New Faculty teaching strategies in Higher Education

Currently I am developing a peer support group for new faculty in the area of teaching at my university. This has me spending a lot of time researching best practice in the area of undergraduate teaching. There is a lot of talk about student engagement, social media integration, technology use etc. in the classroom but what do effective faculty do to engage large undergraduate classrooms?

One of the first things I have found is that good college or university faculty put as much emphasis on their teaching as seriously as they do their research. For new faculty this can be daunting as the publish or perish doom hangs ominously overhead as they work towards achieving tenure. However with the market becoming every more competitive for students as online universities become more the norm and in our neck of the woods some colleges have been given degree granting status , the first year undergraduate experience is becoming more of a concern for administration trying to secure student enrollments. This only adds to the pressure of new faculty not only to produce in the area of research but also to perform well in the classroom.

So what attributes does a new faculty member need to possess to perform well? According to What the best college teachers do by Ken Bain they should:

1. Know their discipline well, including the history of their discipline
2. Be meta-cognitive - able to reflect upon their own learning
3. Can distinguish between foundational concepts and elaboration of ideas within their own field
4. Can discern where students will be likely to face difficulties developing their comprehension
5. Are willing and able to challenge their students mental models
   

When dealing with large undergraduate classrooms in particular I have read through numerous sites and articles, this is a summary of the major points that can be beneficial:

1. Make the large classroom feel small

• Encourage contact between students and faculty
• Develop reciprocity and cooperation among students
• Walk around the classroom while lecturing, move towards students asking the questions
• Try to learn student names
• Pay attention to individual students - take the lead when a student's performance plummets or they are at risk arrange a meeting with the student or send an email expressing your concern
• Make yourself personable and approachable
• Give prompt feedback
  

2. Encourage active learning

• Encourage questions - asking questions in a large classroom is intimidating for students when a student ask a question make sure they feel respected and followed by using responses such as "I'm glad you asked that" or "That's a good question" this will encourage more questions
• Ensure your lecture expands beyond the readings, synthesize and summarize the reading but also use your lecture time to bring in supplemental materials that can spark interest and discussions. Your lecture should not simply rephrase the text or readings but should illustrate key concepts from the reading bringing in real world examples and should encourage critical thinking by your students
• Model your own thought processes and problem solving, especially in undergraduate courses it is important for students to learn how to analyze ideas, text or research within your field, the correct processes need to be modeled. It is important for them to see how academics think
  
• Students attention span for the same activity is about 20 minutes, make sure you have energy-shifts or a change in activity around every 20 minutes. Examples of energy shifts include opening the floor to questions, posing a rhetorical question and posing for answers, giving students time to summarize key points before moving on, or having students engage with peers in regard to the topic.
• Be very familiar with the lecture material so you can focus on your students while presenting the content
• Provide podcast of lectures or readings before class and use the class time to invoke discussion and debate. Students can discuss with peers beside each other and be brought back together to summarize.You want students to be challenging their mental models, give questions or scenarios that push their thinking.

3. Communicate high expectations - DO NOT however set an expectation of failure (i.e. this class is hard, most of you won't do well etc.)

Turning the table, research has demonstrated the undergraduate students perspective as well. Undergraduate students perceive the following as influential in their academic performance.

1. Qualities of the instructor

• interesting
• speaks clearly
• approachable

2. Assessment

• ongoing and prompt feedback
• disliked heavily weighted finals that were not representative of student work
• stressed by uncertainty in knowing what to expect

3. Classroom teaching

• prefer active participation especially techniques that encourage collaboration
• course material is made relevant to students and peaks interest

Ultimately teaching is an art. Like art some people have a natural talent, however, like art most principles and techniques can be learned through study and observation. Teaching is crafted over time and the best teachers work at their craft on an on-going and continual basis.