Teaching Observation 1
Interesting and informative lectures with a story (using LOs and PCK)
Teaching always provides a learning opportunity, for both the student and the instructor. And the observer. Being in a classroom in each of those roles is a very valuable experience for an aspiring teacher.
Over the last year, while attending my mentor classes as a TA for that course, I’ve always thought of his lectures as very interesting and informative with a lot of fascinating facts and data, and new ideas and perspectives of looking at things. Although the lectures were conducted in the typical instructor-centered style, they were still fun and engaging complemented with stories from instructor’s personal life and introducing current news pieces as part of the narrative. With over 100 mostly first-year students in the lecture hall, that seemed appropriate and engaging enough. Recently, I have attended another one of his lectures, for a third-year course this time, with about 80 students in the room.
The style was the same, an engaging introduction with real-life stories and facilitating contributions from the students, then the lecture continued on as a presentation of a lot of interesting material including some historical information, statistical data, case studies, recent research findings, etc. with some open-ended questions to the students along the way. Colorful and informative slides accompanied the well-planned narrative by a lecturer who is clearly very experienced and knows his subject. Halfway through the 90-minute lecture and a couple of times more towards the end, the narrative would be temporarily stalled by the instructor asking the audience of their opinion or suggestions about the specific aspects of the topic as a means of incorporating more engaging lecturing strategies (as the instructor later confirmed in a one-on-one conversation). I think the students enjoyed those activities, they also provided a chance for those interested in the material to engage in a higher-level learning process considering policy implications of the issue at hand, etc; besides, it probably helped wake some of the students who might’ve drifted off during the “lecturing” lecture part. The lecture concluded with the instructor having more to say and the students having more to learn, which would be picked in a similar lecture in a few days.
As an observer, I was reflecting on the general teaching strategies employed by the instructor and also tried to assess the students’ reaction to different teaching methods employed. I was thinking whether I would’ve liked the lecture as a student myself while at the same type considering ways of potentially improving the class if I were to teach on this topic. Thus, I found myself thinking that this is actually the type of teaching and learning I prefer (both as a student and an instructor) with some, yet limited engagement activities and a lecture focused on presenting a lot of interesting theoretical, statistical and policy points that the students are mostly not yet familiar with.
So I do consider this to be a good lecture, the one I’d enjoy attending and can see myself giving, but now the question is, “What would have made it even better?” And this builds into the larger point of “What is my take-away from the observation?” As one of my supervisors at work likes to say, one shouldn’t strive for perfection, but for improvement. Reflecting on my observations from the perspective of my basic understandings of pedagogy including the use of learning objectives (for more info read Allan 1996) and pedagogical content knowledge (Gudmundsdottir & Shulman 1987), I came up with one applicable change I would have attempted to make. The lecture didn’t have any clear learning objective neither implicit not explicit (confirmed by the instructor). While I am not trying to say there can’t be a great class without specified learning objectives (LOs), I do believe that in the cases of lectures like this one that presents a lot of factual information on a new topic having a few LOs would benefit the instructor and the students in clarifying what the main take away’s from the lecture should be.
Having started prepping for my own guest lecture and having been tasked to compile several LOs as part of an exercise, I realized that thinking about them can actually help me structure the lecture slightly differently with emphasis on some important points and potentially telling a story through the lecture, a recurring theme that runs in the background of news items and data points, a broader argument that I would like the students to understand and take away from my lecture. This is what reminded me of the article we read on the pedagogical content knowledge (Gudmundsdottir & Shulman 1987) in which the experience History teacher was talking that his history classes are about telling a story, a story of democracy or of civil rights struggle or something else. Such a story helps students make sense of the larger narrative and whereas some details, such as specific event dates or percentage points could be easily forgotten, the fundamental understanding of the recurring story remains, and it might be the general guide for students engaging further with the given topic further in an academic setting or in a private conversation, whether they talk about history, oil or the housing market.
My take away: LOs & PCK => a Lecture with a Story
(Lesson observed on October 27th, 2016)
References:
- Allan, J. (1996). Learning Outcomes in Higher Education. Studies in Higher Education, 21(1), 93-108.
- Gudmundsdottir, S., & Shulman, L. (1987). Pedagogical Content Knowledge in Social Studies. Scandinavian Journal of Educationl Research, 31(2), 59-70.