Higher Education and Teaching Commons^™

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.

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 …

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.

Data Warehousing Failures: Case Studies And Findings, M. Dean Fenton, M. E. Haywood, Joseph Gregory Gerard, L. E. Gonzalez, Hugh J. Watson

Faculty Research at Morehead State University

Eight studies of data warehousing failures are presented. They were written based on interviews with people who were associated with the projects. The extent of the failure varies with the organization, but in all cases, the project was at least a disappointment. Read the cases and prepare a one or two page discussion of the following: 1. What’s the scope of what can be considered a data warehousing failure? Discuss. 2. What generalizations apply across the cases? 3. What do you find most interesting in the failure stories? 4. Do they provide any insights about how a failure might be …

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. . ."

Confocal Microscopy Of Plant Cells, Carol L. Wymer, Alison F. Beven, Kurt Boudonck, Clive W. Lloyd

Faculty Research at Morehead State University

The increasing availability of confocal microscopy has begun a revolution in plant biology in which microscopy has again become a powerful tool for understanding structure and function. Examples of applications include: three dimensional (3D) reconstruction of the interphase microtubule array in large vacuolated epidermal cells (1); measuring cytoplasmic free calcium changes in whole maize coleoptile segments in response to phototropic and gravitropic stimuli (2); and studying symplastic phloem connections in intact Arabidopsis roots (3). The major reason for this revolution is the ability to collect clear images in three dimensions due to the lack of image degradation caused by out-of-focus …

Some Methodological Concerns When Estimating The Size Of Organizing Activities, Eric Swank, John D. Clapp

Faculty Research at Morehead State University

Researchers and organizers recognize that social movements experience periods of inception, expansion, and decline. Although the movement literature is laden with numerous theoretical formulations on this topic, there are few articles that overtly address the issue of data collection. This paper addresses this methodological issue in detail. In doing so, we use previous media research and two case studies to illustrate the problems associated with the most frequently used data sources of event size. Finally, the paper suggests several research strategies that might enhance the accuracy of those studies that try to trace the protest cycles of community organizing efforts.

Volume 12, Number 01, Don Forrester Editor

Reaching Through Teaching

Full text of Volume 12, Number 01 of Reaching Through Teaching.

Regional Disparities In Kentucky Academic Index Scores, Edward B. Reeves, Harold Harty

Faculty Research at Morehead State University

Recent newspaper articles by columnist Bill Bishop in the Lexington Herald-Leader point to persistent regional disparities in achievement in Kentucky public schools. In spite of a mandate to create educational equality, the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA) has not eliminated inequalities in school performance scores and the problem may even be getting worse according to Mr. Bishop. The objective of the present study is to determine what disparities exist among Kentucky’s eight Service Center Regions. The analysis uses school Academic Index scores, from 1992-93 to 1996-97, averaged by region. The regional averages (or means) are compared descriptively along with the …

Volume 11, Number 02, Lana Wachniak Editor

Reaching Through Teaching

Full text of Volume 11, Number 02 of Reaching Through Teaching.

Do Contextual Effects Bias Kentucky School District Accountability Index Scores?, Edward B. Reeves

Faculty Research at Morehead State University

Kentucky’s system of high-stakes accountability raises the question: Should teachers and school administrators be held accountable for student test results if the scores are influenced by external factors over which these educators have no control? The goal of the present study is to investigate if such external factors, or “contextual effects,” bias the accountability index scores. The issue is important because school districts, schools, and educators should be assessed in a fair manner. The focus of the study is on the Kentucky school district accountability index scores for the 1992-94 and 1994-96 biennia. District scores, rather than school scores, were …

Problem-Based Learning: Preparing Students To Succeed In The 21st Century, Barbara J. Duch, Deborah E. Allen, Harold B. White Iii

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

College graduates who can think critically, solve complex problems, communicate clearly, and work effectively in teams will be prepared for the challenges of the 21st century. Problem-based learning (PBL) helps students develop these crucial skills.

Keys To Using Learning Groups Effectively, Larry K. Michaelsen

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Irrespective of such factors as subject matter and class size, small group work can produce positive motivational and learning outcomes. The key is appropriately managing the variables discussed in this essay.

Adding Online Computer Methods To Your Repertoire Of Teaching Strategies, Nancy A. Diamond

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

On-line teaching methods offer interesting strategies for teaching whatever you already want to teach. This essay describes a broad range of on-line methods and details the elements necessary for their optimal use.

