Center for Research on Learning and Teaching at the University of Michigan p. 2

the American Association of Higher Education p. 2

the Division of Educational, Instructional, and School Psychology of the International Association of Applied Psychology; p. 2

the Committee on Teaching, Research, and Publication of the American Association of University Professors p. 2

Center for Teaching Effectiveness at the University of Texas at Austin p. 2

Effective teaching demands more than the acquisition of skills. To adapt to the educational needs of a particular class at a particular time, the teacher needs to understand the underlying theory of learning and teaching so that each teacher can develop his or her own methods. Thus the “teaching tips” are supported by discussion of relevant research and theory. p. 16

Reviewers, might also have useful research p. 18

T. Binfet, Loyola Marymount University Iris Engstrand, University of San Diego Jacqueline Hansen, Murray State University Mary Heppner, University of Missouri-Columbia June Gary Hopps, University of Georgia Paula S. Krist, Florida Institute of Technology Judy Reinhartz, The University of Texas at Arlington Stewart Wood, Madonna University p. 18

Note: A great book written especially for graduate students is p. 19

Anne Curzon and Lisa Damour's First Day to Final Grade (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2000). p. 20

Robert Boice, Advice for New Faculty Members: Nihil Nimus (Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 2000). p. 24

B. G. Davis, Tools for Teaching (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1993). p. 24

S. F. Davis and W. Buskist (eds.), The Teaching of Psychology: Essays in Honor of Wilbert f. McKeachie and Charles L. Brewer (Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum, 2002). p. 24

L. Dee Fink, Creating Significant Learning Experiences (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003). p. 24

Deborah DeZure (ed.), Learning from Change: Landmarks in Teaching and Learning in Change Magazine, 1969-1999 (Sterling, VA: Stylus Publishing, 2000). p. 24

K. Eble, The Craft of Teaching, 2nd ed. (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1988). Don't think that a 1988 book must be out of date by now. This is a good book to read when you've lost your initial anxiety and want to think about teaching as a craft and a calling. p. 24

Line Fisch, The Chalk Dust Collection: Thoughts and Reflections on Teaching in Colleges and Universities (Stillwater, OK: New Forums Press, 1996). A thoughtful, often amusing collection of essays with much good sense. p. 24

A. Grasha, Teaching with Style (Pittsburgh: Alliance Publishers, 1996). p. 24

Diane F. Halpern and Milton D. Hakel (eds.), “Applying the Science of Learning to University Teaching and Beyond,” New Directions for Teaching and Learning, no. 89, March 2002. p. 24

Ray Perry and John Smart (eds.), Effective Teaching in Higher Education (New York: Agathon Press, 1997). p. 24

R. Prieto and S. A. Meyers, The Teaching Assistant Handbook p. 24

(Stillwater, OK: New Forums Press, 2001). p. 25

J. Biggs, Teaching for Quality Learning at University (Buckingham, UK, and Philadelphia: Society for Research into Higher Education and Open University Press, 1999). p. 25

Nira Hativa, Teaching for Effective Learning in Higher Education (Dordrecht: Kluwer, 2000). p. 25

Linda B. Nilson, Teaching at Its Best, 2nd ed. (Bolton, MA: Anker, 2003). p. 25

Daphne Pan, Learning to Teach, Learning to Learn (Singapore: National University of Singapore, 2001). p. 25

P. Ramsden, Learning to Teach in Higher Education (London and New York: Routledge, 1992). p. 25

In addition there are two national publications on college teaching: The National Teaching and Learning Forum and The Teaching Professor. Both have helpful articles. p. 25

A committee of college and university examiners developed two books, which are now classics, to assist faculty members in thinking about their objectives: Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, Handbook I: Cognitive Domain (Bloom, 1956) and Handbook IT. Affective Domain (Krathwohl et al., 1964). Krathwohl and others have completed a revision (Anderson et al., 2001). Another good framework is the SOLO (Structure of the Observed Learning Outcome) taxonomy (see Biggs, 1999). p. 28

Yet research on teaching suggests that the major influence on what students learn is not the teaching method but the textbook. What should you do? p. 30

Robert Diamond's Designing and Assessing Courses and Curricula: A Practical Guide (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1998) has a good chapter, “Developing a Learning-Centered Syllabus.” p. 35

Barbara Davis's book Tools for Teaching, 2nd ed. (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1993), has a fine chapter on the syllabus (pp. 14-28). p. 35

