Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Simple And Effective Methods For Talking About Teaching, Steffen Wilson, Katherine Kipp

Steffen Wilson

Traditionally, college teaching has been an individual endeavor. An instructor prepares her course without the assistance of colleagues, delivers course material without feedback from peers, assigns grades without the guidance of others, and handles problems as they arise on her own. There is something secure and sacred about this privatization of teaching, and we often are uncomfortable opening up this area of our professional lives to others. The opposite is true for our scholarship; we feel uncomfortable moving forward on a research project without long discussions with our colleagues, seeking their input and opinions on the numerous aspects of research.