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.

Instructional Design Intelligence

I am a huge fan of Barrie Bennett from OISE at the University of Toronto. His book Beyond Monet: The Artful Science of Instructional Integration should be a mandatory read for any teacher. He specializes in instructional design intelligence, which got me to thinking is there such a thing as Instructional Design Intelligence?

I attended a conference a year ago and I overheard one of the biggest e-learning keynote speakers that is on the circuit today criticize David Merrill to a group of colleagues. He believed his work was outdated and no longer relevant. To say the least I was appalled. Yet it has gotten me thinking ever since about the relationship of Instructional Design, ID Models, PLN and SoMe and trying to understand how everything fits together in this day and age.

Much has been written about moral intelligence, multiple intelligence, learning theories from behaviourist to constructivist and everything in between, now combine all the theories of learning with all the 21^st century technology, it simply makes it hard for instructional designers to keep one step in front of the learners.

This all leads me to the question is there such a thing as Instructional Design Intelligence. Instructional Intelligence is described as “the conscious interweaving of assessment and evaluation, knowledge of the learner, a broad teaching repertoire based on solid research, knowledge of content and the nature of the teacher. When combined, these from powerful tools for teaching and learning. “ If I were to use this definition as a model, how could I then define Instructional Design Intelligence.

Well I took a stab at it, here is my draft definition:

Instructional Design Intelligence – the conscious alignment and integration of learning theory, instructional strategies and assessment practices with the consideration of the nature of the content and the knowledge and skills of the both learner and the teacher.

I ponder whether the definition needs to incorporate digital literacy, personal learning networks, and social media, however at this point I argue not as I believe what is important in the definition is the pedagogy not the technology. Thinking further still does an instructional designer not need to have instructional intelligence to have design intelligence? If this is true then instructional design intelligence also requires assessment intelligence and learning intelligence. Is the definition then a combination of different intelligences much like Gartner’s multiple intelligences?

It is an interesting discussion because as I have found it difficult to articulate to others the nature of our work. What does design instruction mean, are not all educators by nature designers? Can we even define Instructional Design Intelligence in one paragraph?

I still have no clear answer only more questions.

The Direction of Instructional Design

I read the Article Do You Need an Instructional Design Degree and was a little dismayed that the sentiment from many including the author was no. I believe the demand is growing for instructional designers, what I think is driving this sentiment, is that instructional design has moved from a career path most commonly found in the educational sector and moved into the corporate world.

While the academic world is slower to adjust to expansion into online learning, corporation and for-profit educational institutes are not (Bates, 2011). These organizations work on business models and are trying to generate profit. The entire notion of rapid e-learning is driven from the business world, time is money. Cheap and fast is what corporate America wants.

I have been in the field for nearly 15 years now and what I have found over time is that corporations don't want instructional designers, they want Flash developers and people with skills with Captivate and Presenter, who can rapidly dump content into programs like Captivate and get a course developed. Unfortunately the job postings for these positions are called Instructional Designers or ELearning Specialists, which in all actuality they are not.

Bates, in his article 2011 Outlook for Online ELearning and Distance Education lists, as one of the barriers to distance education, poor quality offerings. With the advent of great tools for easy media development, the quality of most online learning is still poor, but it is convenient so people will continue to access these types of learning opportunities. Flooding the market with individuals that lack prerequisite knowledge of learning theory, instructional strategies, assessment techniques, principles of multimedia design, cognitive load theory and adult learning theory to design these courses is not helping the situation. Simply because someone can use the tools does not mean that they can design learning experiences that allow for the building of new knowledge by the learner. The technology is being placed before the pedagogy.

I think a better model to adopt is to have a design team, which includes an instructional designer, PLUS media developers at a minimum. At the end of the day instructional designers are not Flash experts, videographers, or Captivate gurus (although some may have the skills), and likewise those techosavvy masters are not Instructional Designers, so don't try to combine the two into one. It is doing the field of online education no good. Instead build a team, it can be a team of two, a designer and a media developer and then marvel at what they can build.

Moving Learning Design Forward

I constantly read about new design ideas, new technologies and the implementation of social media into education. However, at least in part of the world, I rarely find more than text based online courses, that primarily point to course readings with discussion forums time and time again at a post-secondary level.

Working in this world I find faculty very reluctant to move outside of their comfort zone and explore new approaches to learning. Even though we can reassure faculty that their time commitment does not need to be extensive I find that the advances in technology themselves are overwhelming for most.

What are the BIG ideas in e-learning we need to get faculty to embrace?

1, I think we need to have them view technology as not a different way to teach but a way to
teach learners in a manner that could not otherwise by reached in the classroom. What can e-learning provide that classroom instruction cannot? Often as instructional designers I don't think we present e-learning in this manner to instructors.

2. Teaching in the classroom is different than teaching online. Not all good classroom strategies work well online.

3. Multimodal learning. One of the greatest selling features of e-learning is that we can present the same content using different learning paths.

4. When planning instruction consider:

• How will the students interact with other students
• How will the students interact with the instructor
• How will the students interact with the content

5. In e-learning there needs to be a movement for passive learning to active learning. Student engagement is important to e-learning success.

Multimedia Here I Come

I work at a small rural college, that given its size and location it is surprising that learning technology has been so widely embraced. We use Moodle as our LMS and while come fall offer over 100 courses fully online.