Chapter 6, “The Natural History of the Classroom,” in The College Classroom by Richard Mann, S. M. Arnold, J. Bender, S. Cytrynbaum, B. M. Newman, B. Ringwald, J. Ringwald, and R. Rosenwein (New York: Wiley, 1970), is still the best material on the changing needs of classes over the course of a semester. p. 35

Teaching Within the Rhythms of the Semester by Donna K. Duffy and Janet W. Jones (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1995) is also a perceptive and readable guide to thinking about the flow of the course over the term. p. 35

An excellent aid for preparing your syllabus is M. A. Lowther, J. S. Stark, and G. G. Martens, Preparing Course Syllabi for Improved Communication (Ann Arbor: NCRIPTAL, University of Michigan, 1989). p. 35

If you are teaching first-year students, the book Teaching College Freshmen by Bette Erickson and D. W. Strommer (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1991) will be helpful to you. p. 35

The main reason students come to class unprepared is that they don't see what difference it makes. In many courses, textbook assignments and lectures are independent parts of the course, sometimes overlapping, sometimes supplementary, but often not perceived as interdependent. Thus the first strategy for encouraging reading is frequent use of the phrase “As you read in your textbook assignment for today…” or the question “What was your reaction to [the author of the textbook]'s discussion of… ?” p. 44

A number of classic studies have compared printed materials with lectures, and the results—at least with difficult materials—favor print (Hartman, 1961). p. 44

Nevertheless, study questions do not automatically guarantee better learning. Students sometimes tended to look only for answers to the questions while disregarding the other content of the chapter (Marton & Säljö, 1976a). Andre (1987) reviewed studies of study questions and concluded that questions generally do aid learning and that higher-level questions, rather than low-level factual questions, increase the effectiveness of student processing of the reading. Similarly, Wilhite (1983) found that prequestions focusing on material at the top of the organizational structure facilitated learning, especially for the less able students. p. 45

R. G. Crowder and R. K. Wagner, The Psychology of Reading: An Introduction, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford p. 46

F. Marton, D. Hounsell, and N. Entwistle (eds.), The Experience of Learning (Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1984). p. 47

Discussion methods are among the most valuable tools in the teacher's repertoire. Often teachers in large classes feel that they must lecture because discussion is impossible. In fact, discussion techniques can be used in classes of all sizes. Generally smaller classes are more effective, but large classes should not be allowed to inhibit the teacher's ability to stimulate active learning—learning experiences in which the students are thinking about the subject matter. p. 48

Discussion techniques seem particularly appropriate when the instructor wants to do the following: 1. Help students learn to think in terms of the subject matter by giving them practice in thinking. 2. Help students learn to evaluate the logic of and evidence for their own and others' positions. 3. Give students opportunities to formulate applications of principles. 4. Develop motivation for further learning. 5. Help students articulate what they've learned. 6. Get prompt feedback on student understanding or misunderstanding. p. 48

Why should discussion be the method of choice for achieving such objectives? The first justification is a very simple extrapolation of the old adage “Practice makes perfect.” If instructors expect students to learn how to integrate, apply and think, it seems reasonable that students should have an opportunity to practice these skills. To help students learn and think, you need to find out what is in their heads. Discussion can help. p. 48

Research in cognitive psychology has found that memory is affected by how deeply we process new knowledge p. 48

Simply listening to or repeating something is likely to store it in such a way that we have difficulty finding it when p. 48

we want to remember it. If we elaborate our learning by thinking about its relationship to other things we know or by talking about it— explaining, summarizing, or questioning—we are more likely to remember it when we need to use it later. This may help relieve your anxiety about covering the material. In lectures teachers cover more material, but research shows that most of the material covered does not get into the students' notes or memory (Hartley & Davies, 1978). Classic studies over the last five decades have repeatedly shown that, in discussion, students pay attention and think more actively. Because many students are accustomed to listening passively to lectures, in introducing discussion you need to explain why and how discussion will help them construct knowledge they can find and apply when needed. p. 49

PROBLEMS IN TEACHING BY DISCUSSION In discussion groups the instructor is faced with several problems: 1. Getting participation in the discussion. 2. Making progress (or making the student aware of the progress) toward course objectives. 3. Handling emotional reactions of students. 4. Listening to the students supportively. This chapter should help you cope with each of these problems. p. 49

After a class has been meeting and discussing problems successfully, there is little problem in initiating discussion, for it will develop almost spontaneously from problems encountered in reading, from experiences, or from unresolved problems from the previous meeting. But during the first meetings of new groups, you need to create an expectation that something interesting and valuable will occur. p. 49

