A minute of feedback to feed forward

Guest Blogger: Bill Donohue

“One thing I learned today was identifying the main idea, supporting details, and topics of a passage.” 

“Don’t enjoy Pump Handle too much because you can get suspended and miss class… Also watch after everyone.”

The two quotes come from the “minute papers” that I have asked my ENG 099 students to write at the end of a class. According to Angelo and Cross, “this versatile technique—also known as the One-Minute Paper and the Half-Sheet Response—provides a quick and extremely simple way to collect written feedback about student learning” (p. 148). I use the formative, classroom assessment technique to gauge the student learning and provide direction for what I need to adjust as we strive to meet our student learning outcomes. I usually ask student about the most important thing they learned in class and/or any questions they have.

This year, the majority of the students have been able to provide an answer that matched my main goal for that lesson. Some students have focused on aspects of the current class that reviewed the main goal from a prior lesson—a message to me to make sure I keep reviewing prior information in class as we build on those concepts and learn new ones. I can address questions during the next class period, email students directly if they provided their name, and provide supplemental information on Moodle that addresses questions and further illuminates course content.

And occasionally, I am reminded of the greater impact we have on our student’s lives. In one class period, as we discussed assignment due dates that coincided with Pump Handle, I slipped into “Dad” mode, laid out scenarios that have affected previous students, and pleaded with students to be both respectful to each other and have each other’s back. More than one student let me know that message was the most important from that day’s class.

Have you used minute papers or similar classroom assessments? How have they been useful for you or how do you think they may be useful for your courses?

What is Lincoln Excellence in Teaching and Learning?

I find myself throwing around terms like “advancing the legacy” and “Lincoln Excellence” every now and then, especially when I’m trying to convince funding agencies that we are deserving of their attention. The word excellence is even part of the title of the office that I serve; The Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning.

I feel like I have a good grasp on what legacy means; it is the mark that Lincoln has made on the country and world through all its graduates. If we aim to advance the legacy, we simply (or not so simply) keep graduating students that succeed in their disciplines and intentionally work for positive change in their communities and in the world. This can be quantified and measured by the success of our alumni.

Lincoln excellence on the other hand – what is it? Excellence is “the quality of being outstanding or very good” according to Merriam Webster. Are we outstanding in our teaching practices? How do we know? What do we do to be outstanding? Part of me is convinced that we practice excellence in many things that we do in the classroom and beyond. The indirect measure of our excellence is the success of our students past Lincoln. But how can we measure excellence directly? What does excellence in the classroom look like? Is it our ability to engage students and help them learn? How do we know that what we individually consider excellence translates into learning that makes a difference for our students? Does your excellence look similar to my excellence? Are we aiming to educate students that show performance excellence or mastery excellence - the former being the ability to perform well on exams, while the latter includes the ability to use learned material to succeed in life.  Is excellence in a Visual Arts class the same as excellence in a Health Science or Math class? I am intrigued by Lincoln Excellence because I know that we produce outstanding graduates who go on to successfully pursue careers in government, the arts, music, accounting, law, science, medicine etcetera, but if somebody asked me for the recipe for how exactly we do this – and do it well – I would not be able to tell them. Can you?

I would love to read your thoughts on Lincoln Excellence in the classroom and beyond.

How do you practice excellence in your classroom?

Share your thoughts here or in this quick survey: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/PJRY9HW

I will share any survey results in a future blog.

Putting the S in the SLO

A recent thread on a faculty development listserv I belong to has been focusing on how to maximize the learning potential in those SLOs we all dutifully write, discuss the first day of class, and then often don’t think much about again until the end of the semester. Some discussion has centered on how to make SLOs more meaningful to students.  The following, quoted with permission, is from Mary Goldschmidt, Faculty Development Specialist at the University of Scranton:

“Inviting my students to set their own goals as a formal part of the course is something I’ve been doing for 5 years now – in composition courses as well as gen ed courses in literature (not something students are usually too keen to take). It’s a practice strongly supported by the scholarship on self-regulated learning and goal orientation.…To illustrate what these look like, here are a few of my students’ self-defined learning outcomes (paraphrased):

• an electrical engineering major said that he wants to become better at listening to the perspectives of his other small group members because he knows that professionally, he will always be working in teams.
• an occupational therapy major said that she wants to increase her ability to pay attention to detail when reading literature because she can see a parallel between this kind of reading and “reading” her clients, e.g., noticing what’s not always explicit.
• an economics major explained that his father loves poetry and he simply wants to be able to talk more with his Dad about poetry."

Goldsmith goes on to point out that it’s not enough just to do this once on the first day of class; student engagement has to be sustained.  “Twice later in the semester, I ask students to write reflections on the actions they’re taking to work toward their goals, the progress they’re making, and what new or different things they might do to better achieve their goals. I also ask them how I can best support them in their learning.  Students are significantly more engaged in the course when they have their own intrinsic motivation for doing well – beyond just wanting a good grade.”

Have you tried anything similar with your students?  How has it worked?

Do you speak SoTL?

I'm writing this in the air over Savannah, on my way back from a great SoTL conference.  For those who don't know, SoTL stands for "Scholarship of Teaching and Learning" (the title of this blog is the motto on  the conference t-shirts) and is a great organization to explore. 

After two days of 9 - 5 conference sessions I have amassed lots to think about and hopefully share with you in future blogs.  While all that new info is being digested, though, I will just share a list one of the speakers presented to answer the question, "Why SoTL?"

1. SoTL fosters student learning:  Teachers who ask "What works?" are more likely to be using activities that do. 
2. SoTL bridges the gap between teaching and research: It's a false dichotomy to separate teaching and research.
3. SoTL benefits SoTL-active faculty, helps them fight classroom inertia and invites them to change and improve their teaching:  It helps teachers grow, change, be more interested, stop being complacent.
4. SoTL benefits other students and faculty:  Teachers can share the findings across disciplines, breaking down some of the silos.
5. SoTL benefits the institution:  It helps to generate visible analyses of student learning--assessment at course and program level, models of practice for local colleagues, high-quality evidence for internal/external assessment and accessible examples of quality education for prospective students.
6. SoTL is a model of faculty development:  It provides a space for dialogue about practices that contribute to advancing knowledge
7. SoTL increases faculty credentials for professional rewards such as tenure and promotion.
8. SoTL lets us follow our passion:  It helps us learn from our students and learn who our students are, what it is that we are doing, and how we can do it even better.

SoTL starts with a question: Is there any teaching/learning-related question that has been nagging at you that you might begin to explore, either individually or collaboratively?

What Makes a Group Project Work?

Most of us involve our students in group projects at some point, knowing that such projects promote active learning, student motivation, and enhanced retention.  The Galileo Educational Network has developed a comprehensive rubric teachers can use to evaluate group projects.  The rubric contains specific descriptors for each of the following eight general components:

• Authenticity
• Academic Rigor
• Assessment
• Beyond the School
• Use of Digital Technologies
• Active Exploration
• Connecting with Experts
• Elaborated Communication

As I read through the article describing this rubric, I was struck by how useful these eight categories can be for evaluating any class project, individual or group, reminding us of the how and the who and the why and the where questions we should be asking as we design learning activities.

Do you have a favorite group project that incorporates all eight components?  What does it look like? Or would you argue that not all of the eight are necessary?  What’s your assessment of this project assessment tool?