Practicum (2)–A wiser use of learning objectives and learning activities

Introduction to Critical Thinking
Lecture: How Evaluate Arguments?

There are mainly two things I have learnt from this practicum. The first thing is about learning objectives. The second thing is about lecturing.

(1) Learning Objectives
What are the functions of learning objectives? And how can I make the most of them? There are at least two kinds of learning objectives: course learning objectives and lecture learning objectives. Course learning objectives are the things that students will be able to do by the end of the whole course. This kind of learning objectives is very useful. From the students’ perspective, they give them a clear idea what the course can help them achieve. From my perspective, they help me design the course. They remind me the main goal(s) of the course and help me determine the content and the assignments of the course—they should relevant to the goals of the course.

Lecture learning objectives may be tricky. It may seem too demanding to ask students to be achieve something at the end of each and every lecture, not least if such achievements have to be closely related to the course learning objectives. But I maintain that they can be useful. Lecture learning objectives could simply be some small tasks or the understanding of some fact/theory. Moreover, lecture learning objectives can help students follow the lecture. They can show the students clearly the end-goal(s) of the lecture. Lecture learning objectives can also help me design the course because they remind me to make sure that every (or almost every) lecture should be guiding students to achieve the course learning objectives, the end-goals of the course.

One side-note about learning objectives. My lecture learning objectives tend to be very similar to the outline of the lecture. Learning objectives should be more task-oriented and specific. I should pay attention in the future.

(2) Lecturing
This is somewhat related to one question I had in the last observation. Sometimes I do need to lecture: presenting facts/a theory/etc. to the students. How can I keep their attention?

Well, the first thing to consider is of course whether lecturing is really necessary. Are the materials really useful? Can they be presented in some other ways? For the sake of discussion, suppose lecturing is necessary. One thing I can do is to engage the students as quickly as possible. Start the lecturing with a question. If not, try to ask a question as soon as possible. There are two reasons. First, engaging them can help them stay focussed during the lecturing. Second, engaging them can help encourage later participation. If I start a lecture by lecturing for say 20 minutes, students may fall into a passive listening mode very quickly such that they may become less willing to participate or less active in the learning activity after 20 minutes of lecturing. Engaging them by e.g. asking question can help preventing them from getting into such passive listening mode.

I also learnt one trick from my mentor. When asking questions, try sometimes to give them one minute to think about the question—and actually enforce it. That is, make sure that there is one minute of silence where students can think. The reason is some students are fast thinkers and some are slower. If I don’t give them enough time to think, the fast thinkers may answer the questions every time, and the slow thinkers will never have a chance to think, process the information, and participate. This is something I am definitely going to try in my future lecturing.