One of the best ways of starting a discussion is to refer to a concrete, common experience through presentation of a demonstration, film, role play, short skit, or brief reading. It could be a common experience of all students or an issue on campus or in the media, or you can provide the experience. Following such a presentation it's easy to ask, “Why did_?” p. 50

Such an opening has a number of advantages. Because everyone in the group has seen it, everyone knows something about the topic under discussion. In addition, by focusing the discussion on the presentation, the instructor takes some of the pressure off anxious or threatened students who are afraid to reveal their own opinions or feelings. p. 50

A second technique of stimulating discussion is through disagreement. Experimental evidence is accumulating to indicate that a certain degree of surprise or uncertainty arouses curiosity a basic motive for learning (Berlyne, 1960). Some teachers effectively play the role of devil's advocate; others are effective in pointing out differences in points of view. p. 50

The most common discussion opener is the question, and the most common error in questioning is not allowing students time enough to think. You should not expect an immediate response to every question. If your question is intended to stimulate thinking, give the students time to think. Five seconds of silence may seem an eternity, but a pause for 5 to 30 seconds will result in better discussion. In some cases you may plan for such a thoughtful silence by asking the students to think about the question for a few seconds and then write down one element that might help answer the question. p. 51

Factual Questions. There are times when it is appropriate to check student background knowledge with a series of brief factual questions, but more frequently you want to stimulate problem solving. One common error in phrasing questions for this purpose is to ask a question in a form conveying to students the message “I know something you don't know and you'll look stupid if you don't guess right.” p. 52

Application and Interpretation Questions. Rather than dealing with factual questions, formulate discussions so as to get at relationships, applications, or analyses of facts and materials. Solomon, Rosenberg, and Bezdek (1964) found that teachers who used interpretation questions produced gains in student comprehension. A question of the type “How does the idea that apply to __” is much more likely to stimulate discussion than the question “What is the definition of ?” The secret is not to avoid questions or to lecture in statements, but rather to listen and to reflect on what is heard. Dillon (1982), a leading researcher on questioning, advises that once you have defined the issue for discussion, keep quiet unless you are perplexed or didn't hear a comment. Questions are tools for teaching, but as Dillon demonstrated, they sometimes interfere with, as well as facilitate, achievement of teaching goals. What happens depends on the question and its use. p. 52

Problem Questions. A question may arise from a case, or it may be a hypothetical problem. It may be a problem whose solution the instructor knows; it may be a problem that the instructor has not solved. In any case it should be a problem that is meaningful to the students, and for the sake of morale, it should be a problem they can make some progress on. And even if the teacher knows an answer or has a preferred solution, the students should have a chance to come up with new solutions. The teacher's job is not to sell students on a particular solution, but rather to listen and to teach them how to solve problems themselves. Don't be afraid to express your own curiosity, question, or “what if …” wonder about a topic. Ask the p. 52

students what they think. It is better to be an open-minded, curious questioner than the font of all knowledge. p. 53

Other Types of Questions. Connective and causal effect questions involve attempts to link material or concepts that otherwise might not seem related. One might, for example, cut across disciplines to link literature, music, and historical events or one might ask, “What are the possible causes of this phenomenon?” p. 53

Comparative questions, as the name suggests, ask for comparisons between one theory and another, one author and another, one research study and another. Such questions help students determine important dimensions of comparison. p. 53

Evaluative questions ask not only for comparisons but for a judgment of the relative value of the points being compared; for example, “Which of two theories better accounts for the data? Which of two essays better contributes to an understanding of the issue?” p. 53

Critical questions examine the validity of an author's arguments or discussion. Television, magazines, and other media provide opportunities for using critical or evaluative questioning. For example, “An eminent authority states thus and so. Under what conditions might that not be true?” Being so critical that students feel that their reading has been a waste of time is not helpful, but presenting an alternative argument or conclusion may start students analyzing their reading more carefully, and eventually you want students to become critical readers who themselves challenge assumptions and conclusions. p. 53

One of the biggest problems in teaching by discussion is focus. Getting the discussion headed in the right direction and keeping it there requires that both students and the instructor be focused on the same questions. One of the better methods for producing focus is to use a problem or a case study as the main topic of discussion. The chapter “Problem-Based Learning” discusses problem-based learning and the case method in more detail, but what follows here are some general ideas about working with problem-based discussions more efficiently. p. 53