Relating Student Experience To Courses And The Curriculum, Virginia S. Lee

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

This essay offers a rationale for incorporating students’ personal experience into the curriculum and techniques for doing so to facilitate both cognitive and affective curricular objectives.

The Critical Match Between Motivation To Learn And Motivation To Teach, Ronald Teeples, Harvey Wichman

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Student motives to learn cannot be effectively understood as something independent of prevailing pedagogies, which are shaped by motives to teach. The authors discuss bringing these two aspects of motivation into closer congruence.

Developing A Philosophy Of Teaching Statement, Nancy Van Note Chism

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Suggestions are presented for preparing a statement about one’s philosophy of teaching in relationship to the preparation of a teaching portfolio. Included are ideas on developing several common components of such statements.

Writing To Learn, Judith Kalman, Calvin Kalman

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

The authors explain a technique that discourages the viewing of material as an agglomeration of disembodied facts and fosters students’ awareness of the concepts underlying the topics being discussed.

Volume 11, Number 01, Lana Wachniak Editor

Reaching Through Teaching

Full text of Volume 11, Number 01 of Reaching Through Teaching.

Can Games Help Develop Mathematical Thinking?, Dilshad Ashraf, Habib Hussain, Abdul Ghafoor, Dulshon Shamatov

Book Chapters / Conference Papers

No abstract provided.

Academic Civility Begins In The Classroom, Roger G. Baldwin

Professional and Organizational Development Network in Higher Education: Archives

Values and traditions supporting academic civility are learned in the classroom. This essay discusses the role of the college professor in promoting civil discourse and nurturing overall academic civility.

Taking Instruction Online: The Art Of Delivery, Donna R. Everett

Faculty Research at Morehead State University

The notion that people seek to make meaning out of their world, whether it is the classroom or the living room, is not a new one. Educational philosophers and learning theorists have attempted to explain how learners learn and construct meaning from instruction or the classroom. Stimulus-response theorists (Thorndike, Guthrie, Pavlov—as cited in Hilgard & Bower, 1966; Watson, 1960; and Skinner, 1960) view learners as reactive, passive robots only responding when stimulated by something outside of themselves. Reese & Overton (1970) propose to call this the mechanistic world view—any change in the learners comes from outside of themselves. Organismic theorists …

The Status Of Faculty Professional Service And Academic Outreach In New England, Sharon Singleton, Cathy Burack, Deborah Hirsch

New England Resource Center for Higher Education Publications

In 1994 the New England Resource Center for Higher Education surveyed New England colleges and universities about the professional service faculty are engaging in, and the policies and structures that support such activities. Information was obtained from 120 institutions. As seen through a wide lens, there is considerable institutional commitment to faculty professional service. A majority of respondents reported that service is both a stated part of their institutional mission and that faculty, administrators and staff supported that commitment. However, a sharper focus reveals a gap between statements and practice: only a third of the respondents were able to demonstrate …

Ngc 5291: Implications For The Formation Of Dwarf Irregular Galaxies, Benjamin K. Malphrus, Caroline E. Simpson, S. T. Gottesman, Timothy G. Hawarden

Faculty Research at Morehead State University

The possible formation and evolution of dwarf irregular galaxies from material derived from perturbed evolved galaxies is addressed via an HI study of a likely example, the peculiar system NGC 5291. This system, located in the western outskirts of the cluster Abell 3574, contains the lenticular galaxy NGC 5291 which is in close proximity to a disturbed companion and is flanked by an extensive complex of numerous knots extending roughly 4' north and 4' south of the galaxy. In an initial optical and radio study, Longmore et al. (1979, MNRAS, 188, 285) showed that these knots have the spectra of …

Volume 10, Number 02, Lana Wachniak Editor

Reaching Through Teaching

Full text of Volume 10, Number 02 of Reaching Through Teaching.

Rewarding Faculty Professional Service, Kerryann O’Meara

New England Resource Center for Higher Education Publications

Scholars of higher education have long recognized that existing reward systems and structures in academic communities do not weight faculty professional service as they do teaching and research. In the past five years, however, many colleges and universities have found innovative ways to define, document, and evaluate faculty professional service in traditional promotion and tenure systems. Other institutions have created or expanded alternate faculty reward systems, including faculty profiles in service, merit pay, and post-tenure reviews emphasizing service. Based on data from a nation-wide sample, this paper discusses innovations in rewarding faculty professional service and offers conclusions and recommendations.