Education Commons^™

The Virtual University: Lessons From A Virtual Cross-Cultural Learning Situation In International Management, Mikael Søndergaard, Jeanette Lemmergaard, Paul Donnelly, Marta B. Cálas

Conference papers

This paper addresses some issues regarding virtual learning and the future of traditional universities. Specifically, it considers these issues by reflecting on the following: First, it focuses on the repercussions of information technologies for teaching and learning in "cross-cultural" courses. It critically assesses, via three recent examples, how these approaches influence teaching and learning in the context of international management courses. Second, drawing from the above examples, the paper reflects more broadly on the implications of these technologies: (1) for new forms of knowing and knowledge production; and (2) for the future of institutional conditions of universities.

Assessing Preservice Teachers’ Concerns And Comforts With Multicultural Education, Carmen Montecinos, Francisco Rios

Woodring College of Education Faculty Publications

Currently, racial/ethnic minority students represent a third of the K­12 student enrollment across the United States; by the year 2035, they will represent over 50 percent (American Educational Research Association, Division K Newsletter, 1998). This significant increase in the ethnic diversity of the K­12 population, coupled with persistent disparities in educational attainment among various ethnic/racial groups in the United States, has supported an educational reform movement known as multicultural education (Banks, 1997). This movement’s goal is to redesign schooling in ways that "increase educational equity for a range of cultural, ethnic, and economic groups" (Banks, 1997, p. 7). Teacher …

Sabbatical Leave Report, Kent Redmon

Sabbaticals

No abstract provided.

Nefdc Exchange, Volume 9, Number 2, Spring 1999, New England Faculty Development Consortium

NEFDC Exchange

Contents

Developing New and Junior Faculty Careers - Mary Deane Sorcinelli. University of Massachusetts, Amherst

From the President - Susan J. Pasquale, Harvard Medical School

2nd Annual NEFDC Faculty Development Roundup May 26, 1999 Keene State College, Keene, New Hampshire

Review: Two very different books of teaching cases - Jeffrey Halprin, Nichols College

Board of Directors

Tractatus Pedagogico Peripateticus (The Walk Of Future Learning), Daniel James Macneil

Master's Capstone Projects

Our understanding of human learning has been greatly improved by recent research findings from the fields of cognitive science, neurobiology, organizational studies, anthropology, linguistics, and evolutionary psychology. Despite all that is known, however, the majority of formal schools in the world operate much as they did 50 years ago. The pedagogy and the structure of the educational experience still reflect industrial age assumptions that are increasingly anachronistic in the modern knowledge production economy and in the post-modern cultural arena. Given the paucity of examples, it is difficult to visualize the characteristics of a future learning society - a society that …

Web Accessories For Introductory Economics At The University Of Massachusetts, Nancy Folbre

Economics Department Faculty Publications Series

This is a brief description of two websites that were developed to supplement introductory economics courses.

Transforming Experiences: The Benefits Of Intellectual Risk, John Strassburger

Publications

This is the fourth in a series of occasional papers about the challenges confronting students and what Ursinus is doing to help them enter adult life.

Critical Thinking Requires Critical Questioning, Karen J. Thoms

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Just what is a critical thinker? According to Richard Paul (1990), a critical thinker is someone who is able to think well and fair mindedly about his or her own beliefs and viewpoints as well as those which are diametrically opposed. The critical thinker does not just think about these beliefs and viewpoints, but explores and appreciates their adequacy, cohesion, and reasonableness. Attitudes and passions are included. To become a critical thinker is not to be the same person you are now, but only with better abilities; it is to become a different person (page iii).

Critical thinking is expected …

Are We Going To Cyberspace, Or Is This Just Another Trip To Abilene?, William K. Jackson

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

The costs of technology are high, and the options for its use are varied. In order to avoid arriving at a technological Abilene, we must continually ask and answer the question "what ought we do with technology?" and not "what can we do with technology?" Purpose must lead deployment. Otherwise, we risk expending great efforts and scarce resources to produce the educational equivalent of "Thank you for calling, press 1 if you. . ."

Interdisciplinary Teaching And Learning, Deborah Dezure

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Interdisciplinary initiatives are proliferating throughout higher education at an unprecedented rate (Edwards, 1996; Gaff and Ratcliff, 1997; Klein, 1996). They can be found in general education, replacing and augmenting distribution requirements; in emerging disciplines, such as cultural and gender studies, environmental studies, and neuroscience; in new curricular designs, such as learning communities, capstone courses, and service learning; and in the new pedagogies, such as collaborative learning, discovery and problembased learning, and the use of technology, particularly the Internet for instruction.

If we want our students to engage in complex intellectual tasks to integrate the insights of different disciplines, then lets …

Learning Outside The Box: Making Connections Between Co-Curricular Activities And The Curriculum, Myra S. Wilhite, Elizabeth A. Banset

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Students have much to gain from the integration of co-curricular activities into the curriculum. In out-of-class experiences, students tend to take greater responsibility for their own learning; they learn from one another as well as their instructors. In addition, cocurricular activities promote personal growth, physical and mental health, academic achievement, social and cultural awareness, and help students formulate short- and long-range goals.

Successful co-curricular programs encourage the development of friendships, a sense of belonging, enhanced intellectual awareness, improved academic performance, an appreciation of different perspectives, and close interaction with faculty and staff members who really care about students.

Listening In The Classroom: A Two-Way Street, Elisa Carbone

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Listening to our students creates a supportive environment in which students feel respected. If students feel respected and valued, they will be less afraid to ask questions, express opinions, and share insights; and they will be more likely to listen to each other during discussions. This is an environment conducive to the enhancement of learning.

It is well worth taking the time to teach students how to improve their listening habits. Let them know about the differential between thought speed and speech speed. Encourage them to do mental summaries of your lecture while you re speaking. Have them act out …

The Nature Of Expertise: Implication For Teachers And Teaching, Ronald A. Smith, Richard G. Tiberius

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

How do teachers become experts at teaching-at helping their students become experts? In a culture dependent on high performance, teachers need to understand the nature of the expertise that their students want to acquire as well as the nature of their own expertise. How we view expertise determines the goals we set for our students, as well as the standards we use to inform and measure our own development as experts in teaching.

The Uses Of Uncertainty In The College Classroom, Virginia S. Lee

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Psychological research has corroborated the importance of uncertainty to learning at the psychophysiological level. Recent studies in brain dynamics have demonstrated that the brain manifests an inherent variability that increases with the presentation of new stimuli. This psychophysiological uncertainty plays a significant catalytic role in learning, It opens up the organism to experience, causing it to investigate the environment with enhanced receptivity, preparing it for different behavioral actions, and facilitating the central processing and encoding of information received from such renewed exploration. Searching, exploring, and trial-and-error behaviors indicate psychophysiological uncertainty and accompany the appearance of reorganization, stability, and progressive development …

Class In The Classroom, Lee Warren

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Class is an often invisible form of difference. Yet it is there all the time, affecting how and what students learn at every turn. It pervades the values and the purposes of colleges and universities. It contributes to determining the courses offered and the books read and discussed. Still, it is a diversity issue rarely acknowledged.