I have been fortunate enough that the people at the top of this college want to move forward. Finding instructional designers that are willing to come to a small Northern community is tough, I just happened to be married to a local guy. I think however my decision to leave K-12 and come to the college was perfect timing.

It was almost serendipity but it looks like multimedia development which is my passion will now be my future. I volunteered to develop a corporate training course on diversity. Our executive initially wanted to explore Second Life, which given the target audience I did not believe was the best approach. They were looking to be more forward in the design but really did not know what was available. What they really wanted was a somewhat immersive and interactive environment.

I have been lucky enough to suggest and lead the way on what we should get for software, how to outsource development such as animations and 3-D modeling, and the work on the design of a Flash interface to drive our product development. We are a small college and I know it sounds like a lot of money, but really it is not. We are purchasing programsthat allow for animation development without a programming background. We are looking for ways to play with the big boys without the big boy dollars.

I am just feeling happy today that my career move is taking me in this new direction.... maybe when I am well into it with a zillion deadlines I might feel otherwise!

I have reached a decision

I have decided it is time for action. I am currently seeking out ideas, suggestions and support for the formation of a new association - the Canadian Association of Distance Graduate Students.

So having said that here is my proposed Mission Statement:

Mission Statement

" The promote the involvement of distance graduate students in the graduate experience by working with universities and associations to advocate for authentic experiences, opportunities and awards targeted specifically at distance graduate students."

Vision

1. To provide distance graduate students equal opportunities for research and teaching assistantships.
2. To provide access for distance students to virtually attend workshops and presentations provided by their faculty or GSA.
3. To lobby and campaign for scholarships, bursaries and endowments that can equally accessed by distance students.
4. To advocate for fair and reasonable tuition fees.

Please pass this along to those you know

I can be reached via e-mail at dgfeledi@ucalgary.ca

Thanks for your assistance!

Are there inquities imposed upon distance graduate students?

I am working on my fourth University degree. Three of which have been online including the doctorate that I am currently working on (which includes two summer residencies). My primary reason for doing three out of my four degrees online, money, plain and simple. With three teenagers, a mortgage, a vehicle payment, and living three hours away from the nearest city, how could I afford to quit my job, move away from my family and go back to school? So online learning has worked really well for me and allowed me the opportunity to pursue course work I would not have otherwise been able to do, while still working and raising a family. I am exceedingly grateful for that. But if I had the chance I would do it face to face for the invaluable experience of being on campus immersed in the world of academia.

The other day I was informed I had received an award, I was ecstatic! My first every in 8 years as a distance student. I was surprised and honored. So I looked at other opportunities for awards, I had kind of looked casually before but I took a thorough look this time. To my disappointment few awards, scholarships, bursaries etc. are available to working distance graduate students. The reason we make too much money, regardless of our bills, our families, our obligations we pull a pay cheque, so we are ineligible for most awards.

Lets look at the reality, as a distance student in general I pay an enormously huge amount of money compared to on campus graduate students for the same degree, at least that seems to be the case at most Canadian Universities. However, I am denied many of the opportunities of the on campus graduate students. It is not from lack of willingness. I am willing to take on responsibilties above my course work and my day job. I am willing to teach undergraduate courses, many are online so it is feasible to do. I am willing to assist professors with their research, conducting surveys, interviews, crunching numbers etc. on my own time through vacation days etc. Why, because I believe the doctoral journey is important, and these experiences are part of that journey. However, this is all reserved for the on campus graduate students, they need the money and are given these opportunites. I don't begrudge the on campus student, I am just seeking equal treatment.

It seems to me that the Universities are more than willing to take our money but not more than willing to treat us like other graduate students. No scholarships, no teaching or research assistantships, no dropping in on the noon hour sessions, guest presentations, graduate student workshops etc. This is not specific to my faculty, it is evident at all levels within the University I attend. For example my Graduate Student Association (which I pay fees to) is willing to take my money but offer no services to the distance student. It would be easy to include the distance student, presentations and workshops can be webcasted or Elluminated. I inquired about this and my GSA said they had not even heard of Elluminate but I was told they would look into for the future maybe. So are we some how lesser students, is our work, our willingness to learn, to participate in the University experience less important?

Plain and simple I just want to be treated equally. The biggest inequity I have found all to late is this:

I applied as an distance student because I could not meet the on campus residency requirements as outlined by the University, only to discover that a LOT of the on campus students do not either, at both Universities I have attended in my course of graduate studies. They work and live some of them in different provinces, never have had to be on residence, pay less for courses, have to take less courses and are eligible for all the doctoral awards. How does that work???? How is that fair? If I had known this I would have applied as an on campus student and kept working and living where I am at now, for a lot less money and a lot more benefits.

I simply want fairness and equality, as a working doctoral student between course work and my job sometimes I am grinding away for sometimes up to 18 hours a day. It is not an easier ride, I am required to do the same candidacy exam and defense as the on campus students . I take the same research and social theory courses PLUS a requirement for 5 other courses the on campus students are not required to take. I can understand the rationale if the on campus graduate students were actually meeting residency requirements, but if they are not, how is this fair?

I wonder if this has only been my experience or if others have had similar experiences. This is my second graduate degree, my masters was done at a different University, but my experience there was the same. I would love to hear from the other side of the debate as obviously I can only perceive this from own experience and do not necessarily understand all the rationale. So if you can enlighten me please do!

I don't know maybe there is a doctoral thesis in all of this! LOL!