One of Maier's (1952) important contributions to effective group problem solving, as well as to teaching, is to point out that groups are likely to be more effective if they tackle one aspect of a problem at a time rather than skipping from formulation of the problem, to solutions, to evidence, to “what-have-you,” as different members of the group toss in their own ideas. In developmental discussion the group tackles one thing at a time. p. 54

One of the first tasks is likely to be a clarification of the problem. Often groups are ineffective because different participants have different ideas of what the problem is, and group members may feel frustrated at the end of the discussion because “the group never got to the real problem.” p. 54

A second task is likely to be: What do we know? or What data are relevant? p. 54

A third task may be: What are the characteristics of an acceptable solution?—for example: What is needed? p. 54

A fourth step could be: What are possible solutions? and a fifth step may be to evaluate these solutions against the criteria for a solution determined in the previous step. p. 54

The developmental discussion technique can be used even in large groups, since there are a limited number of points to be made at each step regardless of the number of participants. Maier and Maier (1957) have shown that developmental discussion techniques improve the quality of decisions compared with freer, more nondirective discussion methods. p. 54

The “classic” (and I do mean classic) discussion technique is the Socratic method. In television, novels, and anecdotes about the first year of law school it is usually portrayed as a sadistic, anxietyproducing method of eliciting student stupidity, and even when I place myself in the role of slave boy taught by Socrates in the Meno, I feel more like a pawn than an active learner. p. 54

The leading modern student of Socratic teaching is Allen Collins, who has observed a variety of Socratic dialogues and analyzed the strategies used (1977; Collins & Stevens, 1982). p. 55

Basically, most Socratic teachers attempt to teach students to reason to general principles from specific cases. Collins (1977) gives 23 rules, such as the following: p. 55

1. Ask about a known case. For example, if I were trying to teach a group of teaching assistants about student cheating, I might say, “Can you describe a situation in which cheating occurred?” p. 55

2. Ask for any factors. “Why did the cheating occur?” p. 55

3. Ask for intermediate factors. If the student suggests a factor that is not an immediate cause, ask for intermediate steps. For example, if a teaching assistant says, “Students feel a lot of pressure to get good grades,” I might say, “Why did the pressure for grades result in cheating in this situation?” p. 55

4. Ask for prior factors. If the student gives a factor that has prior factors, ask for the prior factors. For example, “Why do students feel pressure to get good grades?” p. 55

5. Form a general rule for an insufficient factor. For example, “Do all students who feel pressure cheat?” p. 55

6. Pick a counterexample for an insufficient factor. For example, “Do you think these students cheat on every test?” p. 55

7. Form a general rule for an unnecessary factor. For example, if a teaching fellow suggests that cheating occurs when tests are difficult, I might say, “Probably the pressure to cheat is greater when tests are difficult, but does cheating occur only on difficult tests?” p. 55

8. Pick a counterexample for an unnecessary factor. For example, “Is cheating likely to occur on college admissions tests, such as the SAT?” p. 55

9. Pick a case with an extreme value. For example, “Why is cheating minimized on SAT tests?” p. 55

10. Probe for necessary or sufficient factors. p. 55

11. Pose two cases and probe for differences. For example, “Why is there more cheating in large classes than in small ones?” p. 56

12. Ask for a prediction about an unknown case. p. 56

13. Trace the consequences of a general rule. For example, if the teaching assistants conclude that cheating will occur when tests are difficult and are not well proctored, I might say, “Engineering classes are considered difficult, and I understand that there is little cheating even though tests are unproctored.” (The school has an honor code.) p. 56

Barriers to Discussion: Why Students Don't Participate Student habits of passivity Failure to see the value of discussion Fear of criticism or of looking stupid p. 56

A primary barrier to discussion is the students' feeling that they p. 56

are not learning. Occasional summaries during the hour not only help students chart their progress but also help smooth out communication problems. p. 57

Keeping a visible record on the chalkboard of ideas, questions, data, or points to explore helps maintain focus and give a sense of progress. Asking students to summarize progress and what now needs to be done helps them develop as learners. p. 57

WHAT CAN I DO ABOUT NONPARTICIPANTS?6 p. 57

What keeps a student from talking? There are a variety of reasons—boredom, lack of knowledge, general habits of passivity, cultural norms—but most compelling is a fear of being embarrassed. p. 58

What can reduce this fear? Getting acquainted is one aid. Once students know that they are among friends, they can risk expressing themselves. If they know that at least one classmate supports an idea, the risk is reduced. For both these reasons the technique of subgrouping helps; for example, you can ask students to discuss a question in pairs or small groups before asking for general discussion. p. 58

