Delivering the Material Effectively

Students indicated that their wellbeing was supported when they were learning the course material effectively.  Students expressed their frustration when teaching was perceived as ineffective: “They know a lot of stuff but a lot of profs that I have had, they cannot like teach well at all. So like knowing something very well and teaching it to other people are like two different things to me” (Arts Student)If a student is unable to learn effectively in class, they “don’t feel like [they] retained anything, and so if a midterm or final comes along, it’s a lot more me prepping myself” (Arts Student).

In addition to enhancing student motivation to learn, active teaching practices also help students learn the course material effectively. Instructors can enhance teaching effectiveness by incorporating a variety of teaching practices such as doing demonstrations, showing videos, balancing active and passive teaching practices, using multiple examples, and connecting students to extra resources when appropriate. Participants indicated that effective teachers are able to explain concepts in different ways. As Student 20 puts it, if one explanation “didn’t work the first time so second time it’s probably not going to work either.” Finding alternative ways to explain one concept may help students understand the material better.

Participants also indicated that lecture outlines, lecture recaps and review sessions help them organize and solidify their learning. Lecture outlines help students see how different topics fit together, which makes learning easier and helps students to organize their notes. Lecture recaps help students retain the information by reiterating concepts at the end of the lecture and helping students identify gaps in their knowledge. One Arts student finds recapping “important because maybe you missed something or you didn’t understand something so in a recap of that class you get a brief description of what happened [so] you may understand better. Or because of that recap you then could have a question to ask the prof”. Review sessions seem to fulfill a similar function to lecture recaps, but on a larger scale.

Students in this project shared that teaching practices that are most effective for first-year students may not be the most effective for upper year students. First-year students may feel overwhelmed by the pace of learning and may need additional supports built into the courses. For example, first-year students may benefit from having tutorial sections, but “by the time you’re in fourth or fifth year, I feel like if you want smaller classes you are looking for seminars” (Arts student). Another Arts student described having first-year instructors who “would do like mini workshops for like whenever they introduced certain assignments they’d be like hey this is like roughly how you write an essay… things were more laid out in first year”. Students also recognized the importance that “as [they] continue university there [should be] less spoon feeding.”

Several instructors indicated that undergraduates are still learning how to learn, and that they can provide additional support during this stage of students’ lives. Instructor 11 (Science) lets students know that they are “still learning how to learn and I view my role as helping them do that” while Instructor 9 (Arts) “make[s] it very clear that I think they are all very smart. They all deserve to be here. They can all succeed.”

Here is a list of teaching strategies that students shared in this project as ones that supported their learning through effective delivery of course content:

  • Using active teaching methods
  • Using simple language
  • Using clear examples
  • Explaining things in multiple ways
  • Conveying the material in a clear logical manner
  • Providing lecture outlines
  • Providing learning objectives
  • Recapping at the end of lecture
  • Moving at a pace that is appropriate to the student

Do you have other ways of helping students understand a difficult concept? We would love to hear from you!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Spam prevention powered by Akismet