something new and then ask the students how well they think it worked for them, and then we compare those student answers to their performance on tests and papers and then we decide for ourselves what worked and what didn't.

We are self-evaluating at all times, all semester long, every semester.  If something works, the next semester goes better.  If it doesn't, we try a different strategy.  That is how we uncover our own areas that need improvement.

[gourmetless]

Student replies on evaluations are often not very helpful, because they see only a small part of the larger plan.  They are also focused on their own performance, rather than the discipline standards the professors are taught to uphold.  Students have different yardsticks than professors, who have different yardsticks than administrators.

I would also add the best feedback from students I get is the last day of class, when I ask what was helpful readings, what was not.  What were helpful projects/assignments, what were not.  What did you want more of?  Less of?  Why?

[concerned_parent]

Big:

Thanks. This is what I thought happens. My next question is how effectively this process works?

-many posts are by struggling English and History faculty?
-several post are on grading
-several posts are on lack of student preparation
etc.

My motivation is to understand what really happens....why there is a gap between what should be (your narration) vs what really is (many posts).

If student and administrators comments don't help, what can help?



 

[gourmetless]

Reminder:  This is a forum for professors to talk to one another about the issues which affect us in our sometimes-thought-to-be-perfect-by-the-misinformed-but which-is-really-like-any-other-soap-opera workplace.

[concerned_parent]

I am a potential future teacher and therefore, I qualify to be on this chat. Other parents may or may not consider to be professors, that is their choice.

If my post offends someone, bring it to the attention of moderator.

Thank you.

[gourmetless]

I am not offended.  Merely bringing up the point that these fora are meant for complaining about problems and sharing potential solutions, so one shouldn't be surprised to see that here.

[big_giant_head]

Further, CP, you should realize that there are a higher proportion of complaining English and History professors here because those departments tend to supply a higher proportion of professors, period.  English departments, specifically, are almost always among the largest departments on any campus.  There has to be a lot of us to cover the thousands of sections of Comp I and II that everyone has to take. 

[conjugate]

I learned how to teach by being given a book and a course outline and a two-day orientation lecture; I prepared and gave an example lecture on the second day.  Then they left me alone until the end of the semester.

Not a good method; it worked with me (I pride myself on good teaching when I have the time to put into it, and make the time when I can) but the school preferred to produce researchers, to whom they said, in essence, "Sorry, but you'll probably have to teach too."

Oddly, a lot of good teachers came out of this sink-or-swim process.  In part, graduate students were used as revenue sources, so a poor teacher was more likely not to be reappointed than a good teacher with uncertain grades. 

My answer to your quiz is "none of the above"; I improve my teaching by observing student reactions and outcomes, and spending more time on material that quiz and homework scores indicate was not properly learned the first time through.  I try different approaches to teaching the material, and different ways to explain how things work.  These ways come and go as I look for something that will fit the class of that particular semester.

Does that answer your question?

[cc_alan]

My answer to your quiz is "none of the above"; I improve my teaching by observing student reactions and outcomes, and spending more time on material that quiz and homework scores indicate was not properly learned the first time through.  I try different approaches to teaching the material, and different ways to explain how things work.  These ways come and go as I look for something that will fit the class of that particular semester.

Does that answer your question?

I'm going to jump in with a "heck yes" on the bolded part above. I have learned so much over the years by paying attention to the students. I still remember one eval comment from a student who commented on my taking notes on students' responses and how s/he had never seen that done before.

My material is probably far more scripted than yours, conjugate, because of the material. First year chemistry lends itself to building up the material in each section and while it can change from class-to-class because of students questions and my perception on how they are doing, the major components of each lecture don't typically vary ginormously from section-to-section.

Over the years, I've adjusted and tweaked (hey... none of that, now) the material to anticipate students' questions and difficulties with the course material.

Student: "What happens if <insert question and advanced idea>?"

Me: "If you hold on to that question for a bit, I think you'll get your answer from the later material. Once we get to that concept, I'll check with you to see if it answered your question."

Alan

[sagit]

My answer to your quiz is "none of the above"; I improve my teaching by observing student reactions and outcomes, and spending more time on material that quiz and homework scores indicate was not properly learned the first time through.  I try different approaches to teaching the material, and different ways to explain how things work.  These ways come and go as I look for something that will fit the class of that particular semester.

Does that answer your question?

I'm going to jump in with a "heck yes" on the bolded part above. I have learned so much over the years by paying attention to the students. I still remember one eval comment from a student who commented on my taking notes on students' responses and how s/he had never seen that done before.

I wish I could take notes on students comments in class.  I feel like I just don't have the mental flexibility to take all the notes I would want to take and to continue facilitating the discussion.  Though, maybe I could while they are in small group work... I should try that.  Thanks for the idea :)

On this same note, to improve my teaching, I am constantly trying to find new ways of creating activities and assignments which will develop the conceptual understanding I'm looking for.  Each semester I seem to get closer to my goals with my students yet still find ways that they are not reaching their full potential.  Though... sometimes I wonder if my goals are attainable within a 1 semester course.  And yet, mine is the last course they'll have on this topic... Sigh.