One of the popular techniques for achieving student participation in groups is the buzz session. In this procedure, classes are split into small subgroups for a brief discussion of a problem. Groups can be asked to come up with one hypothesis that they see as relevant, with one application of a principle, with an example of a concept, or with a solution to a problem. In large classes I march up the aisles saying, “Odd,” “Even,” “Odd,” “Even” for each row and ask the “odd” row to turn around to talk to the “even” row behind, forming themselves into groups of four to six. I tell them to first introduce themselves to one another and then to choose a person to report for the group. Next p. 59

they are to get from each member of the group one idea about the problem or question posed. Finally they are to come up with one idea to report to the total class. I give the group a limited time to work, sometimes five minutes or less, occasionally ten minutes or more, depending on the tasks. Peer-led discussions need not be limited to five or ten minutes or even to the classroom (see the chapter “Active Learning”). p. 60

The Inner Circle or Fishbowl In using the inner circle technique I announce that at the next class meeting we are going to have a class within a class, with several of the students (6 to 15) acting as the discussion group and the others as observers. If the classroom has movable chairs, I then arrange the seating in the form of concentric circles. I am impressed that students who are normally silent will talk when they feel the increased sense of responsibility as members of the inner circle. p. 60

TEACHING STUDENTS HOW TO LEARN THROUGH DISCUSSION p. 63

First, they need to understand the importance of discussion for learning. p. 64

What skills need to be learned? One skill is clarification of what the group is trying to do—becoming sensitive to confusion about what the group is working on and asking for clarification. p. 64

A second attribute is the students' development of a willingness to talk about their own ideas openly and to listen and respond to others' ideas. p. 64

Teachers can encourage development of listening skills by asking one group member to repeat or paraphrase what another said before responding to it, and repeatedly pointing out the purpose and values students gain from discussion. p. 64

A third skill is planning. Discussions are sometimes frustrating because they are only getting under way when the end of the class period comes. p. 64

A fourth skill is building on others' ideas in such a way as to increase their motivation rather than make them feel punished or forgotten. Often students see discussion as a competitive situation in which they win by tearing down other students' ideas. As Haines and McKeachie (1967) have shown, cooperative discussion methods encourage more effective work and better morale than competitive methods. p. 64

A fifth attribute is skill in evaluation. If classes are to learn how to discuss issues effectively, they need to review periodically what aspects of their discussion are proving to be worthwhile and what barriers, gaps, or difficulties have arisen. Some classes reserve the last five minutes of the period for a review of the discussion's effectiveness. p. 64

A sixth attribute is sensitivity to feelings of other group members. Students need to become aware of the possibility that feelings of rejection, frustration, dependence, and so on may influence group members' participation in discussion. p. 64

In pioneering experiments in educational psychology and general psychology, Gruber and Weitman (1962) found that students taught in small, student-led discussion groups without a teacher not only did at least as well on a final examination as students who heard the teacher lecture, but also were superior in curiosity (as measured by question-asking behavior) and in interest in educational psychology. p. 65

TAKING MINUTES OR NOTES, SUMMARIZING One of the problems with discussion is students' feeling that they have learned less than in lectures where they have taken voluminous notes. Thus I like to summarize our progress at the end of the period or ask students to contribute to a summary. Better yet, use the last five to ten minutes for getting feedback. p. 65

Supplementary Reading C. C. Bonwell and T. E. Sutherland, “The Active Learning Continuum: Choosing Activities to Engage Students in the Classroom,” in T. E. Sutherland and C. C. Bonwell (eds.), “Using Active Learning in College Classes: A Range of Options for Faculty,” New Directions for Teaching and Learning, no. 67, October 1996, 3-16. S. D. Brookfield and S. Preskill, Discussion as a Way of Teaching: Tools and Techniques for Democratic Classrooms (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1999). A. Collins, “Different Goals of Inquiry Teaching,” Questioning Exchange, 1988,2(1), 39-45. J. T. Dillon, Teaching and the Art of Questioning (Bloomington, IN: Phi Delta Kappa Educational Foundation, 1983). B. S. Fuhrmann and A. F Grasha, A Practical Handbook for College Teachers (Boston: Little, Brown, 1983), Chapter 6. p. 66

A large number of studies have compared the effectiveness of lectures with other teaching methods. The results are discouraging for those who lecture. Discussion methods are superior to lectures in student retention of information after the end of a course; in transfer of knowledge to new situations; in development of problem solving, thinking, or attitude change; and in motivation for further learning (McKeachie et al., 1990). p. 67

