ruminators' ilk

HOW TO TEACH A DIRTY BOOK

Is there a place for Peyton Place in the college classroom?

The author is Emily Toth, who teaches English at Louisiana State University.

How to Teach a Dirty Book

I acquired this resource from inside highered.com  09.22.06

ASSESSMENT AND TESTING AS TEACHING TOOLS

Assessment can actually be one of your greatest teaching tools and a way to connect with your students, but this requires rethinking the role of assessment in your course. This newsletter presents a model of "educative assessment,"informed by the work of Wiggins (1998) and described by Fink in Creating Significant Learning Experiences(2003, p.82).This model focuses on how you can move beyond assessment for the sole purpose of assigning a grade and use it,coupled with feedback,to encourage meaningful learning.

The author is Kelly McGonigal, Ph.D.,  Psychology department, Stanford University.

Read more:

 Getting More "Teaching" out of "Testing" and "Grading"

This is a 4-page PDF file.

I acquired this link from Rick Reis, tomorrowsprofessor listserv, Standord University

WHY GOOD TEACHERS HAVE BAD CLASSES

Bad classes happen for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it is the way the course has been organized—is it coverage-centered or learning-centered? Other times it seems that the traditional teaching methods—lecture and Socratic discussions—just don’t engage students the waythey used to. Sometimes students just don’t do the reading...why is that? Much of the literature on effective teaching suggests that there are several important ways to approach the problem of a bad class: creating a sense of community and collaborative learning in the class, getting feedback about the course from your students early and throughout the term, varying your teaching methods, and bringing significant “active learning” moments into each class meeting.

Included in this article is another piece titled, "Confessions of a Bore."

Read more:

Why Good Teachers Have Bad Classes

This is a 4-page PDF file.

I acquired this resource from Stanford University, Center for Teaching and Learning