[educator1]

CP,

This is a good forum to ask this question because, by its very nature, these are teachers who care, as demonstrated by their participation in these fora.
In the general population of faculty, however, I am afraid that conjugate's experience is repeated rather often

I learned how to teach by being given a book and a course outline and a two-day orientation lecture; I prepared and gave an example lecture on the second day.  Then they left me alone until the end of the semester.

Not a good method; it worked with me (I pride myself on good teaching when I have the time to put into it, and make the time when I can) but the school preferred to produce researchers, to whom they said, in essence, "Sorry, but you'll probably have to teach too."

Teaching is rarely, in my experience in R1 institutions, part of the tenure and promotion process. Those TT professors who really care about teaching and really try to improve year to year are to be celebrated! They are not that rare, but in my experience, are not an overwhelming majority, either.

I am thrilled to read Big Giant Head's response. I am glad to see that happening. However, I have observed that our new TT hires are overwhelmed in the classroom and rarely have a clue as to what to do but repeat what they remember of their own education. Our Graduate school, just this year, started a seminar to prepare newly minted Phd's for the academic profession. It is 80% research and grant writing and 20% teaching oriented. Unfortunately faculty, departments, and universities (at least at R1 institutions) are rated and valued primarily according to the quality of the research, not so much on the quality of the teaching.

To answer your questions. I also listen to my students and, haven given up on ever improving our student evaluation system, conduct my own evaluations using our on-line survey system for my students approximately one third through the semester. I ask them very specific questions regarding classroom activities, resources that I have provided for them, and their current understanding of the material. They have been very helpful in their responses and this allows me to make mid-course corrections (yes, there are the dim-wits who give meaningless responses, but there are a small minority which I ignore).

I have been working with my department to share ideas and standardize the material covered and assessments utilized in our multi-section introductory and intermediate courses (I teach statistics) so that students don't play one teacher against another.

I try to stay somewhat current with developments in pedagogy and participate in the seminars provided by our Instructional Advancement department, which are  way too few and far between and never touch tho faculty that really need them.

[inorganic_bz]

Some classroom improvement is borrowed from other teachers.  I sat in on a statistics class one year (since I had never formally taken a stat class as an undergraduate) and the instructor used many group activities.  I saw that the students were interacting together and teaching each other.  They were also developing interpersonal skills while learning statistics.  I started using more group activities in my own class (almost every other lecture) and I feel like it helped my students become more responsible for their own learning.

Another example is a teacher in our department has started using "clickers" to help get student responses in each class.  Using this approach, each student is responsible for paying attention and responding to questions during lecture. This is much better than the old "raise your hand if you think it's true," method. He has talked me into trying it in the spring and if it's valuable then I will have a new weapon in my teaching arsenal.

Other improvement just comes through experience. I used to post a grade sheet in my classroom.  I noticed that after every new post students congregated around it at the beginning of class and this distracted me and the other students and wasted time.  Now, I just post the updated grade sheets outside of my office.  This is something I just had to learn, and there are many other examples of little improvements like this that you make every time you teach a class.

Finally, let me say that I feel like it's important that a teacher (at any institution) to stay active in research in their chosen field. Of course, depending on your institution's focus you will always have to adjust the percent of time you devote to research vs. teaching.  I think that doing some research always improves teaching.  It energizes you, excites you, and changes you from a "talker" into a "teacher."

[cc_alan]

My answer to your quiz is "none of the above"; I improve my teaching by observing student reactions and outcomes, and spending more time on material that quiz and homework scores indicate was not properly learned the first time through.  I try different approaches to teaching the material, and different ways to explain how things work.  These ways come and go as I look for something that will fit the class of that particular semester.

Does that answer your question?

I'm going to jump in with a "heck yes" on the bolded part above. I have learned so much over the years by paying attention to the students. I still remember one eval comment from a student who commented on my taking notes on students' responses and how s/he had never seen that done before.

I wish I could take notes on students comments in class.  I feel like I just don't have the mental flexibility to take all the notes I would want to take and to continue facilitating the discussion.  Though, maybe I could while they are in small group work... I should try that.  Thanks for the idea :)

I rarely do detailed notes because as you wrote, it could pull you away from the current work in the classroom. It's usually a few words-

"xxx doesn't seem to work well... try something different"

"alter order of presentation to emphasize xxx"

"remember to ask about xxx next time"

My comments become more focused the more I work on a topic. I teach one class 6 times a year and at least once every term (quarter system). Since I'm finishing my 10th year as a ft instructor, my comments are now pretty specific for that course. On the other hand, there are two other courses that I teach only twice a year so there are some areas in each course that still need a lot of work and my comments for those areas (typically the concepts in the last half of the course) tend to encompass more material.

I typically spend more prep time on the initial material of the course in th beginning. This means that the later material is far less polished, but each term I focus on material that comes later in the term.

That was a bit of rambling... sorry...

Alan

[glowdart]

Part of improvement comes from sheer repetition, also.  At some point, after a decade or two of practice, you get better.  (I have to hope, I have to hope, I have to hope!) 

I tend to be a constant tweaker -- changing readings based on what's going on the in the world, what's working or not with each successive class of student, what they tell me that they have read before, etc.   I constantly change up assignments to find things that work. 

I'm lucky that I work with a ton of other colleagues who all talk openly and freely about teaching.  We're all constantly discussing what works and what doesn't, swapping assignments, observing each other, etc.