Similarly, print offers advantages over lecture. Students can read faster than lecturers can lecture, and they can go back when they don't understand, skip material that is irrelevant, and review immediately or later. Lectures go at the lecturer's pace, and students who fall behind are out of luck. But don't despair; lectures can still be useful. p. 67

WHAT ARE LECTURES GOOD FOR? Presenting up-to-date information (There is typically a gap between the latest scholarship and its appearance in a textbook.) Summarizing material scattered over a variety of sources Adapting material to the background and interests of a particular group of students at a particular time and place Helping students read more effectively by providing an orientation and conceptual framework Focusing on key concepts, principles, or ideas p. 68

Lectures also have motivational values apart from their cognitive content. By helping students become aware of a problem, of conflicting points of view, or of challenges to ideas they have previously taken for granted, the lecturer can stimulate interest in further learning in an area. Moreover, the lecturer's own attitudes and enthusiasm have an important effect on student motivation. Research on student ratings of teaching as well as on student learning indicates that the enthusiasm of the lecturer is an important factor in effecting student learning and motivation. p. 68

The lecturer also models ways of approaching problems, portraying a scholar in action in ways that are difficult for other media or methods of instruction to achieve. You can say, “Here is how I go about solving this kind of problem (analyzing this phenomenon, etc.). Now you try it.” p. 69

As I noted in the preceding chapter, memory depends heavily on the learner's activity—thinking about and elaborating on new knowledge. A key difference between modern theories of memory and earlier theory is that earlier theory thought of knowledge as single associations, in some ways like tucking each bit of knowledge into a pigeonhole. Now we think of knowledge as being stored in structures such as networks with linked concepts, facts, and principles. The lecture thus needs to build a bridge between what is in the students' minds and the structures in the subject matter. Metaphors, examples, and demonstrations are the elements of the bridge. Providing a meaningful organization is thus a key function of the lecture. Our research (Naveh-Benjamin et al., 1989) showed that students begin a course with little organization but during a course develop conceptual structures that more and more closely resemble those of the instructor. p. 69

A typical lecture strives to present a systematic, concise summary of the knowledge to be covered in the day's assignment. Chang, Crombag, van der Drift, and Moonen (1983, p. 21) call this approach “conclusion oriented.” While there are times when this is useful, more often you need to teach students how to read and understand the assignments themselves. Your job is less knowledge dispensing than teaching students how to learn and think. p. 69

I was a conclusion-oriented lecturer for 30 years. Now more of my lectures involve analyzing materials, formulating problems, developing hypotheses, bringing evidence to bear, criticizing and evaluating alternative solutions—revealing methods of learning and thinking and involving students in the process. p. 69

One of the implications of the theoretical approach I have taken is that what is an ideal approach to lecturing early in a course is likely to be inappropriate later in the course. As noted earlier, the way students process verbal material depends on the structures that not only enable them to process bigger and bigger chunks of subject matter but also give them tacit knowledge of the methods, procedures, and conventions used in the field and by you as a lecturer. Intentionally or not, you are teaching students how to become more skilled in learning from your lectures. p. 70

In thinking about lecture organization, most teachers think first about the structure of the subject matter, then try to organize the content in some logical fashion, such as building from specifics to generalization or deriving specific implications from general principles. Too often we get so immersed in “covering” the subject that we forget to ask, “What do I really want students to remember from this lecture next week, next year?” p. 72

Some common organizing principles used by lecturers are cause to effect; time sequence (for example, stories); parallel organization such as phenomenon to theory to evidence; problem to solution; pro versus con to resolution; familiar to unfamiliar; and concept to application.10 p. 72

Leith (1977) has suggested that different subjects are basically different in the ways in which progress is made in the field. Some subjects are organized in a linear or hierarchical fashion in which one concept builds on a preceding one. The logical structure of one's subject should be one factor determining the lecture organization, but equally important is the cognitive structure in the students' minds. If we are to teach our students effectively, we need to bridge the gap between the structure in the subject matter and structures in the students' minds. As is indicated in all of the chapters in this book, you are not making impressions on a blank slate. Rather our task in teaching is to help students reorganize existing cognitive structures or to add new dimensions or new features to existing structures. Thus the organization of the lecture needs to take account of the student's existing knowledge and expectations as well as the structure of the subject matter. Analogies linking new ideas to similar ones that students already know can help. Remember that what you are trying to do is get an organization into your students' heads that will help them fit in relevant facts and form a base for further learning and thinking. p. 72

