Everyone who teaches wants engaged students. But how do we do this? There are so many buzz words out there about flipped classrooms, active learning, and grit. The research literature examining effective teaching practices has grown, yet it is largely inaccessible. Over 700 different journals address college teaching in various forms. How can instructors wade through this to find the most effective strategies. In today’s post, I will share a few helpful formulas and strategies to create intentionally designed activities to engage students.
Across different disciplines, there are a multitude of instructional approaches from lecturing to discussion to peer teaching. No matter which approach is used, students learn best when they are engaged with the course content.
Engagement doesn’t happen by accident. It requires intentionally designing class to foster learning.
I recommend instructors ask these three questions before every class session.
1. What are you trying to accomplish?
2. How will you accomplish it?
3. How will you know when you are effective?
Yes, these are simple questions, but taking a step back and asking these before class can transform your thinking about teaching.
I believe and the research supports that actively engaging students can improve their learning. Whether you primarily teach through lectures in large classes or small graduate seminars, well designed activities can improve your students’ learning.
When planning an activity, there are three elements to consider:
1) Guiding principles
Guiding principles includes thinking about your students and their relationship to the course content. For example, if your students are novices and you are first introducing a concept to them, then lecture based activities may prove helpful. If you are asking students to critically examine a concept, discussion activities may help. Ask yourself about what the students know before coming into class (prior knowledge), what preparation they may have done to get ready for class, and what your learning objectives are for the course and class session.
In addition, consider the research and learning theories that might be helpful for your students. Are you trying to leverage the benefits of experiential learning? Do you want to use an activity that the research suggests is helpful for your particular content or problem. The research can prove enormously helpful in suggesting the advantage or disadvantage of various teaching approaches.
2) Preparation
Different activities require varying levels of preparation. Some necessitate extensive background work while others can be used at a moment’s notice. Thinking through what you need to do to prepare for an activity will go a long way towards making it a success.
3) Process
How will the activity go? What is first? Second? And so on? How much time will it take? Thinking through the activity’s process can help you successfully manage the activity in class.
Teaching for Learning
For those of you who have been reading Higher Ed Professor for a while, you will recognize many of these elements as central to my recent book, Teaching for Learning: 101 Intentionally Designed Educational Activities to Put Students on the Path to Success.
Each of the activities in the book follow the basic formula that I’ve outlined here to create intentionally designed educational activities to engage students. Only we did the hard work for you!
As a special thank you and to celebrate the New Year, we are offering a special opportunity related to the book. We will be giving away 5 copies of Teaching for Learning. The only thing we ask in return is you give an unbiased review of the book on Amazon. To enter the drawing, tweet using the hashtag #teachingforlearning or send an email to higheredprofessor@gmail.com by Friday January 15th.
If you already have a copy of the book, thank you, thank you! I’d be so grateful if you would post a review on Amazon as well. This will help us get the material into as many hands as possible. We’ve heard from many people who have found the book helpful and I think anyone who teaches will find it a great resource.
Thank you for helping us spread the word!