One suggestion for organization is that the introduction of the lecture should point to a gap in the student's existing cognitive structure or should challenge or raise a question about something in the student's existing method of organizing material in order to arouse curiosity (Berlyne, 1954a, 1954b). There is a good deal of research on the role of prequestions in directing attention to features of written texts. Prequestions in the introduction of a lecture may help students to discriminate between more and less important features of lectures. For example, before a lecture on cognitive changes in aging, I ask, “Do you get more or less intelligent as you get older?” and “What is a fair test of intelligence for older people?” Such questions may help create expectations that enable students to allocate their cognitive capacity more effectively. If students know what they are expected to learn from a lecture, they learn more of that material (sometimes at the expense of other material; Royer, 1977). p. 73

Another approach is to begin with a demonstration, example, case, or application that captures attention. In many fields it is possible to begin some lectures with presentation of a problem or case from a current newspaper or television show, then ask students how they would think about it in the light of this course, or alternatively illustrate in the lecture how experts in this field would think about it. p. 73

In organizing the body of the lecture, the most common error is probably that of trying to include too much. The enemy of learning is the teacher's need to cover the content at all costs. When I began lecturing, my mentor told me, “If you get across three or four points in a lecture so that students understand and remember them, you've done well.” Lecturers very often overload the students' information processing capacity so that they become less able to understand the material than if fewer points had been presented. David Katz (1950), a pioneer Gestalt psychologist, called this phenomenon “mental dazzle.” He suggested that, just as too much light causes our eyes to be dazzled so that we cannot see anything, so too can too many new ideas overload processing capacity so that we cannot understand anything. p. 73

Using Examples. Move from the concrete to the abstract. To link what is in your head with what is in the students' heads, you need to use examples that relate the subject to the students' experience and knowledge. p. 74

Concept formation research suggests that examples differing from one another are likely to be most effective if you point out the essential features of the concept exemplified in each example. p. 74

Periodic Summaries Within the Lecture. From our knowledge of students' note-taking behavior we know that students would be better able to learn from lectures if there were periodic summaries of preceding material. p. 74

Such summaries can help make clear to students transitions from one theme to another, so that they are aided in organizing the material not only in their notes but in their minds. p. 74

The message of this chapter is that one way of improving lectures is to think about how students process lectures. What are students trying to do during a lecture? p. 75

As one looks at students at a lecture and observes their behavior, the most impressive thing one notices is the passive role students have in most classrooms. Some students are having difficulty in staying awake; others are attempting to pass the time as easily as possible by reading other materials, counting lecturer mannerisms, or simply doodling and listening in a relatively effortless manner. Most students are taking notes. Ideally, many students are attempting to construct knowledge by linking what the lecturer says with what they p. 75

already know. p. 76

Attention One of the factors determining students' success in information processing is their ability to attend to the lecture. Attention basically involves focusing one's cognitions on those things that are changing, novel, or motivating. Individuals have a limited capacity for attending to the varied features of their environment. The individual's total capacity for attention may vary with the degree of activation or motivation. At any one time, part of the capacity may be devoted to the task at hand (in this case listening to the lecturer), part may be involved in taking notes, and part may be left over to shift primary attention to distractions or daydreams when boredom occurs. Hartley and Cameron's (1967) review of the research on attention of students during lectures reports that attention typically increases from the beginning of the lecture to ten minutes into the lecture, decreases after that point, and picks up toward the end. p. 76

HOW DO STUDENTS PROCESS THE CONTENT OF A LECTURE? p. 77

Marton and Säljö (1976a, 1976b) and other researchers at the University of Goteborg have described differences in the way students go about trying to learn educational materials. Some students process the material as little as possible, simply taking as many verbatim notes as they can. This would be described by Marton as a “surface approach.” Other students try to see implications of what the lecturer is saying, relate what is currently being said to other information either in the lecture or in their own experience and reading, and try to understand what the author intended. They elaborate and translate the instructor's words into their own. They may question. This more thoughtful and more active kind of listening is what Marton and Säljö refer to as “deep processing.” p. 78

Experienced students can probably vary their strategies from verbatim memory to memory of concepts, depending on the demands of the situation. Generally, deep processing better enables students to remember and use knowledge for thinking and further learning. Pointing out relationships, asking rhetorical questions, or asking questions to be answered by class members are ways of encouraging deeper processing. You can also ask for examples of how students apply concepts to their own experiences, thus encouraging all students to realize that it is important to try to think about how concepts relate to oneself. p. 78

SHOULD STUDENTS TAKE NOTES? p. 78

Note taking is one of the activities by which students attempt to stay attentive, but note taking is also an aid to memory. Working memory, or short-term memory, is a term used to describe the fact that one can hold only a given amount of material in mind at one time. When the lecturer presents a succession of new concepts, students' faces begin to show signs of anguish and frustration; some write furiously in their notebooks, while others stop writing in complete discouragement. Note taking thus is dependent on one's ability to maintain attention, understand what is being said, and hold it in working memory long enough to write it down. Studies of student notes show, not surprisingly, that students fail to get most of the lecture content into their notes, and some of the notes are wrong. However, research supports two values of note taking. One is that the notes provide an external memory which can be reviewed later; the other is that note taking involves elaboration and transformation of ideas, which aids memory (Hartley & Davies, 1978; Peper & Mayer, 1978). But note taking has costs as well as benefits. Student notetaking strategies differ. Some students take copious notes; others take none. We know that cognitive capacity is limited; that is, people can take in, understand, and store only so much information in any p. 78

brief period of time. Information will be processed more effectively if the student is actively engaged in note taking—analyzing and processing the information rather than passively soaking it up—but taking notes takes capacity that may be needed for comprehension if material is difficult. Thus, encourage students to take fewer notes and to listen carefully when you are introducing new, difficult material. They can then fill in their notes after class. p. 79

Students' ability to process information depends on the degree to which the information can be integrated or “chunked.” No one has great ability at handling large numbers of unrelated items in active memory. Thus when students are in an area of new concepts or when the instructor is using language that is not entirely familiar to the students, students may be processing the lecture word by word or phrase by phrase and lose the sense of a sentence or of a paragraph before the end of the thought is reached. This means that lecturers need to be aware of instances in which new words or concepts are being introduced and to build in greater redundancy, as well as pauses during which students can catch up and get appropriate notes. p. 79

Snow and Peterson (1980) point out that brighter students benefit more from taking notes than less able students. For students with less background knowledge, note taking takes capacity needed for listening and comprehending, so they simply miss much of what is being said. This is not simply a matter of intelligence; rather, a student's ability to maintain materials in memory while taking notes and even to process and think about relationships between one idea and other ideas depends on the knowledge or cognitive structures the student has available for organizing and relating the material. p. 79

Hartley's research, as well as that of Annis (1981) and Kiewra (1989), suggests that a skeletal outline is helpful to students, but that with detailed notes students relax into passivity. It is better simply to provide an overall framework, which they can fill in by selecting important points and interpreting them in their own words. Because student capacity for information processing is limited and because students stop and go over a confusing part of a lecture again, you need to build more redundancy into your lectures than into writing, and you need to build in pauses where students can catch up and think rather than simply struggle to keep up. One can train students to write better notes by collecting student notes, evaluating the degree to which they summarize, translate, and show relationships as opposed to simply representing more or less verbatim accounts, and reporting back to the class suggestions for improvement. p. 79

HOW TO GET STUDENTS ACTIVELY THINKING IN A LECTURE SITUATION p. 80

As we have seen, a major problem with the lecture is that students assume a passive, nonthinking, information receiving role. Yet, if they are to remember and use the information, they need to be actively engaged in thinking about the content presented. One easy and effective device is the “minute paper” (Wilson, 1986). The minute paper is, as its title indicates, a paper literally written in a minute (or it can be a two-minute or three-minute paper).12 Announce at the beginning of the class period that you will interrupt your lecture midway through the period so that the students may write a oneminute paper on a topic derived from the lecture or that you will ask them at the end of the lecture to write the most important thing they have learned. Even better, you can ask them also to write the most important thing they learned from the previous week's lecture. p. 80

The most comprehensive book on lecturing is Donald Bligh's What's the Use of Lectures? (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2000). A very practical guide for lecturers is George Brown's classic paperback, Lecturing and Explaining (London: Methuen, 1978). Barbara Davis's Tools for Teaching, 2nd ed. (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1993), gives practical tips on preparing, delivering, and personalizing lecture classes. Jerry Evensky's chapter “The Lecture,” in L. Lambert, S. L. Tice, and P. Featherstone (eds.), University Teaching (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1996), is excellent. I like his statement “You should not think of the lecture as the passive period to be relieved by 'Now we're going to do active learning.'” The paper by James Hartley and A. Cameron, “Some Observations on the Efficiency of Lecturing,” in Educational Review, 1967, 20(1), 30-37, is a classic. p. 81